- BioViva has initiated its first human treatment using a telomerase-activating gene-therapy construct as an experimental anti-aging intervention, with commentary from Fight Aging! and a Singularity Weblog interview with CEO Liz Parrish.  
- A tissue-engineering study demonstrated successful growth of healthy intestine on a tubular 3-D scaffold made from surgical-suture material, followed by functional regeneration of gut lining in dogs, suggesting a scalable path toward organ replacement.  
- Ultra-long-range PCR techniques (>1 Gb amplicons) were discussed, highlighting Phusion Hot-Start polymerase for its ~50× higher fidelity than Taq and the proposal to use in-vitro compartmentalized directed evolution to select polymerases with extreme processivity and reduced drop-off.  
- Samy Kamkar’s open-source hardware exploits were showcased, including “Combobreaker” (a robotic brute-force device for defeating combination locks) and “Skyjack” (a quadcopter that hijacks nearby drones via insecure Wi-Fi), framed as low-cost proofs-of-concept.  
- A genome-wide study on extremely high intelligence was linked, revealing that rare functional alleles are more often detrimental than beneficial to cognitive performance, sparking debate on genetic ceilings and analogies to “fast-twitch” muscle genes in athletics.  
- FBI forensic-standards documents and an Ion Torrent validation study were shared, reflecting ongoing evaluation of benchtop sequencers for CODIS-grade STR genotyping.  
- A participant announced the construction of five redundant scanning-tunneling microscopes (STMs) for open biotech use, inviting collaborators to place orders.  
- Wiki updates on DNA-synthesis hardware emphasized that conjugation and ligation steps remain the least resolved bottlenecks in next-generation benchtop synthesizers.