General Electric : The GE Brief – September 18, 2018

Earlier this year, health workers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo saved lives by inoculating 3,300 people with a new type of vaccine. The Ebola vaccine is a so-called viral vector vaccine. Researchers bioengineer them by taking common, mostly harmless viruses and adding bits of DNA that encode proteins and antigens specific to Ebola. These DNA bits do not cause the disease, but train the body's immune cells to immediately recognize the Ebola virus as a dangerous invader that must be killed when it shows up.

Breakthrough technology: The interesting thing about viral vector vaccines is that, for the first time in history, 'pharmaceutical companies can develop many different kinds of vaccines using the same [vector carrier],' said Daria Donati, director of business development and innovation at GE Healthcare Life Sciences. Thus, in practice, health care providers could use a viral vaccine to vaccinate a person for many different diseases.

Read more about the production process of viral vaccines here.

Last Thursday, GE installed the last of 66 Haliade wind turbines at Merkur, one of Germany's largest offshore wind farms located in the North Sea. The move is in line with Germany's aim to generate 80% of all electricity from renewable sources by 2050.

Potent power: Merkur is designed to produce as much as 1,750 gigawatt-hours of renewable electricity, enough to supply 500,000 German homes. Each of the turbines generates 6 megawatts and has a rotor that spans 150 meters in diameter. GE Renewable Energy and the blade-maker LM Wind Power, which GE acquired last year, are already working on a more powerful iteration of the Haliade called the Haliade-X. The Haliade-X will be the world's largest and most powerful offshore wind turbine. Just one of these turbines will be capable of powering the equivalent of 16,000 European homes.

Read more about the offshore wind turbines at Merkur wind farm here.

CFM International, a 50/50 joint venture between GE Aviation and Safran Aircraft Engines, has received orders and commitments for more than 16,100 LEAP jet engines valued at more than $233 billion. No wonder it has been racing to ramp up production. The company is currently shipping a record number of jet engines, about 30 engines per week, between the LEAP-1A for Airbus and the LEAP-1B for Boeing. But it needs to run even faster to keep up with deliveries.

Recovery in sight: CFM says a recent surge in deliveries of raw material and long-lead components will put them on track by year-end. 'On LEAP-1A we are delivering 12 to 14 engines per week and we want to increase that to 16, which is about the rate that's required [by Airbus] for next year,' CFM President and CEO Gaël Méheust said. For the LEAP-1B, 'we are [currently] delivering 14 a week, but we want to raise that to 16, 18 and then 20 by the end of the year.' CFM plans to deliver 2,100 engines in 2018, 10% more than its previous record set last year.

Read more about the LEAP engines here.

1. One mind, three telepathic drones
Researchers at DARPA are exploring technology that enables pilots to use an implanted brain chip to steer three fighter jet drones at once. The technology could also lead to more responsive prosthetic limbs.

2. Turning off the cancer immortality gene
Scientists at the University of California, San Francisco used CRISPR to flip the 'immortality switch' that enables some 50 cancer cell types to endlessly reproduce. They focused on a mutation in the TERT promoter that is 'the third most common mutation among all human cancers,' according to UCSF.

3. Fasting to live longer
Researchers at Georgia State University found that a molecule produced during fasting can have anti-aging effects on the human vascular system. The scientists are now looking for a 'new chemical' that could mimic the properties of this molecule.

Plus, a non-antibiotic TB drug and gut electricity in this week's Coolest Things on Earth.

- QUOTE OF THE DAY -

'Vaccines are an important tool in the fight against Ebola. This is why it has been a priority to move them rapidly into place to begin protecting our health workers and the affected population.'

- Dr. Oly Ilunga Kalenga, DRC minister of public health

Quote: GE Reports. Images: JUNIOR D. KANNAH/AFP/Getty Images.

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