- Pioneer, Exxon Shares Fall After News of Federal Investigation Into Deal The Wall Street Journal
- Majority Leader Schumer Statement On The FTC Investigating Exxon’s Proposed Blockbuster Merger With Pioneer After He Urged FTC To Examine Deal For Anticompetitive Harms | Senate Democratic Leadership Senate Democratic Leadership
- Federal Trade Commission is investigating ExxonMobil’s $60B deal to acquire a Texas oil company Yahoo Finance
- FTC Investigates Exxon’s $60 Billion Deal for Pioneer The Wall Street Journal
- Exxon, Pioneer receive second US FTC request for details on pending takeover Reuters
Tag Archives: Pioneer
Messi to play in Minnesota? A soccer fan’s dream closer to reality – St. Paul Pioneer Press
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How British synthpop pioneer Martyn Ware helped launch Tina Turner’s unlikely ’80s comeback: ‘She had very little to lose by trying new stuff’ – Yahoo Entertainment
- How British synthpop pioneer Martyn Ware helped launch Tina Turner’s unlikely ’80s comeback: ‘She had very little to lose by trying new stuff’ Yahoo Entertainment
- Tina Turner suffered from kidney disease before her death: ‘I have put myself in great danger’ Fox News
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- Tina Turner died believing her mum didn’t want her: ‘She didn’t want another kid’ Yahoo New Zealand News
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New Gene-Editing Biotech Aera Therapeutics From Pioneer Feng Zhang
- CRISPR pioneer Feng Zhang is building a new gene-editing startup, Insider has learned.
- Aera Therapeutics is working to improve the delivery of CRISPR — a key challenge in gene-editing.
- Arch Venture Partners and GV have invested in Aera, which has raised about $200 million.
CRISPR pioneer Feng Zhang is in the process of launching yet another ambitious gene-editing startup, backed by approximately $200 million from some of biotech’s biggest investors, Insider has exclusively learned.
The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based biotech, named Aera Therapeutics, hopes to crack a persistent challenge in the gene-editing field: delivering genetic goods, including CRISPR, into different organs inside the body. Based on some of Zhang’s research published last year, Aera is developing better gene carriers to reach more cells and organs than currently possible, ultimately hoping to expand the number of diseases that CRISPR can treat.
Aera is still in stealth mode, meaning it hasn’t been publicly announced. Insider confirmed its existence by reviewing corporate filings along with interviewing people familiar with the company.
Aera Therapeutics could be the FedEx of gene-editing companies
Genetic technologies like CRISPR and mRNA have rapidly progressed in the past few years, but how to deliver these medicines into the body remains a “multibillion-dollar question,” said Josh Wolfe, a cofounder and managing partner of the VC firm Lux Capital. Wolfe compared the opportunity to the rise of delivery giants FedEx and UPS, which grew alongside the internet and online commerce.
“I am convinced the most important piece of the next chapter is who is going to be the FedEx and UPS to do targeted delivery, not to a town or a city, but to a specific apartment or home, or in this case, a specific cell or organ,” Wolfe told Insider.
Aera was incorporated in September 2021, shortly after Zhang’s research was published in Science. The company currently is hiring up and has already acquired VNV, a Lux-backed biotech startup that was pursuing a similar delivery idea, according to Jason Shepherd, a University of Utah neurobiologist who cofounded VNV and now consults for Aera.
Aera has recently hired a CEO and raised about $200 million, Shepherd added, although he declined to name the CEO.
The startup’s only backers listed in its Massachusetts corporate filings are Arch Venture Partners and GV, with Arch’s managing partner Robert Nelsen, GV venture partner Issi Rozen, and GV general partner David Schenkein listed as the company’s current officers and directors. Nelsen and GV both declined to comment.
Aera is the latest company founded by CRISPR pioneer Feng Zhang
Zhang is not listed on the corporate filings, but is a cofounder of the company, says Shepherd.
The 40-year-old Zhang has become a prolific gene-editing researcher and company creator at the Broad Institute. Aera is at least the seventh startup Zhang has cofounded, joining a list that includes base-editing biotech Beam Therapeutics, CRISPR company Editas Medicine, and gene-editing startup Arbor Biotechnologies. Zhang did not respond to an interview request from Insider.
Genetic medicines have two key parts: the cargo and the container. For a gene-editing medicine, for instance, the cargo is the DNA-modifying CRISPR. The container is the packaging that carries that cargo into the body and inside of cells.
Most of Zhang’s previous startups — and the vast majority of the gene-editing field — have focused on developing new cargo.
The space has gravitated to using two types of containers: lipid nanoparticles, which are microscopic balls of fat, or hollowed-out viruses. Both have limitations. Lipid nanoparticles tend to land in the liver, which is ideal for editing liver cells but less helpful in reaching other organs. Hollowed-out viruses can only fit a tiny amount of cargo inside, and many biotechs are grappling with toxicity issues, as the body’s immune system reacts to a foreign virus.
Aera hopes its approach can reach more organs and cause less of an immune reaction, Shepherd said.
A surprise discovery about a memory gene leads to a new delivery idea
Jason Shepherd
While Area is based in a Cambridge biotech incubator called Alexandria LaunchLabs, some if its research came from Shepherd’s neurobiology lab in Utah. He studied a memory-forming protein in our brains called ARC, and found that it evolved from, and even acts like, a virus. This protein forms shells that viruses use to protect themselves and enter cells.
Shepherd published his findings in a 2018 Cell paper, and venture-capitalists came calling, interested in seeing if this ARC protein could be a new delivery tool to deliver RNA into cells.
Lux and Shepherd started a stealth biotech to see if it could use the ARC protein to deliver a desired piece of RNA. Just as that startup — called VNV, or Virus Not Virus — was gearing up to start animal testing and raise a Series A, Zhang published a Science paper in August 2021. That study found there were many virus-like particles in the human body like ARC.
While the ARC protein seems tailored for brain delivery, Zhang’s suite of proteins could reach other organs, Shepherd said.
Zhang called his system SEND — a loose-fitting acronym for Selective Endogenous eNcapsidation for cellular Delivery.
“The biomedical community has been developing powerful molecular therapeutics, but delivering them to cells in a precise and efficient way is challenging,” Zhang said in an August 2021 statement about his research. “SEND has the potential to overcome these challenges.”
Zhang initially named the startup TranSEND, but renamed it this past July to Aera after running into copyright concerns, Shepherd said. Shepherd added the company isn’t exclusively focused on delivery, as it also has licensed in some of Zhang’s research on gene-editing technologies.
“The promise of being able to impact something as important as gene therapy is super exciting,” Shepherd said.
Specialists pioneer new procedure in Trinidad and Tobago
Features
Janelle De Souza
Doctors of patients with severe tricuspid regurgitation now have an option other than open heart surgery for their critical patients in TT.
The Advanced Cardiovascular Institute (ACI) has assembled a multi-disciplinary team who have successfully done minimally invasive, non-surgical heart procedures to treat valve disease and to review candidates.
Managing director at ACI and MRI of TT Christopher Camacho was happy to know patents no longer had to travel abroad to have caval valve implantation (CAVI), a minimally invasive procedure to treat severe tricuspid regurgitation, as a successful procedure was recently done in TT.
“This is personal to me because my mom passed from valve disease. I saw a patient who was very close to me while I am in the cardiac arena – I know surgeons nationally and internationally – and yet there was no option for her because no surgical option was available. She could not have her valve replaced.
“So seeing how we are maturing to where more and more patients like my mom now have an option here in Trinidad is important. It’s gratifying to me to see us make that step forward as a society.”
The breakthrough procedure was successfully performed for the first time in TT and the Caribbean region on November 30, 2021 at West Shore Private Hospital. The medical team was led by interventional cardiologist, and founder and executive chairman of Cardiovascular Associates Ltd, Dr Ronald Henry; and included professor Dr Prashant Vaijyanath, a renowned cardiothoracic surgeon from India who was trained by the manufacturers of the CAVI device; anaesthesiologist Dr Sheldon Olton and cardiothoracic surgeon Dr Wazir Mohammed.
It was done on a patient suffering from severe tricuspid regurgitation – a leaking heart valve condition associated with severe heart failure – and the patient was showing a promising outcome after six months of medical follow-ups.
The CAVI procedure involves the implantation of two valves through a small cut in the patient’s upper thigh. They are deployed using catheters and guidewires under X-ray guidance, all conducted in a special procedural room called a catheterization laboratory.
Camacho explained with age or because of different diseases, some people suffered from valvular disease. Valves in the heart make sure blood flows on one direction and at the right time. These valves can either start to leak so that blood goes in the wrong direction, or do not open well so there is less blood flow.
Tricuspid regurgitation is a condition which causes the blood to flow backwards in the upper chamber of the heart (right atrium) when the lower chamber (right ventricle) contracts. This leads to recurrent right heart failure, excessive abdominal swelling, liver congestion, swollen feet, digestive problems and chronic fatigue.
Traditionally, treating valvular disease meant open heart surgery where a surgeon would have to crack open the chest bone, stop the heart from beating, put the patient on a bypass machine, cut open the heart to access the valve, either repair or insert a prosthetic valve, and close the heart and the chest, leaving the patient with a lengthy recovery ahead.
“That process is a very invasive one and may patients, when their valve condition progresses to a certain extent and they have other comorbidities, they are not able to do surgery. The risk is rated too high for the potential benefits of the surgery, the chances of surviving is too low, and there’s nothing available for them. At that point you just try to give them the best care for the rest of the time they have.”
Camacho said CAVI is a similar procedure to transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) which is done on the aortic valve in the left ventricle of the heart. With TAVI, a new, synthetic valve is placed inside the old valve through a catheter. Once the new valve is expanded, it pushes the old valve leaflets out of the way and the tissue in the replacement valve takes over the job of regulating blood flow. Now, in many instances, it is the standard of care for someone with a bad aortic valve.
“With the successes of TAVI, researchers have been looking at the other valves but they all have complications that make them particularly challenging so that they haven’t yet been done this way.
“The tricuspid valve is not particularly amenable to the same approach as TAVI and that took them a while to figure out. Since that valve is difficult to replace where it is, they leave that dysfunctional valve inside the heart alone and put two check valves on the two main inlet valves, the inferior and superior vena cava, to prevent blood going the wrong way.”
The TricValve system procedure performed with CAVI was developed by a German company. It gained European approval in May 2021 and US approval in January 2022 but is still under trial.
He said the ACI programme worked with Vaijyanath who noted that the patient was not a good candidate for conventional valve replacement surgery because of multiple comorbidities and suggested the use of CAVI. After review, the ACI medical team medical team decided the patient would be ideal for the revolutionary new procedure.
Vaijyanath called the manufacturers who released the valve to him in India based on “compassionate use” (the patient had a fatal condition and had no other option) to bring it to TT for the patient.
The patient was discharged a few days after the procedure followed by six months of check ups and recovery before results were confirmed. Now six months post-discharge, the patient continues to demonstrate significant improvement in symptoms and requires much less medications.
“This is one of the few times little TT was able to do a procedure before the US. But more importantly it highlights our programmes at ACI at West Shore. We have embarked, with Dr Prashant Vaijyanath, into this arena of structural heart treatment. We have done several TAVI cases which highlights the partnership and success of an international expert working with local experts to successfully transfer technology.”
Henry, who is considered the pioneer of interventional cardiology in the Caribbean, explained the left side of the heart was a high pressure area which received oxygenated blood from the lungs and pumped it to the body. Meanwhile, the right side of the heart received deoxygenated blood from the body and sent it to the lungs to be oxygenated. The right side was a low pressure circuit with less wear and tear so any issues there were not natural.
“What happens when the valve goes down, usually these people are very sick. There are other problems that have caused undue stress which caused the valve the leak. It’s not natural wear and tear so even after you fix the valve problem, theses people continue to have other comorbidities.”
He said addressing the tricuspid valve surgically was always a challenge as surgeons either pinned the valve back together or placed a substitute valve in the location. Neither produced satisfactory results.
He said the CAVI procedure was more applicable to this part of the world when comparing the cost of other treatments with their expensive specialised tools, equipment and overhead costs. Those treatments, he said, were out of the reach of the average patient in the Caribbean.
However, CAVI, TAVI and stent placement generally used the same catheterization laboratory, equipment, and skill set except there were nuances to every procedure.
“The biggest change is the approach to structural heart disease where is it now collaborative. You have to get the surgeons, interventional cardiologists, anaesthesiologists, radiologists, everybody, all working within the same environment of the cath lab.”
He said even before the patient went into the procedure room, the team needed high speed and high-fidelity CAT scans to analyse veins and arteries and to use 3D reconstruction technology. They also had to take measurements so they could collaborate with manufacturers regarding the sizes of the valves. And since the valves were custom made in Germany from cow heart sacs from Brazil, there was a lag time before delivery.
He added that the valves were already constantly evolving which was not surprising because, generally, when there were “revolutionary” aspects of medical care, there was a period of rapid evolution in the early stages that eventually levelled off as they matured.
“This structural heart disease is in an explosive growth period where there is exponential knowledge. New things are coming out every year. It’s a very exciting time and a very consoling time for people who previously did not have options.”
Henry said CAVI was not standard because there were no long-term randomised trials or 20 years of data to compare. So, for now, it was only to be used on people who had severe, life-threatening leaks, on whom medical therapy had failed, and there were no other options.
He said small leaks responded well to medication so only a small number of people with valvular disease had severe leaks in the tricuspid valve. Nevertheless, the ACI team was in the process if screening patients but none had yet to be selected.
“Ten, 15 years from now when there are long-term follow up studies, then one might be able to offer it at an earlier stage. But, for now, the appropriate time to offer it is only after traditional treatments fail and the patient is in a life-threatening situation with no alternative.”
Camacho too stressed that the CAVI procedure was still relatively young and so still relatively expensive. However, he anticipated the price would reduce in time as the technology matured and there were more competitors on the market.
“I am proud to say Trinidad has led the English-speaking Caribbean in interventional cardiology, electrophysiology and now, I’m happy to see that also taking place in the structural heart arena with this team.”
Robert ‘RazerGuy’ Krakoff, Razer Co-Founder and Pioneer of the Gaming Mouse, Dies at 81
Robert “RazerGuy” Krakoff, the co-founder of Razer and pioneer of the gaming mouse, has died at the age of 81.
Krakoff passed away on April 26, 2022, and Razer shared a message on Twitter announcing the sad news.
“We are saddened by the passing of Co-Founder and President Emeritus, Robert Krakoff, known by everyone as RazerGuy,” Razer wrote. “Robert’s unwavering drive and passion for gaming lives on and continues to inspire all of us. Thank you Rob, you will be missed.”
We are saddened by the passing of Co-Founder and President Emeritus, Robert Krakoff, known by everyone as RazerGuy. Robert’s unwavering drive and passion for gaming lives on and continues to inspire all of us.
Thank you Rob, you will be missed. pic.twitter.com/2HKNcFaOj2
— R Λ Z Ξ R (@Razer) April 28, 2022
As reported by The Verge, Krakoff was instrumental in bringing the first gaming mouse – the Razer Boomslang – to market in 1999. Krakoff was working for Kärna at the time, a company that invented an “opto-mechanical encoding wheel that could track a mouse’s movements at 2000 dpi, far higher resolution than other mice at the time.”
Krakoff did not create the Razer Boomslang, but was a key figure in making it happen alongside a marketing agency called Fitch that essentially kickstarted the Razer brand we know today. This includes the name, three-headed snake logo, website, packaging, and the design and engineering of the Boomslang mouse.
Kärna went bankrupt in 2001 and Krakoff would continue on to co-found Razer with Razer’s current CEO Min-Lian Tan in 2005.
At Razer, Krakoff would become the public face of the company and would not only include a message from RazerGuy with Razer products, but he also added his e-mail to the note as well. He was also known for having interviews with up-and-coming journalists and would even give some of them jobs.
Following his time at Razer, he would start a company MindFX Science, which focused on energy drinks and supplements in hopes to sell a “healthy alternative to the highly caffeinated energy drinks and pre-workout products.”
He was also a published author under the name RM Krakoff, writing a dozen books since 2009 that ranged from fiction to nonfiction.
Krakoff is survived by his wife, Dr. Patsi Krakoff, their two children, Scott and Robin, and five “very cool” grandchildren.
Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
Hip-hop pioneer DJ Kay Slay dies of Covid aged 55 | Hip-hop
The pioneering hip-hop artist Keith Grayson, who performed as DJ Kay Slay and worked with top stars, has died of complications from Covid-19.
Grayson’s death at 55 on Sunday was confirmed by his family in a statement released through New York radio station Hot 97, where he hosted The Drama Hour for more than two decades.
“A dominant figure in hip-hop culture with millions of fans worldwide, DJ Kay Slay will be remembered for his passion and excellence with a legacy that will transcend generations,” the statement said.
Grayson grew up in Harlem, immersed in New York City’s early hip-hop scene. He got his start as a teenage graffiti artist and was featured in the 1983 hip-hop documentary Style Wars.
He began selling bootleg mixtapes on street corners in the early 90s and released his first studio album, The Streetsweeper, Vol 1, in May 2003. Grayson released several more albums and worked with the likes of Nas, Kendrick Lamar, Jadakiss and Busta Rhymes.
“Hot 97 is shocked and saddened by the loss of our beloved DJ Kay Slay,” the station said in a statement.
E.O. Wilson, a Pioneer of Evolutionary Biology, Dies at 92
“Future generations are going to forgive us our horrible genocidal wars, because it’ll pass too far in history. They will forgive us all of the earlier generations’ follies and the harm. But they will not forgive us having so carelessly thrown away a large part of the rest of life on our watch.” Edward Osborne Wilson was one of the great biologists of the 20th century, a classical naturalist drawn to wild places. “Here is a nest of the infamous fire ant.” He was the world’s foremost specialist in the biology of ants. But his mind and talent ranged far beyond insects. He was a profound thinker who developed major theories in ecology and evolution. He became an unlikely celebrity, taking center stage in two controversies of 20th-century science. Over the course of his career, he won nearly every major award in science — and two Pulitzer Prizes. “I’d like to say a word on saving biological diversity — the rest of life.” The New York Times sat down with him in his office at Harvard in March of 2008 for this interview to discuss his life and how his love of science grew out of his love of the natural world. “I believe that a child is, by nature, a hunter. I started with a butterfly collection when I was 9 years old. And I fancied myself an explorer, and decided that I would conduct an expedition and collect insects. And I started it, and I never stopped.” His early expeditions led to the description of hundreds of new species. His breakthroughs in studying social insect behavior and communication changed the way we view ourselves. “Some people have called you a modern-day Darwin. Setting aside false modesty, how does that sit with you?” “Of course, he, being the pioneer and a man of just almost unbelievable acuity, I think he’s matchless. But among current living people, I think I’m the best approach.” The early part of Wilson’s career was marked by conflict and controversy. The 1950s and ‘60s were turbulent years in science. The discovery in 1953 of the structure of DNA by Francis Crick and James Watson forever changed biology. Tensions arose between those in the new discipline of molecular biology and classical biologists, whose focus on whole organisms and species seemed old-fashioned. Perhaps no place was the rift more pronounced than at Harvard. And Edward Wilson and James Watson clashed. “He was insistent that all that old biology needs to go away because now, the future of biology lay with molecular biology. And the sooner we get on that, the better. And he was very rude about that. I took it very personally, because I looked up to the man. He was only a year older, but here was someone who had achieved an advance truly historic. I called him the Caligula of biology. And he could do anything he wished, and everybody would applaud.” In time, the two eminent scientists mended fences, speaking highly of one another in public and occasionally appearing together on television. In the 1970s, Wilson became the center of a political storm when he pioneered a new discipline called sociobiology. He extended his ideas on social insect behavior to animals and then humans, thrusting himself center stage into the debate over nature versus nurture. “This is the fundamental principle of sociobiology. Genes for particular social behaviors exist, and that they have spread by natural selection. But scientists are deeply divided as to the scientific and social implications.” “What it did was to flutter the dovecotes of the social sciences and, generally, of the political far left. All of those had decided that the human brain is a blank slate, and that everything is determined by history and by contingency. And anybody that said that there was a biologically based human nature would have to be up to no good. What you were doing was opening the door to racism or sex discrimination. The opposition to sociobiology at Harvard was particularly virulent. It was led by Richard Lewontin and Steve Gould. They set out to discredit entirely of any merit to sociobiology.” “We know nothing about why some people are more aggressive than others, some people are more entrepreneurial, indeed why some people have more musical ability than others. There is no evidence at all that such individuals differ in their genes.” For Wilson, the criticism took a more concrete form at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. “My turn came to give the talk. And this group, they rushed the stage. They grabbed the microphone. One of the young women came up behind me, seized the pitcher of ice water and poured it on my head. I was saying to myself, this is very interesting. I think I’m going to be the only scientist ever physically attacked in recent years for an idea.” Seeing the controversy, he set out to address it directly. “Even moderately centrist papers — Time magazine, for example — has come to accept that this was some sort of extreme belief about human genetic basis of behavior. So I sat down and wrote the book “On Human Nature,” which was to explain the human aspect as I saw it, including a lot of the new evidence. That won a Pulitzer Prize. And that’s sort of still the shouting crowd, as they say at a football game after the opponent makes a touchdown. It was a lot less after that.” Edward Osborne Wilson was born in 1929 in Birmingham, Ala. His home life was difficult. His father was an alcoholic who eventually committed suicide. But these hardships were paired with a natural love of the outdoors. “My father had jobs that took him to many places, to several localities in Alabama, and then Pensacola and so on. I went to something like 15 or 16 schools in 11 years of schooling. I was pretty much on my own as an only child, so I had woods to myself, so to speak. And I felt like an explorer every day I went out.” Wilson was blinded in one eye in a childhood fishing accident The resulting lack of depth perception made some observations difficult. But he could hold insects up to his good eye. “I brought home black widows. My parents actually allowed me to breed black widow spiders in big jars on the back porch.” “Were you religious as a boy?” “Well, I was Southern Baptist, of course. And of course I was devout, because everybody was devout, just like everybody in southern Alabama was racist. It was part of the culture that was unquestioned. When I arrived at college, I discovered evolution, and combined that with the natural rebelliousness of a 17 and 18-year-old — I drifted away from fundamentalist Protestantism.” “So do you believe in God?” “I’m not an atheist, because I think it would be foolish to deny, dogmatically, the possibility of some form of superior intelligence. But religion is simply an expression of tribalism that includes the belief, the hope, the desire that that particular tribe is blessed by God. Satisfied with that explanation, I then find it a lot easier to talk with tribal chiefs, also known as priests, rabbis and pastors.” His 2006 book, “The Creation,” was specifically directed to Christians. “I have become very friendly with evangelical leaders as a result of my call for cooperation between scientists and environmentalists to engage in the saving of Earth’s biodiversity.” “We have to paint the — ” At the time of this interview, Wilson, age 79, was keeping busy at his lab at Harvard, starring in a “Nova” episode on PBS and writing books. He was looking forward to publication of his first novel, a political allegory set in an anthill. His greatest legacy may be his effort to preserve the planet’s declining biodiversity. “What we have to keep in mind in considering the rest of life on Earth, is that we’re losing it. And it is the part that cannot be brought back. We are destroying species and ecosystems, which are millions of years old and invaluable to humanity and future generations. And we don’t know how fast they are disappearing. How to wake things up? So I wrote a paper called the “Encyclopedia of Life.” And this caught very quickly. A lot of people said, yes, that’s the way to do it. Electronic encyclopedia with a website for each species of organisms in the world, even if there turned out to be 100 million of them.” The Encyclopedia of Life launched in February of 2008. It was merely the latest of Wilson’s many efforts to heighten public awareness of species loss. “How would you like to be remembered?” “As a successor to Darwin. [laughs] As having carried the torch, at least for a short while.”
Japan’s Nintendo game console pioneer Uemura dead at 78
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Masayuki Uemura, a Japanese home computer game pioneer whose Nintendo consoles sold millions of units worldwide, has died, according to the university in Kyoto where he taught. He was 78.
Uemura, the lead architect behind Nintendo Co.’s trailblazing home game consoles, died Monday, Ritsumeikan University said in a statement. The cause of his death was not released.
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Born in Tokyo in 1943, Uemura studied electronic engineering at the Chiba Institute of Technology and joined Nintendo in 1971.
Uemura was tasked by then-president Hiroshi Yamauchi in 1981 with developing a home console for games like Donkey Kong, which was a huge hit in the United States at the time but only available for arcade use.
The so-called Famicom game system hit the Japanese market in 1983 as Nintendo’s first cartridge-based console, allowing users to play popular games that came in cassette formats. The upgraded Super Famicom was released in Japan in 1990.
NINTENDO’S PROFITS DECLINE FOLLOWING LAST YEAR’S PANDEMIC BOOST
The Nintendo Entertainment System, as it was known, hit the United States in 1985 and eventually became a global sensation with more than 60 million consoles sold worldwide, bringing international recognition to a company that previously made traditional Japanese card games, other playing cards and toys.
After retiring from Nintendo, Uemura taught game studies starting in 2004 at Ritsumeikan University in the ancient Japanese capital, which is also home to Nintendo.
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“We offer our heartfelt appreciation for Mr. Uemura’s huge contributions to the development of the game industry by introducing a variety of video game consoles including family computers,” Ritsumeikan University said in a statement. “May he rest in peace.”
The Pioneer Woman’s Ree Drummond Mourns Death of Her Brother
It’s a sad day on the ranch for Ree Drummond and her family.
On Wednesday, Nov. 3, the Pioneer Woman star shared news that her beloved brother Michael Smith had died at the age of 54. In a moving tribute shared to her Facebook, Drummond wrote alongside photos of her sibling throughout the years, “It isn’t possible to sum up the life of someone as perfectly wonderful as my brother Michael, so right now I won’t try.”
“He was seventeen months older than me, my first friend and buddy, and I’m so grateful for over 50 years of photos and memories,” she continued. “Please pray for my parents, whose devotion to Mike was boundless, and who will feel this loss most acutely.”
The 52-year-old Food Network star added, “Michael Smith, you were everything.”
According to a Nov. 2 Instagram post from Drummond’s sister, Betsy, Michael passed away “last weekend.” Betsy wrote alongside a photo taken from their childhood, “He was one of a kind, and he will be missed by so many people who loved him.”