New York is aiming to ban the sale of all gas-powered vehicles in the state by 2035. CBS News reports: A bill amending the state’s environmental conservation law was passed by the state’s Senate and Assembly and signed by Governor Kathy Hochul last week. Under the new law, 100% of in-state sales of new passenger cars and trucks will have zero emissions by 2035. That means state agencies will work to develop affordable powering options for zero-emissions vehicles in all communities, improve sustainable transportation and support bicycle and pedestrian options. Several agencies will work to create a zero-emissions vehicle market development strategy by 2023, so ensure more zero-emission cars are available in the state.

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Source: Slashdot – New York To Ban Sale of All Gas-Powered Vehicles In the State By 2035

Researchers from MIT have developed a new way to grow tiny replicas of the pancreas, using either healthy or cancerous pancreatic cells. They believe that their “specialized gel” could also be useful for studying lung, colorectal, and other cancers, including how potential cancer drugs affect tumors and their environment. The findings have been published in the journal Nature Materials. MIT reports: Using a specialized gel that mimics the extracellular environment surrounding the pancreas, the researchers were able to grow pancreatic “organoids,” allowing them to study the important interactions between pancreatic tumors and their environment. Unlike some of the gels now used to grow tissue, the new MIT gel is completely synthetic, easy to assemble and can be produced with a consistent composition every time. The researchers have also shown that their new gel can be used to grow other types of tissue, including intestinal and endometrial tissue. […] About 10 years ago, [Linda Griffith, the School of Engineering Professor of Teaching Innovation and a professor of biological engineering and mechanical engineering, and her lab] started to work on designing a synthetic gel that could be used to grow epithelial cells, which form the sheets that line most organs, along with other supportive cells.

The gel they developed is based on polyethylene glycol (PEG), a polymer that is often used for medical applications because it doesn’t interact with living cells. By studying the biochemical and biophysical properties of the extracellular matrix, which surrounds organs in the body, the researchers were able to identify features they could incorporate into the PEG gel to help cells grow in it. One key feature is the presence of molecules called peptide ligands, which interact with cell surface proteins called integrins. The sticky binding between ligands and integrins allows cells to adhere to the gel and form organoids. The researchers found that incorporating small synthetic peptides derived from fibronectin and collagen in their gels allowed them to grow a variety of epithelial tissues, including intestinal tissue. They showed that supportive cells called stromal cells, along with immune cells, can also thrive in this environment.

In the new study, Griffith and [Claus Jorgensen, a group leader at the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute] wanted to see if the gel could also be used to support the growth of normal pancreatic organoids and pancreatic tumors. Traditionally, it has been difficult to grow pancreatic tissue in a manner that replicates both the cancerous cells and the supporting environment, because once pancreatic tumor cells are removed from the body, they lose their distinctive cancerous traits. Griffith’s lab developed a protocol to produce the new gel, and then teamed up with Jorgensen’s lab, which studies the biology of pancreatic cancer, to test it. Jorgensen and his students were able to produce the gel and use it to grow pancreatic organoids, using healthy or cancerous pancreatic cells derived from mice. “We got the protocol from Linda and we got the reagents in, and then it just worked,” Jorgensen says. “I think that speaks volumes of how robust the system is and how easy it is to implement in the lab.”

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Source: Slashdot – Engineers Grow Pancreatic ‘Organoids’ That Mimic the Real Thing

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Uber drivers are employees, not contractors, and so entitled to greater workers’ rights under local labor laws, a Dutch court ruled on Monday, handing a setback to the U.S. company’s European business model. It was another court victory for unions fighting for better pay and benefits for those employed in the gig economy and followed a similar decision this year about Uber in Britain. The Amsterdam District Court sided with the Federation of Dutch Trade Unions (FNV), which had argued that Uber’s roughly 4,000 drivers in the capital are employees of a taxi company and should be granted benefits in line with the taxi sector.

The court found drivers who transport passengers via the Uber app are covered by the collective labour agreement for taxi transportation. “The legal relationship between Uber and these drivers meets all the characteristics of an employment contract,” the ruling said. Uber drivers are in some cases entitled to back pay, the court said. The judges also ordered Uber to pay a fine of 50,000 euros ($58,940) for failing to implement the terms of the labor agreement for taxi drivers.
Uber said it would appeal against the decision and “has no plans to employ drivers in the Netherlands.” They added: “We are disappointed with this decision because we know that the overwhelming majority of drivers wish to remain independent. Drivers don’t want to give up their freedom to choose if, when and where to work.”

Last November, Uber, Lyft and other gig economy companies scored a decisive win in California when a majority of the state’s voters passed a company-sponsored ballot measure that cemented workers’ status as contractors, albeit with some benefits.

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Source: Slashdot – Uber Drivers Are Employees, Not Contractors, Says Dutch Court

Kape Technologies Plc agreed to buy ExpressVPN in a $936 million deal that will more than double the cybersecurity company’s customer base and expand its tools for private web surfing. Bloomberg reports: Kape will pay $354 million in cash when the deal closes and the equivalent of $237 million in shares, which can be sold after a 24-month lockup, the company said in a statement on Monday. Another $345 million in cash will be paid in two installments, 12 months and 24 months after the close. The deal still needs approval from regulators.

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Source: Slashdot – Kape Technologies Agrees to Buy ExpressVPN for 6 Million

According to Insider, Sony is charging a $10 upgrade fee to bring cross-generational games from a PS4 to a PS5. From the report: When new game consoles launch nowadays, a variety of games on that new console are also available on the previous generation of consoles. The next major PlayStation 5 exclusive game, for instance, is also headed to the PlayStation 4: “Horizon Forbidden West” launches in early 2022, and millions of players will get it on the last generation console. [..] Unfortunately, when PlayStation 4 owners do finally find and purchase a PlayStation 5, those cross-generational games don’t automatically make the leap with them. Instead, Sony intends to charge $10 apiece for that upgrade — and that’s only after fans criticized Sony for an even stranger policy.

“Thursday was to be a celebration of ‘Horizon Forbidden West’ and the amazing team at Guerrilla working to deliver it on February 18, 2022,” PlayStation leader Jim Ryan said in an update on a Sony blog post earlier this month. “However, it’s abundantly clear that the offerings we confirmed in our pre-order kickoff missed the mark.” Ryan was referring to a previously announced pre-order announcement for “Horizon Forbidden West” that revealed the only way to get both the PS4 and PS5 versions of the game was to order an $80 “digital deluxe” edition — a $20 increase over the base level $60 price of a PS4 video game.

Sony had previously announced that any PlayStation 5 games in the “launch window” would only need to be purchased on one console to own both the PS4 and PS5 versions. “Horizon Forbidden West” has been delayed repeatedly, which pushed it out of the ambiguous “launch window” Sony set for the PlayStation 5 (which launched in November 2020). When PlayStation fans cited this, Sony caved. Moreover, Ryan laid out a clear upgrade path for the future — albeit one that’s still open to scrutiny. “Moving forward, PlayStation first-party exclusive cross-gen titles (newly releasing on PS4 & PS5) — both digital and physical — will offer a $10 USD digital upgrade option from PS4 to PS5,” Ryan said. “This will apply to the next ‘God of War’ and ‘Gran Turismo 7,’ and any other exclusive cross-gen PS4 & PS5 title published by Sony Interactive Entertainment.” Microsoft’s policy, on the other hand, states that if you owned a game on a previous Xbox console, you own it on the current consoles. If there’s a newer version of that game for your newer console, that’s the version you get when you buy and download the game.

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Source: Slashdot – Sony Is Nickel-and-Diming PS5 Owners On Upgrades For Games They Already Own