lördag 13 september 2025
tisdag 2 september 2025
Forecasting an Imminent Israeli Strike on Iran
Multiple converging factors point toward a high probability of a renewed and more expansive Israeli strike against Iran within the coming months, most likely between September and October 7, 2025, with residual probability extending into late November or early December. Israel’s strategic imperatives, Iran’s defensive mobilization, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political calculus reinforce the likelihood. This is not a singular scenario but rather the anticipated culmination of a phased campaign, already in motion, designed to disrupt its strategic weapons programs, impose lasting operational disadvantage, and neutralize Iran’s regional military network, including those in Lebanon and Yemen.
Strategic Drivers
There are several strategic imperatives driving Israel’s likely military action against Iran. This includes the full neutralization of Iran’s regional military ecosystem. Israel’s continuous operations in Gaza and its persistent pressure on disarming Hezbollah in Lebanon are not isolated campaigns. They are shaping operations aimed at reducing the two-front (or three-front) threat Israel faces in a direct confrontation with Iran. By degrading proxy capacity now, Israel frees resources and attention for a larger, concentrated blow against Iranian assets without the burden of sustained high-intensity proxy retaliation.
Moreover, it might be viewed by Israel that the current timing is an opportunity to exploit internal Iranian fault lines where it can be obvious that Israeli intelligence may take advantage of the exploitable rifts in the Iranian leadership ecosystem. This includes the ongoing rifts between the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the regular Iranian army, as well as between the IRGC and the Supreme Leader’s advisory council. Altogether, these seams, if widened, could limit Iran’s unified response and complicate its chain of command in the early hours of an Israeli strike.
Aligning a strategic military timeline within a political context is also another factor that may trigger a more expansive attack on Iran. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s possible target date before October 7, 2025, is symbolically and politically loaded. Delivering a strategic blow before this anniversary serves multiple purposes, including but not limited to consolidating his domestic political standing, demonstrating Israel’s capacity to impose strategic costs on Iran, and shaping the broader narrative in the US
Mossad has already intensified intelligence and special operations inside Iran, including target acquisition and asset positioning. This was also very apparent in the drone attacks by Israel, that took place from within Iran, in the recent confrontation. They resulted in the successful elimination of many of Iran’s senior military members. These activities are not stand-alone intelligence-gathering missions; they are preparatory steps for synchronized special forces, air, and cyber composite operations. Accordingly, expanded Israeli intelligence and activity against Iran is highly likely with the operational aim to pre-emptively disable Iranian sensor grids, command nodes, and ballistic missile launch infrastructure.
Indications within the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) suggest a possible force regeneration, given the apparent contradiction between political calls for full Gaza occupation and the IDF chief of staff’s emphasis on giving forces a rest. This is consistent with a combat reconstitution phase. This also aligns with the doctrine of unit rotation, replenishment, and training for the demands of long-range precision strike and high-tempo air operations.
At this stage, signs of Iranian defensive mobilization are extremely important. Tehran’s formation of a National Defense Council under Ali Larijani and consolidation of 13 security agencies into three “super-agencies” is an unmistakable sign that Iran expects a broader confrontation. Such a restructuring’s purpose is to tighten internal security, improve rapid mobilization of conventional and unconventional forces, and streamline command and control. Ironically, such rapid reorganizations can create bureaucratic friction—an exploitable weakness during the chaos of an initial strike.
https://globalsecurityreview.com/forecasting-an-imminent-israeli-strike-on-iran/
torsdag 28 augusti 2025
onsdag 20 augusti 2025
onsdag 30 juli 2025
söndag 13 juli 2025
What is Beeper?
Beeper is a universal chat app. With Beeper, you can send and receive messages to friends, family and colleagues on over 10 different chat networks, all from a single app.
Beeper is free to use, with optional paid subscription. You can use Beeper on all your devices — your messages sync seamlessly. Our apps are available on Android, iPhone, iPad, ChromeOS, macOS, Windows and Linux.
https://www.beeper.com/
torsdag 26 juni 2025
lördag 7 juni 2025
måndag 26 maj 2025
AI Discovers Suspected Trigger of Alzheimer's, And Maybe a Treatment
https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-discovers-suspected-trigger-of-alzheimers-and-maybe-a-treatment
Researchers from the University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego) used AI to discover that a gene recognized as a sign of Alzheimer's disease could be causing it too. It highlights one of the big challenges in the study of Alzheimer's: understanding both the changes the disease causes, and the changes that cause the disease.
An enzyme called phosphoglycerate dehydrogenase (PHGDH), and the gene that encodes it, were the focus here. The researchers had previously established the gene was typically more active in people with faster-progressing Alzheimer's.
PHGDH graphic
What wasn't clear was what was driving this link. The team used AI to model the structure of the PHGDH enzyme more fully, suggesting it had a previously hidden function: flicking switches for other specific genes on and off.
Further analysis showed PHGDH interacting with two genes inside brain cells known as astrocytes, in ways that interfere with the brain's ability to regulate inflammation and clear out waste. The researchers think this could be one of the tipping points triggering Alzheimer's, and explaining the association between PHGDH and the disease.
"It really demanded modern AI to formulate the three-dimensional structure very precisely to make this discovery," says bioengineer Sheng Zhong, from UC San Diego.
Next, the team investigated ways to inhibit PHGDH, but only partly – ideally, a drug would block its ability to regulate genes in astrocytes, while still allowing it to perform its vital enzymatic role.
The team found a molecule called NCT-503 that fit the bill. AI modeling was deployed again to examine the structure of this molecule, and how it interacts with PHGDH. NCT-503 seems to bind to a pocket in PHGDH to stop its unauthorized gene-switching.
There's still a long way to go before an actual Alzheimer's drug might be developed from this finding, but the research has shown that a treatment based on NCT-503 can put up guardrails around PHGDH in mouse models of the disease. The mice that were treated showed improvements in memory and anxiety tests.
"Now there is a therapeutic candidate with demonstrated efficacy that has the potential of being further developed into clinical tests," says Zhong.
"There may be entirely new classes of small molecules that can potentially be leveraged for development into future therapeutics."
Crucially, NCT-503 is able to pass the blood-brain barrier to access neurons and their associated cells, making the new treatment research even more promising. Drugs based on the molecule could even be taken orally.
While it's taking time to unpick the complexities of Alzheimer's disease, and all the different factors involved in its development – from environmental stresses to inherited genetics – each new study gets us a step closer to solutions, and improving how we tackle the condition.
"Unfortunately, treatment options for Alzheimer's disease are very limited," says Zhong. "And treatment responses are not outstanding at this moment."
The research has been published in Cell.
söndag 4 maj 2025
fredag 18 april 2025
fredag 21 mars 2025
torsdag 27 februari 2025
The radical treatments bringing people back from the brink of death
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg26435193-700-the-radical-treatments-bringing-people-back-from-the-brink-of-death/
Reperfusion technologies that can reanimate human brains are raising the possibility that death could be a reversible condition, even hours after a cardiac arrest
The severed pig’s head had come from the local abattoir. It would have typically been discarded, but Zvonimir Vrselja, a neuroscientist at Yale School of Medicine, and his colleagues had other ideas. Four hours after this particular animal was decapitated, they removed its brain from its skull. They then connected the dead brain’s vasculature to tubes that would pump a special cocktail of preserving agents into its blood vessels and turned the perfusion machine on.
That was when something incredible happened. The cortex turned from grey to pink. Brain cells started producing proteins. Neurons juddered back to life, displaying signs of metabolic activity indistinguishable from that of living cells. Basic cellular functions, activities that were supposed to irreversibly cease after blood flow stopped, were restored. The pig’s brain wasn’t alive, exactly – but it certainly wasn’t dead.
Now, for the first time, the team is using the technique on human brains.
“We are trying to be transparent and very careful because there’s so much value that can come out of this,” says Vrselja. Reanimating – in a sense – a dead human brain would have tremendous medical benefits. Researchers could trial drugs on cellularly active human brains, leading to improved treatments. Similar techniques are already being used to better preserve other human organs for transplants, too. And in what is perhaps the most immediately.
fredag 21 februari 2025
fredag 17 januari 2025
Prenumerera på:
Inlägg (Atom)
PDF24 Tools Free and easy-to-use online PDF tools that make you more productive.
https://tools.pdf24.org/en/