The University of Washingtonannounced that a team of researchers has developed a prothrombin time/international normalized ratio (PT/INR) blood clotting test that requires only a single drop of blood and a smartphone. According to the team’s February 11, 2022 paper published in Nature Communications, the test uses a tiny cup containing copper, and a blood clotting agent that is attached to the smartphone below the camera, as shown in the figure below from the paper.
After adding a drop of blood, the smartphone vibrates, causing the blood to react with copper and the agent to form a blood clot, all of which is observed and measured by the camera. A video of the device is here.
Blood clotting, also known as coagulation, is the process by which blood changes into a gel-like substance to prevent bleeding. Excessive blood clotting within blood vessels can restrict blood flow, leading to serious conditions like deep vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolisms. Blood thinners can reduce clotting, but patients must have their blood tested frequently to ensure proper dosage, as too much or too little blood clotting can be life-threatening.
Shyam Gollakota, a University of Washington professor and co-author of the paper, stated:
Back in the day, doctors used to manually rock tubes of blood back and forth to monitor how long it took a clot to form. This, however, requires a lot of blood, making it infeasible to use in home settings. The creative leap we make here is that we’re showing that by using the vibration motor on a smartphone, our algorithms can do the same thing, except with a single drop of blood. And we get accuracy similar to the best commercially available techniques. … This is the best of all worlds — it’s basically the holy grail of PT/INR testing. It makes it frugal and accessible to millions of people, even where resources are very limited.
The research team hopes its new test can be deployed in patients’ homes and resource-limited areas. A public release of the team’s code can be found here.
HTC released a video showing off its vision of the metaverse, a reflection of what the company thinks virtual spaces will look like in the near future. And… it’s not a great look. Some ideas are inevitable. Slim and light XR glasses capable of fluidly serving up novel and meaningful interactions are basically the holy […]
Why does the industry need another register management tool? This is a question that Tamas Olaszi, the founder of Jade Design Automation hears from time to time since Jade-DA brought Register Manager, their EDA tool, to market. So why?
There is a genuine answer to this question but first let me use this interview to give some helpful… Read More
BetDao is a GameFi initiative that aims to transform the online card games and the industry around it. BetDao includes a staking Decentralized Application (dApp) that allows users to earn more $BDAO tokens by staking them. Players can earn the governance token $BCHIEF by playing with their $BDAO token. The $BCHIEF token is one of...
Seoul, Korea, Feb 11, 2022 - (ACN Newswire) - Recently, Tower Finance is proud to announce the Launch of its Algorithmic Stablecoin. Algorithm-based stablecoins are new variants of cryptocurrency tailored for offering improved price stability. In the current market today, more and more users have taken interest, as it can also help in balancing the supply and demand of the asset in circulation.
Algorithmic Stablecoin Protocol, developed by Tower Finance, looks to offer considerably improved capital efficiency in comparison to collateralized stablecoins.
What is Tower Finance?
The Tower Finance is a Fractional-Algorithmic Stablecoin, soft-pegged to the U.S. Dollar, built on the Polygon network. The protocol plans to maintain TWR price stability by storing sufficient collateral in the time locked-smart contracts. The USDC is deposited into the protocol when a user mints TWR token, while the CUBE token, which is used for minting, is burned. When the user redeems TWR tokens, the protocol pays back USDC and mints the required amount of CUBE tokens. This allows arbitrageurs to help maintain price stability.
Aiming to solve the 'Stablecoin trilemma'
Tower Finance aims to provide a solution for the so-called 'Stablecoin trilemma' of decentralization, capital efficiency, and price stability by introducing TWR, its fractional-collateralized algorithmic stablecoin. Tower Finance aims to build an ecosystem that incorporates both collateral and high capital efficiency, hence developing stability.
By implementing a floating collateralization ratio, TWR not only maintains its peg in the most efficient manner possible, but it also captures value for CUBE holders and produces yield for its community of holders.
Implementing DeFi 2.0 through Protocol Owned Liquidity and Protocol Rented Liquidity
Tower Finance is the first algorithmic stablecoin protocol to adopt the 'Protocol Owned Liquidity' model introduced by OlympusDAO. While the structure is different, the underlying idea is similar. The protocol charges a penalty to users who terminate the vesting terms for the farming rewards. When this happens, the protocol uses 2/3 of the collected penalty for providing liquidity. Half of it is converted to USDC and used to provide liquidity. The leftover, which amounts to 1/3 of the collected penalty, is sent to the Profit Manager.
When TWR is minted with USDC and CUBE, the protocol doesn't immediately burn CUBE. Instead, 50% of CUBE is sold to temporarily create a CUBE-USDC LP to provide additional liquidity. We call this 'Protocol Rented Liquidity', because the meant-to-be-burnt tokens are borrowed for a short period of time to add liquidity to Tower's ecosystem until it is removed via governance decisions, in which case, the USDC is converted into CUBE and burned.
With a commitment for long-term sustainability yet a market fit, ultra high-yield/yield enhancement go-to-market strategy, it is perfectly destined to pave the way for stablecoin protocols in the era of DeFi 2.0
Tower Finance officially launches on Valentine's Day: 14th of Feb, 6:00am UTC.
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Introduction Currently within esports there is a need to develop more holistic wellbeing practices and strategies to support all levels of gamers. With esports continuing to grow in popularity and with more professional and semi-professional teams entering the arena there is a growing responsibility of these teams to look after the wellbeing of their esports […]
Proper weather implementation is something of a holy grail for racing games - it's why the feature bounces in and out of various series in the genre, why it's entirely absent in most and why we've been waiting for almost 14 years for it to make its debut in iRacing (can we really honestly get it this year please?)
Having had a brief glimpse at its implementation in Gran Turismo 7 in tonight's State of Play presentation, I think we might well have a new standard setter for the feature.