- A gigapixel microscopy technique was shared that repurposes an ordinary flatbed scanner into a super-high-resolution imaging platform; the 2013 paper “Gigapixel microscopy using a flatbed scanner” (arXiv:1209.4045, PMC3891323) gives full construction details.  
- Expansion microscopy for human clinical specimens (“ExPath”) was announced: Boyden Lab released protocols on expansionmicroscopy.org and a Nature Biotechnology paper (nbt.3892) showing nanoscale imaging of cancer and other tissue for improved diagnostics.  
- DARPA’s $21.6 M Neural Engineering System Design award to UC Berkeley was highlighted for its goal of holographic, biocompatible cortical interfaces that can “write” patterned light directly onto hundreds of thousands of neurons to restore sight or hearing.  
- A new study demonstrating electron-microscopic reconstruction of functionally identified neurons in a neural integrator was linked (Cell, 2017), along with an LSTM-network interpretability blog post (yerevann.github.io).  
- DIYbio advocacy was discussed: participants noted that institutional scientists are now pursuing projects long championed in DIYbio circles, and higher-profile outreach (e.g., via Eric Topol) could raise legitimacy and career prospects.  
- A speculative “cryptographically-secure blood oath” scheme was proposed, combining DNA/bacteria or nanobots with public-key signatures to create tamper-evident blood seals or multi-party multisignature tokens.  
- Toxicity of glyphosate vs. commercial Roundup formulations was debated; participants cited studies showing undisclosed adjuvants and solvents—not glyphosate itself—may drive observed toxicity and teratogenicity at sub-lethal doses.  
- An orbital-ring design discussion referenced a Reddit thread attempting to calculate the minimum viable orbital-ring mass that could lift 5 tons for $70 M, aiming at a bootstrappable space-elevator architecture.