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Tagged: Star Trek

News

Actor Leonard Nimoy has passed away at age 83

As many of you, I too am just hearing the news. Actor Leonard Nimoy has passed away at age 83. It’s never easy to see one of your childhood heroes pass on. As you know Mr. Nimoy was best known on Star Trek as Spock. While other will write about the actor and the show he was best known for I would like to remember what he gave us. A character of logic and Science that offered balance to the otherwise hot head Captain Kirk. They taught us that being different was OK and working together we accomplish anything. It’s not just the character, it’s the memories we grew up with. Both what the show offered as well as the time spent with family. As I child I spent many weekends on the couch with my father watching the original series. No different than playing catch these are the bonds we take with us.

On to your next adventure sir! Stop and say HI to my father along the way. Rest in peace.

GEEK / Science

Dermal Regenerator

Dermal_regenerator The Cellular Regenerator or Dermal Regenerator is a device on Star Trek capable of speeding up the healing process of living tissue by using light. A lot of the technology we now take for granted was actually inspired by Star Trek. And when i first saw the dermal regenerator on Star Trek i thought that this doesn’t seem too far fetched. Turns out I was quite right. Fittingly It’s a technology developed by NASA that is now being adapted to do just that.  Now it might only be a matter of time before every hospital has one, heck maybe even every household.

The need to care for a population with chronic wounds is a growing challenge that requires innovative approaches. Two approaches that specifically address the identified pathophysiological processes involved in wound healing are hyperbaric oxygen therapy and light therapy.

Light Emitting Diodes (LED-technology), originally developed for NASA plant growth experiments in space, show promise for delivering light deep into tissues of the body to promote wound healing and human tissue growth. In this paper we review and present our new data of LED treatment on cells grown in culture, on ischemic and diabetic wounds in rat models, and on acute and chronic wounds in humans. Results include: in vitro increases of cell growth of 140-200% in mouse derived fibroblasts, rat derived osteoblasts, and rat derived skeletal muscle. Increases in growth of 155% -171% of normal human epithelial cells in vitro. Wound size decreases of up to 36% in conjunction with HBO in ischemic rat models. Improvement of greater than 40% in musculoskeletal training injuries in Navy SEAL team members. Decreased wound healing time by 50% of crew members aboard a U.S. Naval submarine. And finally, up to a 47% reduction in pain of children suffering from oral mucositis. We believe that the use of NASA Light-Emitting Diodes (LED) for light therapy will greatly enhance the natural wound healing process. This work is supported and managed through the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center – SBIR Program.

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GEEK

Star Trek Home!

Interior designer Tony Alleyne spent over $150,000 converting his house into the USS Enterprise from Star Trek. It took him over 6 years of tedious construction to convert every wall, floor and appliance to the 24th century spaceship.

Games / GEEK

Star Trek Online Going Free-to-Play in January 2012

Star Trek Online will be going free-to-play on January 17, 2012, Perfect World Entertainment has announced.

Perfect World Entertainment first announced the change-over to the free-to-play model in an earnings call, stating the studio was in the process on working on the new model.

The January launch is slightly later than initially stated by CEO Kelvin Lau who said the change would happen by the end of the year.

MMO to have greater potential as F2P, says CEO.

Perfect World Entertainment has announced plans to turn Star Trek Online into a free-to-play MMO by the end of the year.

“And also Star Trek Online, after the acquisition, in fact Cryptic is working on the free-to-play model for Star Trek Online,” Perfect World Entertainment’s CEO Kelvin Lau explained in a recent earnings call.

“This is going to be launched by the end of this year as well. So I think free-to-play model we have a bigger potential in US market and also in China market.”

Star Trek Online’s developer Cryptic Studios recently teamed up with Alienware Arena to offer a giveaway of 60 days of game time to recipients. <—- link for more