1 year ago
103 Like me, my eggs were flying system class, writes Anna Louie Sussman. My canine Stewie and I were successful spot 8D, portion 12 of my cryopreserved oocytes, 4 straws of 3 eggs each, had a model spot further back. They were ensconced successful a cryogenic retention flask packed into a metallic suitcase adjacent to Paolo, the courier overseeing their transition from a fertility session successful Bologna, Italy, to the session successful Madrid, Spain, wherever I would beryllium undergoing successful vitro fertilization (IVF) successful respective weeks’ time.
The shipping of gametes and embryos astir the satellite is simply a increasing portion of a booming planetary fertility sector. As radical person children aboriginal successful life, the request for fertility attraction increases each year. The quality to determination eggs, sperm, and embryos crossed borders allows tens of thousands of patients to entree this aesculapian attraction if it’s unavailable successful their ain state due to the fact that of ineligible restrictions oregon prohibitive pricing.
In my case, I had frozen eggs successful Bologna successful 2016, and again successful Madrid 2 years later, due to the fact that it would person taken maine respective much years to prevention up for a rhythm successful New York.
After paying for retention costs for six and 4 years, respectively, astatine 40 I was acceptable to effort to get pregnant. Transporting the Bolognese batch served to virtually enactment each my eggs successful 1 basket. Read the afloat story.
Read more:
- How Silicon Valley hatched a program to crook humor into quality eggs. A well-connected startup institution is trying to rewrite the rules of reproduction. Read the afloat story.
- Trans men’s eggs person been matured successful the lab—and could assistance them person children. A caller method means eggs tin beryllium grown from the ovaries of transgender men, adjacent aft years of testosterone therapy. Read the afloat story.
- Inside the contention to marque quality enactment cells successful the lab. Scientists mightiness soon beryllium capable to make eggs and sperm from tegument and humor cells. What volition that mean? Read the afloat story.
Roblox’s avatars are astir to get much expressive
The news: Roblox users volition soon beryllium capable to springiness their avatars facial expressions that mimic the player’s own, the level announced astatine its yearly Roblox Developer Conference past week. The update would mean users could smile, wink, oregon scrunch their forehead, and their avatar would mimic them successful existent time. Eyes could scan, heads could shake, and eyebrows and ears could wiggle with the aforesaid results.
Why it matters: The online crippled level allows visitors to either play games oregon make them, attracting 52.2 cardinal users each day. The rich, varied virtual worlds created connected the tract person been considered a precursor to what we mightiness spot and acquisition successful the metaverse, with opportunities for transportation with different radical and personalized avatars that players tin usage crossed games.
What’s next: Soon, Roblox says, users volition beryllium capable to talk straight with different avatars arsenic successful different multiplayer video games. In short, the changes mightiness blend our real-world quality acquisition with that of the metaverse and marque avatars much similar ourselves—for amended oregon worse. Read the afloat story.
—Tanya Basu
The must-reads
I’ve combed the net to find you today’s astir fun/important/scary/fascinating stories astir technology.
1 Experts are disquieted astir a spot occupation with the US covid boosters
Health experts are acrophobic the deficiency of quality trials could substance vaccine hesitancy. (FT $)
+ Here’s however the bivalent vaccines work. (Wired $)
+ Booster uptake successful the US is inactive beauteous low. (WP $)
2 The White House wants to fortify its AI spot export prohibition to China
A caller question of companies volition beryllium banned from shipping chips without a license. (Reuters)
+ Inside the bundle that volition go the adjacent conflict beforehand successful the US-China spot war. (MIT Technology Review)
3 How 9/11 normalized a civilization of surveillance
Now, we’re successful information of losing shared spaces altogether. (Wired $)
+ Marseille’s conflict against the surveillance state. (MIT Technology Review)
4 Why particulate is specified a large wellness menace successful California
The state’s caller efforts to prevention h2o could marque it worse. (The Atlantic $)
+ Summer is becoming much and much dangerous. (New Yorker $)
5 The Merge isn’t crypto’s metallic bullet
But it could assistance pave the mode to a cleaner, much businesslike future. (FT $)
+ Crypto scams are inactive 10 a penny, though. (Bloomberg $)
+ The industry’s youthful idealism is faltering successful the look of regulation. (The Atlantic $)
+ Why Ethereum is switching to impervious of involvement and however it volition work. (MIT Technology Review)
6 Robots tin assistance halt older radical from falling
Falls successful the location tin beryllium deadly for seniors surviving alone. Robots are 1 mode to help. (WP $)
+ Robots volition play a important relation successful the workforce of the future. (FT $)
7 Inside the emergence and autumn of Launch House
The founders assemblage successful Beverly Hills some failed to support its pistillate members, and to clasp those that assaulted them to account. (Vox)
8 Why ByteDance bought a clump of birthing centers
The acquisition is the latest successful a agelong enactment of healthcare businesses it’s bought. (The Information $)
9 Memorizing Google Maps is easier than you think
Whether you privation to, though, is different substance entirely. (Motherboard)
10 Meet TikTok’s charming grandparents
They’re sharing their words of contented to tens of millions of followers. (The Guardian)
Quote of the day
“It's a lawsuit of enactment up oregon unopen up astatine this point."
—Mike Wagner, CEO of self-driving probe steadfast Edge Case Research, tells Reuters that genuinely autonomous conveyance makers person to rapidly beryllium that their systems work, oregon look failure.
The large story
Inside the combat to reclaim AI from Big Tech’s control
June 2021
Over the past decennary AI has allowed immoderate of the world’s richest and astir almighty companies to show users’ behavior; urge news, information, and products to them; and astir of all, people them with ads.
The occupation is that the firm docket for AI has mostly ignored probe that could assistance code challenges similar economical inequality and clime change. In fact, it has made these challenges worse.
Now, a increasing question of scholars privation to crook the tables. Over the past 5 years, they’ve sought to displacement the field’s priorities distant from simply enriching tech companies, by expanding who gets to enactment successful processing the technology. And their extremity is not lone to mitigate the harms caused by existing systems but to make a new, much equitable and antiauthoritarian AI. Read the afloat story.
—Karen Hao
We tin inactive person bully things
A spot for comfort, amusive and distraction successful these weird times. (Got immoderate ideas? Drop maine a line or tweet 'em astatine me.)
+ Some of Hollywood’s biggest stars don’t look similar they’ve aged a day.
+ How Lord of the Rings’ AI changed however battles look connected the metallic screen.
+ This postulation of pictures of newsstands and their owners is singular (thanks Charlotte!)
+ A speedy tally down of who will—and who should—win the Emmys.
+ We could each bash with a small much kindness successful our lives—here’s however to dispersed it. ($)
