Sorrow and Hope

Inventions & Innovations

Mobility Means Freedom

One of the keys to independence is mobility—being able to move from place to place at will. For those who have suffered spinal cord injuries or perhaps a crippling illness, a wheelchair is the ticket to that mobility and independence. Today there are between five and eight million disabled children in the world who need

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Recycling Breakthrough!

We produce a lot of garbage in our instant, prepackaged society. Landfills around the world are overflowing with solid waste products. Yes, many people are recycling their plastics, paper and glass but can we do more? Infimer®, an Israeli company, has discovered a new process for treating unsorted garbage. The end result is an amazing

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Removing Viruses from Drinking Water

Researchers from Ben Gurion University (BGU) and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) have developed novel ultrafiltration membranes that significantly improve the virus-removal process from treated municipal wastewater used for drinking in water-scarce cities. Current membrane filtration methods require intensive energy to adequately remove pathogenic viruses without using chemicals like chlorine. Researchers at UIUC

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Preventing Hip Fractures

Hip-Hope Technologies, an Israeli start-up company founded in 2011, has developed an innovative, light-weight [1 kg or 2.2 lb] belt that is able to reduce fall impact and lessen the chance of hip fractures in the elderly. As the company’s name suggests, their product offers an alternative to the devastating effects of a broken hip.

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Earth’s Magnetic Field Is Fluctuating

Albert Einstein considered the origin of the earth’s magnetic field one of the five most important unsolved problems in physics. The weakening of the geomagnetic field which extends from the planet’s core into outer space and was first recorded 180 years ago has raised concern by some for the welfare of the biosphere. But a

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Plastic-eating Bacteria

Pollution stemming from plastic products, especially in the oceans, is fast becoming a huge environmental concern. According to an article in EcoWatch, in Los Angeles alone, a staggering 10 metric tons of plastic in one form or another are carried into the Pacific Ocean each day. Approximately 500 billion plastic bags are used in the

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Taking Radiation Protection to a New Level

The Israel Space Agency signed a Declaration of Intent on the launching of an innovative Israeli development, a radiation protection suit, on the next test flight of the spacecraft ‘Orion’ which is scheduled to reach Mars. Science, Technology and Space Minister Ofir Akunis said: “Israeli space technology is known as innovative, reflecting ‘out of the

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A Breath of Fresh Air

Friday, 20 January 2017 | Surgeons at Petach Tikvah’s Beilinson Hospital have successfully performed a rare lung transplant procedure on a 39-year old woman who had been attached to a respirator for the best part of a year before a suitable donor lung was made available. Liz Morad, who underwent surgery at Beilinson earlier this

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Diapers Made from Jellyfish

What do jellyfish and diapers have in common? They are both contributors to environmental problems today. Warmer ocean temperatures have produced, among other things, an ever-increasing number of jellyfish; and, disposable diapers, which take hundreds of years to disintegrate and therefore are overwhelming our landfills. Two unrelated problems solved with one creative solution from Cine’al,

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Genetic Contributor to Alzheimer’s Identified

A new Tel Aviv University study identified a gene coding for a protein that turns off neurotransmission signaling, which contributes to Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The gene, called RGS2 (Regulator of Protein Signaling 2), has never before been implicated in AD. The study, published in Translational Psychiatry, may lead to new avenues for diagnosing Alzheimer’s disease—possibly

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