Why Israel is a hotbed for flash storage innovation

Israel has long been a nation that draws in big corporate R&D facilities and acquisitions

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By Lucas Mearian, Computerworld
May 17, 2012 08:50 AM ET

At the same time EMC was in Israel trying to strike a deal to buy XtremeIO, NetApp and Dell were also there vying for the flash storage array maker’s intellectual property.

EMC’s acquisition of the NAND flash storage company followed a similar move by Apple when it purchased Israeli-based flash drive maker Anobit in January.

"Particularly in flash memory they have really good talent over there," said Ryan Chien, an analyst with market research firm IHS iSuppli.

Flash storage is at the forefront of technology powering current industry trends such as cloud services, virtualization and online transaction processing. Because of that, flash development is a red-hot industry, analysts said. That fact has not been lost on Israel.

Israel has long been a nation that draws in big corporate R&D facilities and acquisitions. Microsoft and Cisco both built their first non-U.S. R&D facilities there, for instance. Google has two R&D centers in Israel now; Intel has four. Intel also has two manufacturing facilities

In 2010-2011, Israel was ranked No. 1 in the world in terms of the quality of its scientific research institutions by the Geneva-based World Economic Forum. It also ranked seventh in its capacity for innovation.

EMC itself has about 800 employees in Israel, part of an R&D center that includes VMware development. In 2010, Micron also purchased Numonyx, which operates a flash fabrication in Israel.

R&D centers in Israel (Source: State of Israel Ministry of Industry, Trade & Labor)

In flash, software rules

When it comes to engineering NAND flash storage products, writing code to manage how the non-volatile memory is used is key, especially as the size of flash chips continues to shrink. (Smaller chips increase the likelihood of increased data errors as electrons leak through thinner and thinner silicon cell walls.) Controlling how data is laid out on flash chips also results in longer product life.

On top of managing the NAND flash itself, solid-state drive (SSD) systems need software that enables optimum performance in conjunction with I/O hungry applications and hard disk drives. For example, tiering technology migrates data from low-end disks to high-end disks to flash drives.

Israel has long been home to flash storage development. For example, USB flash drives were invented by the Israeli company M-Systems in partnership with IBM. M-Systems was bought out by flash drive maker SanDisk in 2006.

"EMC is looking at the NAND resources in Israel, scientists who can handle all the issues with lower-lithography NAND," Chien said.

In 2010, EMC hired Orna Berry — formerly the chief scientist of Israel’s Ministry of Industry, Trade, and Labor — to be the general manager of its Center of Excellence (COE) facility in Beersheba, directly adjacent to Ben-Gurion University. The COE is responsible for R&D in areas such as security, high availability systems and flash memory and runs EMC’s anti-fraud service for the company’s worldwide user base.

The Israeli difference

Because of Israel’s diminutive size and its location, technological innovation is more a matter of "life and death," Berry said. "Many of the technologies, if we don’t invent them, we also [could not] buy them. It’s a political issue. Consequently, we often need to be self-sufficient in certain technologies. On the other hand, being first to market often gives us an opportunity to have a place in the market."

Israel’s military-industrial complex is also tightly intertwined with academia, helping to develop and promote programs that foster technology innovation and corporate incubation. "I would say that almost more than any other government, maybe with the exception of Finland and Singapore, Israel has been extremely focused on turning know-how into economical or defense value as a policy," Berry said.

Mark Peters, an analyst with market research firm ESG, agreed. What Israel has to offer is a large population of students steeped in mathematics and science. The country has no natural resources to speak of and doesn’t export any significant retail items, Peters said.

"When was the last time you saw a tag that said ‘Made in Israel?’" Peters said. "For Israel, education is all about sophisticated science and math. As a country, they’re not focused on low-margin products. They’re always at the advanced level."

Israel’s top schools, such as Tel Aviv University and Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, are bastions of high-tech education.

Additionally, Peters noted that an unusually high number of well-educated Russians have immigrated to Israel since the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1990s. Peters also pointed to high military R&D spending, and a strong venture capitalist community for the nation’s tech success.

Big companies on the prowl

Every large technology company – from IBM to Hewlett-Packard – is considering acquiring a full range of solid-state products, from drives to arrays, Peters said. If they don’t, they’ll be left behind.

"They’ve got to be shopping around everything," he said. "Management, ultimately, for solid-state technology has got to be up and down the entire stack," he said.

For example, last year flash drive maker SanDisk purchased Pliant Technologies for its enterprise-class flash drives. It then turned around and purchased flash management software vendor FlashSoft this past February.

EMC’s acquisition roadmap to date has included nine Israeli-based companies, including Kashya, nLayers and Proactivity. But XtremIO is its largest acquisition by far, with EMC reportedly spending $430 million on a company that has yet to ship its first product.

While the XtremIO buyout raised the eyebrows of some industry pundits who doubted the wisdom of the deal, according to Peters and Kobi Rozengarten, a managing partner at Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP). JVP is one of several major investors in XtremIO, which garnered $25 million in venture funding since its founding in 2009.

Peters and Rozengarten said EMC wanted superior "architectural" software — and got it.

"Today’s flash is a very unreliable device with poor retention and endurance (especially when scaling to 20 nanometers and bellow)," Rozengarten said. "This requires a sophisticated ECC based on [a digital signal processor] and new flash controller know-how. In this space, Israeli’s companies are leading with companies such as Anobit and Densbits."

In fact, Israel has been a hub for many leading companies and technologies including semiconductors, communications, security and storage, Rozengarten said.

As a result, it has become a nation of high-profile startups that don’t last long before they’re scooped up by big international players, Peters said.

Outside Israel, the flash storage market is flush with vendors for the picking, from all-flash array makers such as Nimbus, Violin Memory, Texas Memory Systems, Pure Storage, and Whiptail to PCIe flash card vendors such as Fusion-io, Intel, Micron and Virident. There are also all-flash appliance makers such as SolidFire and Tintri. Of the latter companies, Violin is the least likely to be acquired as it has its sights on going public.

Flash arrays: the next battle ground

Chien expects flash array products to be the next battle ground among vendors. The industry will consolidate quickly over the next several years, he said, as big storage vendors such as Dell, NetApp and HP rush to scoop up flash technology in much the same way they did data deduplication companies a few years ago.

That, no doubt, played into EMC’s decision to snap up XtremIO.

One reason for the battle is that flash storage’s ultra-high performance characteristics address specific applications that are on the leading edge of corporate IT projects — namely cloud, virtualization and web-based services.

For example, cloud service providers want arrays that have the ability to offer multi-tenancy, or many users on a single server or array, but without hitting I/O performance. Virtual Desktop Infrastructures (VDIs) place a heavy I/O burden on servers when large corporate deployments boot up in the morning and shut down and refresh at night.

Although Dell declined to comment on whether it’s in the hunt for flash storage vendors, a NetApp spokesperson said by e-mail that the company is "always on the lookout for opportunities to acquire technology and businesses that complement and enhance our product and solution portfolio.

"We cannot disclose details around our interest in a specific space or target," the spokesperson said. "NetApp remains interested in pursuing corporate development opportunities that help us to gain share, whether it be through acquisitions, strategic partnerships, and/or reseller agreements."

When it came to an XtremIO deal, both NetApp and Dell were at a disadvantage. EMC had been an investor in the company from the beginning, according to at least two sources.

More importantly, EMC was not looking for just another flash hardware product, Peters said. It wanted XtremIO’s flash management intellectual property — the software.

In remarks after the purchase, EMC spokesman Dave Farmer did not refer to XtremIO’s product as a flash array but as "an architecture."

"EMC, whatever else you may think of them, doesn’t do a lot of stupid things," Peters said. "For the next few years, the industry will be focused on storage management and not flash technology."

Lucas Mearian covers storage, disaster recovery and business continuity, financial services infrastructure and health care IT for Computerworld. Follow Lucas on Twitter at @lucasmearian or subscribe to Lucas’s RSS feed. His e-mail address is lmearian@computerworld.com.

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A team of Israeli scientists offer hope in treating autoimmune diseases, such as Crohn’s, lupus, rheumatoid arthritis.

Rachel Hirshfeld, May 10, 2012

A team of Israeli scientists from the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot may have achieved a breakthrough in treating autoimmune diseases, such as Crohn’s, lupus and rheumatoid arthritis, in which the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks healthy tissue rather than invading germs.

The scientists managed to “trick” the immune systems of mice into targeting an enzyme known as MMP-9, one of a family of proteins essential for processes including healing wounds. When the enzyme gets out of control, however, MMP-9 facilitates autoimmune diseases as well as the spread of cancer.

President of the Israeli Biophysical Society Irit Sagi and her research group spent years looking for ways to block MMP-9. They first tried making a synthetic drug molecule targeting MMPs, attempting to mimic the body’s MMP inhibitors, known as TIMPs. However, the efforts proved largely ineffective and had extremely severe side effects.

Subsequently, Netta Sela-Passwell, a graduate student in Sagi’s lab, decided to work on a solution, whereby a vaccine was used to trick the immune system into creating natural antibodies against MMP-9. It works in the same way that a vaccine containing a dead virus induces the immune system to create antibodies ready to attack the live virus.

Together with Prof. Abraham Shanzer of the Weizmann’s organic chemistry department, the researchers created an artificial version of the metal zinc-histidine complex at the heart of MMP-9. They then injected these small, synthetic molecules into mice.

Blood tests done on the mice following the procedure showed the presence of antibodies the scientists dubbed “metallobodies,” which are similar to TIMPs in structure and function. In lab experiments, they saw that the metallobodies bound tightly to both the mouse and human versions of MMP-2 and MMP-9.

They then induced an inflammatory condition that mimics Crohn’s disease in mice, and watched how the metallobodies operated. To the scientists’ great delight, the Crohn’s symptoms were successfully prevented.

“We are excited not only by the potential of this method to treat Crohn’s, but by the potential of using this approach to explore novel treatments for many other diseases,” said Sagi, who is president of the Israeli Biophysical Society.

Yeda Research and Development Company, the technology transfer arm of the Weizmann Institute, has applied for a patent for the synthetic immunization molecules as well as the generated metallobodies.

www.israelnationalnews.com

Ricardo Geromel, Contributor

Covering global economic issues with a focus on Brazil

Investing

May 4, 2012, Forbes

What is Google Up To in Israel ?

I visited Google’s office in Tel Aviv where about 50 people work in Marketing & Sales and over 200 in the engineers department. Yes, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google founders, are Jewish. However,  this post has no religious orientation. If you are looking for some sort of religious conspiracy theory go elsewhere, here you will learn only about what Google is really up to in Israel.

Google office in downtown Tel Aviv

Google first opened its office in Israel in 2006. I visited two of the four floors used by Google on the 21^st and 22^nd floors of the famous Levinstein Tower in downtown Tel Aviv. Although not as impressive as the famed Googleplex in Mountain View, California, the offices offer magnificent views of the Mediterranean sea. Each room has its own theme, with walls and furnishings of all colors. There is a meeting room filled with giant legos, a pinball machine, Nintendo Wii, Playstation and other games. There is also a fully equipped music room with guitars, drums, microphones, professional sound system, etc. Add to that a silent room, a 3D printer, and free food at each floor. The feeling of being in a kindergarten almost made me forget that I was in one of the world’s largest multinational companies.

Google also employs about 80 engineers in its second office in Israel located in Haifa, Israel’s technological center. The Haifa office is just 2 thousand meters away from the beach; I saw pictures but I did not visit that office. The second office also has toys in the lobby, game rooms, beanbag chairs, free food, and so on. Some affirm these Google methods do not enhance creativity. Personally, I believe that, at least, it incentives employees to spend more time together and create stronger personal bonds, which will pay off later by increasing team work.  Here is a video about work-life balance at Google Israel.

After visiting the premises, Inna Weiner, a software engineer, presented products and services that have started and/or  are being developed in Israel:

Live Results is being developed in Israel. It allows people to find data they are looking for directly in the Google webpage, without the need to click on a link that will direct visitors to a website. For instance, you search “Weather in Rio de Janeiro” and it directly shows the forecast instead of only links to websites (in case you are curious, it is 25 degrees Celsius in the Beautiful city today). I believe Live Results is an effort to make users spend more time in the Google page. By the way,  in April, it was the first time people spent more time on Facebook than on Google in Brazil.

Person finder application. An app that was very useful during the Turkey Earthquake. Whenever a natural disaster takes place, the person finder application goes live, aiming to provide reliable and actual information about missing people. People basically have two buttons, “I am looking for someone” and “I have info about someone.”. I enjoy this kind of innovation; it makes me think of Chief Almir using Google Earth to fight deforestation in the Amazon rainforest. The person finder application was developed as part of the 20% of free time that engineers have at Google to work on any project of their choice, as long as that project has been approved by their superior. Bear in mind that whatever is developed during these 20% of “free time” is owned by Google, not by the employees. By the way, people in the Sales & Mktg department don’t have the 20% of free time privilege. However, in the Tel Aviv office they can still use the 3D printer and eat for free all day long.

Google Suggest – The Autocomplete Search Tool that let us “search faster than the speed of typing” was fully developed in Israel. Personally, I find this tool way too intrusive. I don’t like to have the impression that I am so dumb that an algorithm can predict what I am about to search for. I am afraid that tomorrow a machine will know what I am about to think.

Digital Dead Sea Scrolls Project. Google has digitized one of the oldest manuscript ever discovered and allows everyone to examine it online with high resolution. For instance, if you search for “And the world shall dwell with the lamb,” you can instantly find the exact location in the digital version of the original scroll. This project was such a success that in the first day it was live more people saw the dead sea scrolls than in the entire year before.

Inna was very excited to present the work Google has done with the Yad Vashem memorial, dedicated to victims of the Holocaust. This collaboration has created an online collaborative archive of photographs of the museum. Basically, Google uploaded thons of physical documents, such as photos. Anyone, anywhere can not only find information about each person and/or location in the pictures but also easily add information.

Google Insights for search started in Israel and now is being improved by Google engineers all over the world. It is a free tool to analyze search queries. However, only ratios and not the total number of queries are revealed. For instance, you can verify that the total amount of searches for the term “Pele” was about three times higher than ”Maradona” in the past 30 days.

In-Page Analytics was fully developed in Israel. Basically, it lets you quantify precise information about your website. For instance, you can measure the percentage of visitors who clicked on any clickable item in your website.
Receive emails through SMS in Ghana. Google Israel developed an app that allows people to receive emails in SMS format. In Ghana, just like in Guinea Conakry where I worked, broadband internet is not widespread. However, most people have cell phones. When you send an email to someone registered in this service, the person receives the email as a SMS. I hope Google has found a better way of filtering spams than in regular Gmail.

Interactive videos in youtube started in Israel and was taken to Mountain View to be fully developed.

“Got the wrong Bob” for Gmail, Priority inbox for Gmail, Hot topics and hot searches, all started in the Israel office.

Jonathan Riftin, Industry Analyst based in Tel Aviv, explained the Structure of the Marketing & Sales team in Israel:

In Tel Aviv, the Marketing & Sales team only supports big clients. Small and medium businesses are handled by the Mktg & Sales office in Dublin. The Mktg & Sales team is divided in small groups. Each group contains a client manager, account strategists and industry analysts. Client managers are responsible for meeting and handling large accounts, which can be the government, big Israeli companies, universities, and so on. Industry Analysts main tasks are to follow trends and complete market research. For instance, if an airline company wants to open a direct flight from Tel Aviv to Sao Paulo, the industry analyst will measure the amount of queries relating Israel and Brazil and come up with an estimated price of the related sponsored search terms. The estimative is then validated by the client manager who will present it to the prospective client. Account strategists are responsible for building and assisting online campaigns. If an agency builds the online campaign for a client, the account strategist will monitor it and suggest ways to improve the campaign, always focusing on maximizing ROI.

I have also visited Google’s office in the center of Paris. To my surprise, I found out that the Sales & marketing teams are designed in very similar manners worldwide. When Jonathan Riftin, Industry Analyst based in Tel Aviv, explained what the Sales & Marketing team does in Israel, it was like replaying the speech I heard a month ago from Christian Vigne, account strategist at Google Paris, explaining what he does in France.

When asked about the main differences between the Tel Aviv office and the Paris office or any other Google office worldwide regarding the Sales & Marketing teams, the answer was, “Besides cultural differences, the view in the office!” They quickly added that the special ingredient and main reason why Google has such an important R&D center in Israel is because of the quality of Israeli engineers.

Reprinted from Daily Alert, Friday, April 20, 2012

Teachers from Rural U.S. on Educational Journey to Poland and Israel – Corinne Lestch
17 teachers from schools across the U.S. are still processing an emotionally powerful trip to Poland and Israel to deepen their understanding of the Holocaust, and bring back their experiences to the classroom. "We’re using the Holocaust as a lens to teach social justice, and we wanted to concentrate on teachers who have very little access to resources or survivors," said Sondra Perl, an English professor who helped create the Holocaust Educators Network at Lehman College.
    "They’re addressing local issues in their own home states around injustice, tolerance, bullying, racism. Most of them are not Jewish." "Poland broke my heart, and Israel blew my mind," Perl recalled a teacher from Idaho saying. (New York Daily News)

Free Israeli Cataract Clinics Treat 1,000 Ethiopians – Rivka Borochov (Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
    When the seven-person crew from the Israeli volunteer organization Eye from Zion arrived in a remote region in Ethiopia in February to provide free cataract surgery, they were expecting several dozen patients. 1,400 showed up.
    The organization has performed the 20-minute procedure on thousands of people in Asian and African countries.
    After an initial 170 operations in the regions of Debark and Gondar, Eye from Zion founder Nati Marcus planned to return with another team of four eye doctors, a couple of nurses and a technician over the course of the year to finish the job for those on the waiting list.
    No one at Eye from Zion receives any money for their services.

Israeli Defense Firm to Add 100 Jobs in Maryland (Baltimore Sun)
    ELTA North America, a subsidiary of Israel Aerospace Industries Ltd., has opened a location in Maple Lawn in Howard County, Md., where it plans to create 100 new jobs, the state Department of Business and Economic Development said Wednesday.
    Most of ELTA’s employees are scientists, engineers, programmers and technicians who develop products for the armed services.

New Israeli Technology to Recycle Cellulose in Sludge – Karin Kloosterman (Green Prophet)
    Refael Aharon, the CEO and founder of Applied Clean Tech, says his company has refined the process of turning the cellulose in sludge – toilet paper, fecal matter and washing machine lint – into new paper.
    The finished product has no odor and poses no biological hazard. "It’s a real recycled paper," Aharon says.
    The company is already using its cellulose-based raw material in envelopes.

U.S.-Israel 3-D Printer-Makers Merge, Form $1.4B Company – Nataleeya Boss (Twin Cities Business)
    Eden Prairie, Minn.-based 3-D printer manufacturer Stratasys, Inc., will soon merge with Objet, Ltd., a Rehovot, Israel-based company that also makes 3-D printers, the companies said Monday. The equity value of the combined company will total approximately $1.4 billion.

Sony unveils its first smartphone, to arrive in Israel next month. “Israel is the second biggest market in terms of smartphones.”

Elad Benari & Yoni Kempinski, Arutz Sheva, March 15, 2012

Sony Mobile’s first smartphone, the Xperia S, will arrive in Israel in April, and it was officially presented at a special news conference on Wednesday. Arutz Sheva was there.

Sony’s products are popular in Israel and, during 2012, Sony Mobile plans to open four new concept stores across the country, which will be joining an existing store at the Ayalon Mall in Ramat Gan.

The new stores will offer smartphones, but also a large variety of unique accessories.

[youtube:126225]

Antony Barounas, a Vice President at Sony Mobile’s customer unit, told Arutz Sheva that in terms of technology, Israel is the “best of the best.”

“The Israeli market for us at Sony is the second biggest market in terms of smartphones, on a worldwide basis,” said Barounas. “First is Singapore, second is Israel.”

The reason Israel ranking so high, he explained, is that Israelis always want the best and want it earlier than the rest of the market.

“You have a 78 percent penetration in the smartphone business, whereas in Europe it’s only 45,” said Barounas. “These are amazing numbers, and that’s why we’re here.”

www.israelnationalnews.com

What’s new on the app stores on Monday 12 March 2012

Khan Academy’s iPad app includes more than 2,700 educational videos

A selection of 18 new apps for you today:

Khan Academy

Armed with the promise that it “allows you to learn almost anything for free”, educational site Khan Academy now has an iPad app providing access to its 2,700+ videos, covering everything from maths, biology and physics to finance and history.
iPad

Watch with eBay

This is US-only for the moment, but it’s a fascinating take on second-screen apps from eBay. The idea: find auction listings relating to whatever TV show you’re watching at the time, from branded sports apparel to DVDs and signed autographs. There’s also a feature focused on celebrities’ charity causes, spotlighting related items.
iPad

Williams F1 iPredictor

The Williams Formula 1 team has launched a new iPhone app in time for the new season, which gets fans to predict events in each race to earn points: from the top six cars to the total number of safety car appearances. Players have to log in via Facebook, with a prize of a guest slot at a Williams practice day on offer to the winner.
iPhone

Secret Agent Splat’s Mission

Harper Collins’ latest book-app brings Splat the Cat to iOS, as the feisty feline goes on a search for some missing toy ducks. That’s cue for a story, as well as three spy-themed mini-games for children to play.
iPhone / iPad

iA Writer

Marvellous minimalist word-processor app iA Writer is already available on iPad and Mac, but now the former version has been made Universal so it works on iPhone and iPod touch too. And all three sync documents using iCloud.
iPhone

Dolphin Browser

Innovative gesture-based browser Dolphin has been a big hit on Android, but now it’s available for RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook too. Tabbed browsing is blended with a system to trace symbols on the screen to access your favourite websites – a ‘G’ for Google and so on.
BlackBerry PlayBook

Cleantech Group, World Wildlife Fund release first-ever global cleantech innovation ranking. Denmark, Israel and Sweden dominate top-three slots

Reprinted from YNet News, March 1, 2012

Going green, going strong: Israel is among the top-three nations worldwide that provide the best conditions for clean technology startup companies, a recent ranking by the CleanTech Group stated. Topping the list was Denmark, followed by Israel, Sweden, Finland and the United States.

“Coming Clean: The Global Cleantech Innovation Index 2012,” is a first-of-its-kind ranking, complied by the CleanTech Group and the World Wildlife Fund. It listed the top 38 countries worldwide to offer clean energy projects the most favorable conditions.

The report explored clean energy opportunities in each of the 38 countries. The evaluation was based on a 15-indicators scale, which reviewed the creation and commercialization of cleantech start-ups according their potential in relation to their economic size, and innovation projections for the next 10 years.

In 2011, Israel was ranked the world’s fourth-leading nation in cleantech investments.

“Israel leads the pack in its capacity to produce new innovative cleantech companies per capita,” The report said.

According to the report, the two factors that kept Israel out of the top spot are its small domestic market, and “the lack of government support for cleantech development.”

“The global macro-economic landscape is shifting; fostering entrepreneurial start-ups and growth companies with clean technology solutions will be an increasingly important part of countries’ competitiveness on the world stage,” Richard Youngman, of the Cleantech Group said.

“This index shows that several countries are on the right track, but clearly much more needs to be done if we are to properly address climate change and achieve a transition towards a global 100% renewable future,” Samantha Smith of the WWF’s Global Climate and Energy Initiative, said.

Washington, Feb 23, 2012, PTI :

Reprinted from Deccan Herald

Researchers have identified an anti-ageing protein that can extend life span of mice by 16 per cent, a finding they say also offers hope for humans.
A team at the Bar-Ilan University in Israel found that the protein called sirtuin helped male mince live about 16 per cent longer than average, the first such advance for mammals in a field that has so far offered the blessings of extended life span only to yeast, nematodes and fruit flies.
Although the scientists, who detailed their findings in the journal Nature, cannot explain why female mice didn’t also live longer like the males, their research has been hailed as remarkable that has brought the anti-ageing research to a new level of maturity, LiveScience reported.
Mammals, including humans, have seven types of sirtuins, called SIRT1 to SIRT7. Scientists are not sure what these proteins do, although there is some evidence suggesting that they might help prevent chronic diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular disease.
Sirtuin was first came to news in 1999, when researchers found that a certain sirtuin called Sir2 could extend life span in yeast by 30 percent. Studies that followed on worms and flies have had mixed results, and some researchers have started to question whether sirtuins could control life span in more complicated life forms.

The Israeli researchers, led by Yariv Kanfi, now focused on SIRT6. The team had previously found that mice genetically bred to have lots of SIRT6 could get fat on rich diets yet show no signs of heart disease, fatty liver disease and other diseases associated with obesity.
So, they simply let the SIRT6 enhanced mice to live a natural life and found that male mice lived longer, about 16 per cent longer on average, than regular mice kept in the same conditions. But, the female mice with the SIRT6 gene didn’t live longer than regular mice.

By Abigail Klein Leichman
February 16, 2012

They’re weird enough for science fiction, but real enough to work – ISRAEL21c explores some of the strangest scientific developments coming out of Israel today.

In 10 years of covering science and technology developments on ISRAEL21c, we’ve come across virtually everything – from the revolutionary, to the ingenious, the exciting, and even occasionally the downright wacky. And sometimes it’s a bit of everything combined.

We’ve brought together a list of our top 10 weird science favorites, ranging from trees that text message farmers when they are thirsty, to rodent security officers, internal bras, artificial noses, and disappearing dog poo.
Be sure to check our site for more weird (and not-so-weird) scientific advances in Israel.

1. Trees SMS farmers when they’re thirsty

Eran Raveh installing his tree messaging system.

A device in development by Eran Raveh and Arieh Nadler from the Israel Agriculture Ministry’s Volcani Agricultural Research Organization taps into the stem of a tree and allows it to text or email the farmer — or even turn on the irrigation tap itself — when it needs a drink.

Instead of tediously checking 26 points in the ground around the plant, farmers would use the system to automatically monitor electric conductivity inside the tree, a parameter of water stress. Still a few years from the market, the device has already caught the interest of California citrus, banana and mango farmers, as well as vintners. It will be cheap, too, costing only about $250 per orchard because just one probe could monitor some 500 trees.

2. Test-tube testes

Growing sperm in a Petri dish.

In what could be a breakthrough for infertile men, researchers from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and Soroka University Medical Center in Beersheva, along with a German scientist, have invented a special three-dimensional agar culture system (SACS) that allows them to generate sperm from stem cells in a Petri dish.

They are investigating the application of their technique in men with zero sperm count at Israeli IVF clinics. They are also testing it on the germ cells of a young boy who has undergone radiation treatment. It could take up to 10 years until the product is on the market, but lead investigator Prof. Mahmoud Huleihel believes that they have achieved a significant advance in producing viable sperm from germ cells for the first time.

3. Cup & Up is like an internal bra

Cup & Up is attached to the ribs through two small incisions.

The Cup & Up kit devised by an Israeli startup uses the MIM technique (minimally invasive mastopexy) to reshape, support and lift breast tissue in a much more minimally invasive manner than cosmetic breast surgery. The procedure requires two small incisions through which the device is attached to the ribs.

Inventor Dr. Eyal Gur, head of the department of reconstructive and aesthetic surgery at Tel Aviv’s Sourasky Medical Center, calls it an internal bra. "All women are looking for the right bra that will hold their breasts in the position they like or prefer aesthetically. … So I was thinking that with a harness created from materials used in medicine — silicon, threads and very small anchoring screws — we could support breast tissue and avoid further breast sagging."

4. Love detectors and lie detectors

Netanya-based Nemesysco makes layered voice analysis (LVA) software products that can turn a desktop computer into a highly sensitive stress and lie detector (think job interview or insurance fraud) and can detect love and other relevant emotions over a Skype or telephone conversation — in just milliseconds through normal speech.

The 8,000-algorithm-powered software is touted as "a decision support tool in various cases, such as when making an important purchase decision, hiring home care assistance or negotiating personal issues," not to mention numerous commercial, crime-investigation and security applications.

5. Disappearing dog doo

The prototype AshPoopie.

AshPoopie, the brainchild of renowned biotech inventor Prof. Oded Shoseyov of the Hebrew University, is a pooper-scooper with a critical difference: After it gathers dog droppings, it turns them into odorless, sterile ash within seconds. All the dog-walker has to do is push a button to release an activation capsule from the cartridge inside the unit.

With about 75 million registered dogs in the United States and the same number in Europe, it’s no surprise that some of the biggest pet product manufacturers and retailers are interested in partnerships, licensing agreements, joint ventures and sole marketing rights from the manufacturer, Ramat Gan-based Paulee CleanTec. The product will be on the market this year.

6. Sniffing out cancer

Prof. Hossam Haick: the nose knows.

NA-NOSE, an inexpensive "nano-artificial nose" developed and being commercialized by Technion-Israel Institute of Technology Prof. Hossam Haick, detects disease biomarkers passing from the bloodstream to the lungs and out through the breath. The device can even distinguish between lung, prostate, breast, head, neck and colorectal cancers — without blood tests or biopsies.

This revolutionary nanotechnology invention won Haick a €1.73 million Marie Curie Excellence Award in 2006 and a €1.8 million European Research Council award in 2010. An additional €5.4 million grant is funding a European consortium of eight universities and companies, headed by Haick, to develop advanced screening nanosensors for lung cancer.

7. The latest in high-tech security — a mouse

The mouse finds the drugs every time.

Israeli startup Bioexplorers has a non-invasive and easy method to detect contraband in purses, luggage and cargo: trained rodents. "Mice have an excellent sense of smell, and they’re relatively easy to train," explains CEO Eran Lumbroso.

When a person goes through a Bioexplorers system passageway, a fan blows air into a sensor receptor and delivers it into a chamber containing several trained mice. If they sniff drugs or bombs, they move into another chamber and set off an alarm. "The mice rarely make an error, and the entire procedure is far less invasive or intimidating than the alternatives, like using dogs or X-ray machines," says Lumbroso.

8. Robotic fly

The robotic fly now being commercialized is even smaller than the prototype shown here.

It looks like a pesky fly, but don’t swat this one — it is actually a miniaturized device cooked up in Prof. Moshe Shaham’s robotics laboratory at the Technion Institute of Technology in Haifa. Based on micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) technology, the tiny robot theoretically can be guided inside the body via an external controller to perform a variety of medical tasks in a much less invasive way than currently possible.

Shaham says the technology recently went from the lab to a company that is now working to commercialize it. "The first application will be to make sure artificial shunts in the body are functioning properly," he says. He couldn’t speculate on exactly when it will be on the market.

9. Wrinkle-reducing pillowcase

Sleeping your way to smoother skin.

No, this is not about ironing your linens. The Israeli company Cupron makes a range of textile products impregnated with copper oxide, including a pillowcase that it claims can reduce facial lines after sleeping on it for two weeks. As you sleep, perspiration from your skin releases copper ions from the case, which stimulate the production of collagen, helping to reduce fine lines and wrinkles.

Other products the company manufactures in Beit Shemesh include bath towels that don’t retain odors, a self-sterilizing makeup brush set, socks that fight athlete’s foot, and even socks, already in use by the Israel Defense Force, that don’t have to be washed.

10. Robotic octopus

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commons

Better than a real octopus.

Life scientists from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem are part of an international team designing the world’s first robotic octopus — also the world’s first soft-bodied robot — to help marine scientists explore nooks and crannies on the ocean floor. Unlike clunky submarines, the eight-tentacled device would gingerly walk over delicate objects without damaging coral reefs and pristine marine environments.

The initial goal of the project is to monitor the effects of global warming on the sea, but it also could have important applications in surgery, search-and-rescue missions after devastating natural disasters. Using artificial muscle technologies, the scientists hope to replicate not only the way an octopus moves, but also its sucker systems, nervous and sensory systems and the structure of its skin. Due date is 2013.

Israel, whose population of 7.8 million is similar in size to Switzerland’s, has about 60 companies traded on the Nasdaq, the most of any country outside the U.S. after China. The nation is also home to the largest number of startup companies per capita in the world.

By Tal Barak Harif – Jan 25, 2012, Bloomberg

BioLineRx Ltd. (.BLRXARB) surged in New York trading, widening the premium versus its Tel Aviv shares to a record, on bets the biopharmaceutical company will be acquired following its licensing agreement for a hepatitis C treatment.

BioLineRx’s American depositary receipts jumped 69 percent on the Nasdaq Stock Market yesterday, swelling the premium to the Israeli stock to 28 percent. The Tel Aviv shares soared 25 percent at 10:28 a.m. in Tel Aviv today. The Bloomberg Israel-US 25 Index (ISRA25BN) of the largest Israeli companies traded in New York rose 0.1 percent to 92.53. Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. (CHKP) led gains after Topeka Capital Markets Inc. recommended buying shares of the maker of network security equipment.

BioLineRx’s agreement with French company Genoscience to develop and sell a hepatitis C pill treatment boosts the odds that the Jerusalem-based company will be bought, according to Morgan Joseph TriArtisan Group. Bristol-Myers (BMY) Squibb Co. and Gilead Sciences Inc. (GILD) announced $13.3 billion of acquisitions in the past two months to buy developers of hepatitis treatments.

“The fact that BioLineRx now has a highly novel hepatitis C drug in its armory should make the company an appealing target for strategic partners,” Raghuram Selvaraju, a New York-based equity analyst at Morgan Joseph TriArtisan, said by e-mail yesterday. “The hepatitis C viral infection space is an area that has been particularly hot recently.”

The Bloomberg Israel-US 25 Index has gained 10 percent this year, outperforming the Nasdaq Composite Index’s (CCMP) 7 percent advance and the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index’s 4.5 percent increase. A 14 percent jump in Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (TEVA), the world’s largest maker of generic drugs, has helped pushed the Israel-US 25 higher. The TA-25 stock index rose 0.3 percent to 1,126.06 today.

BioLineRx ‘Euphoria’

Bristol-Myers, a biopharmaceutical company based in New York, said on Jan. 7 it would pay about $2.5 billion in cash to buy Inhibitex Inc. (INHX), which is developing an oral drug called INX-189 for treating hepatitis C. Pharmasset Inc. (VRUS), based in Princeton, New Jersey, agreed to be acquired by Gilead Sciences for $10.8 billion in a deal announced on Nov. 21.

Gilead, the world’s largest maker of HIV drugs, offered the highest premium on record for a drug takeover of comparable size, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

As many as 170 million people worldwide carry the hepatitis C virus, a blood-borne disease that can lead to liver cirrhosis and cancer, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. The market for medicines to treat the disease is about $3 billion worldwide, said Andrew Berens, a senior health-care analyst with Bloomberg Industries.

“The euphoria you’re seeing is mostly related to the fact that the announcement makes the company an acquisition target,” Berens said in a phone interview from Skillman, New Jersey. “An oral drug is what everyone is trying to develop because the current injection treatments are toxic and cumbersome.”

Volumes Surge

BioLineRx’s ADRs rose to $5.55 yesterday after the shares in Tel Aviv climbed 37 percent to 1.65 shekels, or the equivalent of 44 cents. One ADR represents 10 shares. The Tel Aviv shares rose to 2.06 shekels, or 55 cents, today.

Phone messages and e-mails sent to Garth Russell, a spokesman for BioLineRx from an external public-relations company, seeking comments on a potential buyout weren’t returned.

Trading volumes on the stock soared yesterday, with more than 6 million BioLineRx ADRs exchanging hands, compared with an average of 7,000 trades a day, according to Bank of New York Mellon Corp.

The Israeli biopharmaceutical company, whose largest shareholder is Teva (BLRX), listed the ADRs on the Nasdaq Stock Market on July 25.

Israel, whose population of 7.8 million is similar in size to Switzerland’s, has about 60 companies traded on the Nasdaq, the most of any country outside the U.S. after China. The nation is also home to the largest number of startup companies per capita in the world.

Venture Capital

Israeli technology companies raised $2.14 billion in 2011, 70 percent more than in 2010, according to the IVC-KPMG Quarterly Survey e-mailed yesterday.

Check Point, the world’s second-largest maker of network security equipment, climbed 1.2 percent to $56.52 in New York, the highest closing price since Nov. 16.

Shares will probably gain 38 percent to $78 in the next 12 months, Frederick Ziegel, an analyst at Topeka Capital Markets, wrote in an e-mailed report yesterday where he rated the company a “buy” in initial coverage.

EZchip Semiconductor Ltd. (EZCH), a maker of network processors that counts U.S. Internet infrastructure company Juniper Networks Inc. (JNPR) as a customer, gained 3.5 percent to $34.02, swelling the premium versus its Tel Aviv shares to $1.48, the widest among the dually-listed companies. EZchip climbed 5.4 percent to 129.60 shekels, or $34.32, today.

Bottomed Out

The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index (SOX), which investors use to track chip industry performance, added 0.4 percent yesterday, extending this year’s gain to 14 percent.

Texas Instruments Inc. (TXN), the world’s largest maker of analog chips, said on Jan. 24 that fourth-quarter sales and profit declined less than analysts had predicted, signaling to brokerage Benchmark Co. that the market for electronic components has bottomed out.

“The chipmakers group seems to be on an upper inflection point,” Gary Mobley, an analyst at Benchmark, said by phone from New York yesterday. “Companies are talking about an end of inventory depletion and see increases in bookings.”

Perrigo Co. (PRGO), the largest U.S. maker of generic over-the- counter drugs, fell 2.1 percent in the U.S. to $97.54 yesterday after its shares in Tel Aviv gained 0.3 percent to 373.50 shekels, or the equivalent of $98.65. The $1.11 discount was the biggest among dually-listed companies. The Tel Aviv shares dropped 0.8 percent to 370.50 shekels, or $98.12, today.

To contact the reporter on this story: Tal Barak Harif in New York at tbarak@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Emma O’Brien at eobrien6@bloomberg.net