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1. Israeli researchers discover how to lengthen life of solar panels

   Explore Jpost 10 hours, 2 min ago News

   

   In a move toward upgrading solar power technologies, a team of Israeli researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has developed an eco-friendly way to lengthen the lifespan of perovskite-based solar cells.

   The researchers designed a new structure to hold the cells, which allows for the easy removal and replacement of perovskite, a light-sensitive material that degrades over time. The process allows for the full restoration of a panel’s photovoltaic capacities and essentially enables it to be recycled.

   Perovskite is a mineral structure that has the capacity to absorb light and is used as a semiconductor. The growing field ...

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   Mentions: Science/Technology

2. One llama’s antibodies, analyzed in Jerusalem, may help ‘millions’ through COVID

   Explore The Times of Israel Nov 8 2020 News

   

   Antibodies from a single llama that were analyzed in a Jerusalem lab could be replicated and help “millions” of coronavirus patients, scientists say.

   Dina Schneidman-Duhovny of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem has examined the qualities of dozens of antibodies from a llama called Wally, and identified which would best fight the coronavirus in humans.

   The best candidates have been tested in vitro by her US-based colleagues with live coronavirus and human cells, and appear to significantly reduce the virus’s ability to infect cells.

   As the llama antibodies are much smaller than human antibodies — they are often dubbed “nanobodies” — they ...

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   Mentions: Medicine/Health

3. Glowing engineered bacteria point out explosive landmines

   Explore ISRAEL21c Oct 20 2020 News

   

   Researchers who discovered how to utilize fluorescent E. coli bacteria to locate landmines have recently further mutated them so that they are now both more sensitive and emit a glow visible to the naked eye, eliminating the need to scan the ground using laser light beams.

   In 2017, researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem molecularly engineered E. coli to emit a fluorescent light upon coming in contact with explosive vapors accumulated in the soil above landmines. This light was recorded using a laser-based scanning system so the mines could be located safely from afar.

   Now, in a study published ...

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   Mentions: Science/Technology

4. Climate research multidisciplinary center opens at Hebrew U.

   Explore Jpost Oct 7 2020 News

   

   The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, which considers climate issues as some of the most significant scientific problems the world currently faces, established a climate research center, the Hebrew University Center for Climate Science (HUCS).
   

    

   The new center, headed by the two researchers Prof. Hezi Gildor and Dr. Uri Adam, will make it possible to deal with the challenges of the climate crisis in the Middle East region. The center's members will focus on building an up-to-date and accurate regional climate model.

    

   The center will allow ideas, research and interdisciplinary brainstorming around the climate issue to collaborate with the Meteorological ...

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   Mentions: Agriculture Science/Technology artificial intelligence

5. Could octopuses have more than one brain? - Hebrew U. study

   Explore Jpost Oct 7 2020 News

   

   A new Hebrew University study recently examined the possibility that octopuses, known to be among the most intelligent of invertebrates, could have multiple brains.

   The full intelligence of an octopus is not fully understood, however it is known that they have the largest nervous system among invertebrates – even larger than some vertebrates – with more nerve cells not in the brain itself but rather in its body and the tentacles.

   The question of multiple brains is one that many researchers are still investigating. 

   The collection of sensory information and the ability to process it, learn from it and respond accordingly, is ...

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   Mentions: Science/Technology

6. Israel's decision to restart schools a cautionary tale - Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

   Explore The Arkansas Democrat Aug 4 2020

   

   Israel's decision to restart schools a cautionary tale Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

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7. Studies show pomegranate supplement slows neurodegenerative diseases

   Explore ISRAEL21c Aug 2 2020 News

   

   Everybody knows that the pomegranate is a superfood. One of the seven native fruits of Israel, pomegranates are packed with health-promoting and healing antioxidants and vitamins.

   Now, an Israeli supplement derived from pomegranate seed oil has proven helpful in improving cognitive function in multiple sclerosis patients experiencing cognitive difficulties associated with the disease.

   Prof. Dimitrios Karussis, the internationally renowned director of the Multiple Sclerosis Center at Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center in Jerusalem, found significant improvement in learning ability and text comprehension, word recall and categorization in 30 patients involved in a groundbreaking study of the patented GranaGard supplement.

   This is ...

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   Mentions: STEM nanotechnology Medicine/Health

8. Yissum Spinouts Raise $79 million in H1 2020 Despite Coronavirus Uncertainty - PRNewswire

   Explore PR Newswire Jul 28 2020 News

   

   Startups from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem raised $79 million in the first half of 2020, Yissum, the technology transfer company of the Hebrew University announced today.  Despite the continuing global uncertainty caused by the coronavirus and ongoing lockdowns around the world, 14 Yissum spinouts raised tens of millions of dollars in early-stage funding rounds.  

    Investments were made in companies in the cleantech, agriculture, and foodtech sectors as well as in life science, AI, and education.  Despite the fact that VC investments in the US  and Europe were down, the number of VC deals in Israel reached an all-time record ...

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   Mentions: Agriculture cancer Yissum

9. Nano-engineered pomegranate oil holds hope for brain disease, study shows

   Explore The Times of Israel Jun 23 2020 News

   

   A Israeli study has found that multiple sclerosis patients taking a nano-engineered nutritional supplement made out of pomegranate oil showed “significant cognitive improvement” after just three months.

   The small-scale study of 30 patients was conducted at the Multiple Sclerosis Center at Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital in Jerusalem by Prof. Dimitrios Karussis, director of the center and a senior neurologist. Results showed that patients taking the supplement witnessed an average 12 percent improvement in learning ability and text comprehension, word recall and categorization, in the three months of treatment.

   The researchers are now writing up the findings to submit them to ...

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   Mentions: stem cells STEM nanotechnology

10. Ancient scepter found in south may have been part of life-sized 'divine statue' - The Times of Israel

    Explore The Times of Israel Jun 18 2020 News

    

    An approximately 3,200-year-old scepter found at a biblical site in southern Israel may be the first physical evidence of life-sized “divine statues” used in Canaanite rituals, according to a new report.

    Yosef Garfinkel, an archaeology professor at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, wrote in the academic journal Antiquity that the scepter, which was made from bronze and coated in silver, was discovered inside the cellar of a Canaanite temple at Lachish.

    He linked the scepter, which looks like a spatula, to a scepter found at Hatzor in the north, as well as to a small figurine found at the site ...

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    Mentions: archaeology Humanities

11. Special vessels show Jewish continuity in Israel after Roman destruction

    Explore Jpost Jun 17 2020 News

    

    New research offers insights on how Jewish life continued in the Land of Israel after the destruction of the Temple and of Jerusalem at the hands of the Romans.

     

    The use of chalkstones vessels, very common among the Jewish population during the Second Temple Period, did not stop with the destruction of city in the second century CE as previously thought, but continued in the Galilee, the new center of Jewish life, for at least another two centuries, a paper published in the May issue of the Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR) documented.

    Several types and ...

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    Mentions: Humanities

12. Why dance? From prehistory to the Bible, scholar offers answers

    Explore Jpost Jun 11 2020 News

    

    In the 1990s, leading Israeli scholar Yosef Garfinkel, head of the Institute of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, led several seasons of excavations at the Neolithic site of Sha’ar Hagolan in northern Israel. Among other things, the researchers uncovered several clay figurines depicting the deity Mother goddess presenting unnaturally elongated heads. For their artistic qualities, the figurines were exhibited in the most important museums around the world. For Garfinkel, they represented the spark which prompted him to investigate a new field of research, the history of human dance.

    “While I was trying to understand more about their ...

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    Mentions: Bible Humanities

13. The Israeli method that could teach China to speak English

    Explore ISRAEL21c Jun 10 2020 News

    

    “How did you do on your Gaokao exams?”

    That phrase might not trip off the tongues of most Western students, but for high schoolers in China, it’s their key to acceptance into university – and to future success.

    What tips the balance? Proficiency in English. And for most Chinese students, that’s a tough bar to meet.

    “While 22% of the Gaokao is English itself, up to 50% of it is dependent on your ability to understand the language,” explains Howard Cooper, CEO of MagniLEARN, an Israeli startup applying artificial intelligence to teaching English online.

    MagniLEARN grew out of the ...

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    Mentions: Science/Technology artificial intelligence

14. Hebrew University receives $1m from US couple for coronavirus lab - The Jerusalem Post

    Explore Jpost Jun 5 2020 News

    

    A Virginia couple has donated $1 million to assist the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in its new program designated to fight the coronavirus.  

     

    The $1 million made by Brad and Sheryl Schwartz through American Friends of Hebrew University (AFHU) will assist in building a top-level bio-safety lab, the first of its kind dedicated to non-governmental research. The donation is a major first step toward funding a biocontainment level 3 national laboratory, which will enable direct-contact research with the live virus, rather than virus components used in current labs.

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    Mentions: Medicine/Health

15. DNA from the Bible's Canaanites lives on in modern Arabs and Jews

    Explore National Geographic May 28 2020 News

    

    THEY ARE BEST known as the people who lived “in a land flowing with milk and honey” until they were vanquished by the ancient Israelites and disappeared from history. But a scientific report published today reveals that the genetic heritage of the Canaanites survives in many modern-day Jews and Arabs.

    The study in Cell also shows that migrants from the distant Caucasus Mountains combined with the indigenous population to forge the unique Canaanite culture that dominated the area between Egypt and Mesopotamia during the Bronze Age, lasting from approximately 3500 B.C. until 1200 B.C.

    The team extracted ancient ...

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    Mentions: Bible Humanities
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