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This is an article by Kristin Drexler, faculty member, Human Ecology and Forestry, School of Science, technology, Engineering, and Math at American Public University. The active participation of local communities is a critical component to the conservation of protected areas like national parks and preserves. Ironically, while these areas are most often thought of in […]
After 2 months of speculation and unanswered questions, we finally get to see Lexus’ hoverboard in action – yes, it’s a real hoverboard, and it works. It’s not Back to the Future, but it’s cool, and it’s here. No CGI, no fakery. As it turns out, riding this hoverboard is no easy feat. Professional skater Ross McGouran […]
If you want to help protect endangered species, there’s a new app that might facilitate that. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) said Monday it’s teaming up with Sweden-based FishBrain to develop a social, free-to-use app that might make a difference for local wildlife. The app can be downloaded for Apple and Android devices. Anglers are among […]
Many of the things we take for granted can be challenging and difficult for blind people - smartphones especially have much less utility for them, as do smartwatches. Enter the stage Dot - the world's first Braille smartwatch could close that gap, allowing people without sight to use and interact with smart devices.
Japanese researchers have just fired the most powerful laser ever fired on Earth, producing a 2 petawatt pulse – 2 quadrillion watts. Located at the Osaka University, the Laser for Fast Ignition Experiment (LFEX) has a concentrated energy equivalent of 1,000 times the world’s electricity consumption. However, it could only be sustained for a trillionth of a second. The […]
Evenwin Precision Technology, an electronics processing company, sacked 90% of its employees, replaced them with robots and saw productivity soar. Previously, there were 650 employees at the factory, now there are 60 - mostly engineers and accountants that oversee the production lines - and the number should go down to 20, according to company officials. The robots have produced almost three times as many pieces as were produced before. Quality has also improved. The product defect rate was 25%, now it is below 5%.
Self-driving cars have a promising future, and leading the pack technologically is Google, now a household name that has long transcended its status as a search engine. First and foremost, Google is a technology company and its interest are aligned with anything cutting edge, whether it's information technology or hardware (smart homes, smart appliances, cars). Since 2011 when Google first showcased its extremely successful self-driving Prius, later switched for a Lexus, the company has been making rapid progress. But Google rarely experiments just for the sake of it. Part of its philosophy is turning disruptive technology into a product, get it out to the people. But how do you go about self-driving cars, considering the auto business is one of the riskiest in the world? Well, just like it did with the Android for smartphones, Google could partner with the leading automakers supplying the technology. Indeed, Google confirmed this January that it had talks with General Motors, Ford, Toyota, Daimler and Volkswagen. But some highly interesting documents gathered by The Guardian suggests a possible alternate route. Google might actually build its own cars, all from scratch.
A year ago, we were telling you about the Canadian robot that successfully hitchhiked Canada from east to west all by itself - a spectacular achievement which prompted its inventors to attempt the same thing in the US. However, hitchBot was vandalized beyond repair and abandoned in Philadelphia.
A couple decades ago, satellite were solely the provision of governments, since they were the only ones that could afford launching billions dollars worth of tech into space. Slowly but surely, corporations hitched a ride and now, when an imaging satellite can fit in the palm of your hand and costs only a fraction it used to, small enterprises are flourishing. Along with them is innovation.
Few people can claim to have built their own dream, but New Zealander Lance Abernethy can – he has taken his passion for small things to the next level and built the smallest functional drill. With the help of technology (in the form of 3D printing), his passion and patience created this new device based on […]
If you’re thinking about the future days when robots will replace humans, well… those days are already here. The Henn-na Hotel (“Strange Hotel”) is staffed entirely by robots, including a dinosaur receptionist. They also have no room keys and a remarkable energy efficiency. ‘What we have strove to achieve with Henn-na Hotel is “The Ultimate […]
A new study published in Nature describes the creation of a new sensor which will allow us to know when our liquid food has gone bad - and it may not be long until we can all 3D print bottle caps with these sensors at home.
Artificial light is something we take for granted and simply don’t think about – but for some communities, light can be a luxury. In the 7,000 scattered islands of the Philippines, light can be very scarce, and saltwater is abundant. With that in mind, SALt engineers have designed a lamp that runs on salt water. […]
Nearly all communication devices today, whether we're speaking of smartphones, tablets or notebooks, rely on WiFi signal to connect to the internet and transmit data. With the rise of the Internet of Things, WiFi will become even more ubiquitous. However, enabling an active WiFi connection also eats up a lot of power. When I have WiFi on, my smartphone goes dead in under 24 hours, compared to 48 or more otherwise. In fact, according to a report, the routers that keep us constantly connected to the Internet – now in nearly 90 million American homes – uses about $1 billion worth of electricity annually. But in a bid to cut WiFi power waste in space, NASA might inadvertently change this situation forever.
Hikers discovered Ötzi the Iceman in the Ötztal Alps of Tyrol, Austria in 1991. Forensic analysis showed that he died around 5,300 years ago, making his the oldest intact human body every found. Ötzi had been preserved by glacier ice and was found with his tools, clothes, and weapons – a time capsule of Copper […]
An 80-year-old man suffering from age-related macular degeneration (AMD) - the most common cause of sight loss in the world - can now see again after being fitted with a bionic eye. The technology was developed at the Manchester Royal Eye Hospital, and the implant marks the first trial for the Argus II system for AMD.
Facial recognition and motion tracking is already old news. The next level is describing what you do or what's going on - for now only in still pictures. Meet NeuralTalk, a deep learning image processing algorithm developed by Stanford engineers which uses processes similar to those used by the human brain to decipher and interpret photos. The software can easily describe, for instance, a band of people dressed up as zombies. It's remarkably effective and freaking creepy at the same time.
Tesla’s newest up-and-coming building could be larger than previously thought – much larger. At a presentation about the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center, Dean Haymore, from Story County Commission, mentioned that Tesla bought an extra 1,200 acres next to the ongoing construction, and will buy 350 more. While this hasn’t yet been confirmed by Elon Musk, this […]
We sometimes get the feeling that the Netherlands is like a Think Tank for countries – they just come up with some of the most creative ideas ever. Now, they’ve tackled a very important part of the infrastructure: road paving. They want to use recycled plastic, and they want to do it soon – in […]
Archaeologists used innovative techniques to gain new insights about the third-millennium urban crisis in Mesopotamia some 4,000 years ago. This marked the fall of the Akkadian Empire – the very first empire in the world. The researchers also drew a comparison to modern-day Syria where current events in the wake of climate change and a violent […]
Tesla Motors’ Elon Musk has said that our civilization is dangerously close to encountering AI problems within a “five-year timeframe, 10 years at most.” He made the comment on the website Edge.org shortly before deleting it. His point was that, sometime soon, we may actually create a form of artificial intelligence that decides to rise […]
The days of wasting condiments, toothpaste and other products that stubbornly stick to the sides of the bottle or package are coming to an end thanks to a new coating developed by MIT researchers. The LiquiGlide spinoff has signed a deal with Orkla (a Norwegian company) that will allow them to use the new coating […]
A startup will allow voluntary internet detectives to study unusual medical cases and attempt to solve them. Millions of people suffer from rare or complex medical conditions for which they have received no diagnosis, but where a handful of doctors have failed, the collective force of the internet can do it – we can do it. […]
MIT engineers demonstrated a working spectrometer that took a huge leap in scale from a huge, bulky lab gear to a portable piece of equipment that's small enough to fit in a smartphone. Spectrometer are essential to research nowadays, employed in everything from physics, to biology, to chemistry. To design the spectrometer, the MIT team made use of tiny semiconductor nanoparticles called quantum dots. Having a portable spectrometer could prove to be extremely practical .You can use it to remotely diagnose diseases, detect pollution or food poisoning.
In March, we were telling you about Tesla Motors' new development, a new battery that could take your home off the grid and eliminate one of the major problems associated with renewable energy - storing it. Now, Tesla is already rolling out the new generation with some remarkable feature. The coolest one? Liquid cooling!
Deep below ground level, 3,500 feet (1000 meters) down a Croatian cave, scientists have discovered a new species of centipede. They named this incredibly resilient creature Geophilus hadesi – earth loving Hades – in honor of Hades, the Greek God of the underworld and ruler of Hell. Centipedes are elongated arthropods with one pair of legs per body […]
NASA is preparing to send a drone to Mars by 2024 - they've already developed a small, lightweight craft that could conduct aerial surveys and identify potential landing areas and zones of interest.
Among the many tools it has in its arsenal, cancer is also very good at hiding - so good that according to a study, we miss 7% of cancers even when we have an X-Ray. But a company is looking to change all that an employ the help of accurate computer algorithms.
A study conducted by assistant professor Jessica Gall Myrick, surveyed almost 7,000 people about their viewing of cat videos and how it affects their moods, to try and find out why so many of us enjoy seeing the furry little pets on video.
Some 10% of the energy generated by a car's engine is lost due to friction between tires and the pavement. What if you could harness this lost energy somehow? A group at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in collaboration with researchers in China have found a ingenious way to collect and use this friction energy by effectively inserting nanogenerators into tires.
Paired with recent advances in graphene deposition and manufacturing, this sort of tech of could very well end up powering your notebook or phone a couple years from now.
By now, we've all hopefully at least heard of graphene, the new wonder material that promises to revolutionize a swarm of applications. But now, a team of researchers from Finland have predicted the existence of atomically thin, free-standing 2D liquid phase - a liquid analogue of graphene.
This question was prompted to Ray Kurzweil - well known futurologist, pioneer of the Singularity Movement and Director of Engineering at Google - by a member of the audience during a Q&A session at an Executive Program hosted at Singularity University last October. You might not give it much thought now, but the truth is half of all American jobs could be replaced by robots in just a couple of decades. If you're a teller, supermarket cashier, call center operator or even a famer, you'll likely lose your job in the coming decades. So, what's to do then? Should we all rally and ban robots? It's no easy topic, but at the same time it's important, I think, not to panic. We need to remember that this isn't the first time something like this happened. It's the old human vs automation problem. How many millions of jobs were lost to mass production in the late XIXth century? How many more once computers started permeating society? At the same time, new jobs were made. Just look at where the information industry is today. The major challenge is not if new jobs can be made. This isn't really problem. The real challenge is to make these available at the right pace and make sure people have the necessary resources to repurpose their skill set. I'll leave you to Ray.
In his book "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep", one of my favorite writers Philip K. Dick explores what sets apart humans from androids. The theme is more valid today than it ever was, considering the great leaps in artificial intelligence we're seeing coming off major tech labs around the world, like Google's. Take for instance how the company employs advanced artificial neural networks to zap through a gazillion images, interpret them and return the right one you're looking for when you make a query using the search engine. Though nothing like a human brain, the networks uses 10-30 stacked layers of artificial neurons with each layer doing its job in incremental order to come to an "answer" by the final output layer is finished. While not dead-on, the network seems to return results better than anything we've seen before and as a by-product, it can also "dream." These artificial dreams output some fascinating images to say the least, going from virtually nothing (white noise) to something's that out of a surrealist painting. Who says computers can't be creative?
It can reach 100 km/h (60 mph) in 2 seconds, it has a 700 horsepower engine, it weighs 90% less than traditional cars, it has less emissions and it’s 3D printed – it may very well be the car of the future. Despite technological developments, the automobile industry has remained relatively stagnant in the past […]
Self-driving cars were one of those technologies that we sort of visualized as part of the future, much like jetpacks or hoverboards... but it seems like the future is already here, at least for driverless cars (you've got a lot to prove, Lexus!). Google's cars are already hitting the street in California.
This weekend, SpaceX is scheduled to deliver cargo and other much needed supplies to the International Space Station via its Dragon capsule. Among the supplies is a surprise for the astronauts on board: the latest high tech gadget from Microsoft, the HoloLens. If you missed ZME Science's feature of the HoloLens, well you're in for a treat if this is the first time you hear about it. Basically, the tech involves using holographic computing which enables you to mix virtual reality with ..actual reality. Holograms following in your kitchen, weather reports on your coffee cup. Really, anything is possible with the HoloLens, let alone in the final frontier: space.
There are probably a million cooking apps out there, but none of them are backed by a supercomputer. Meet Chef Watson: a “cognitive computing app” that promises to revolutionize the way you cook and expand your gastronomic comfort zone.
It's a touchy issue for some - the matter of adoption by homosexual couples. Some argue against this type of adoption, while others claim that there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. Now, a new study conducted by University of Colorado Denver research found that children of same-sex parents experience 'no difference' in terms of social and behavioral outcomes to children of heterosexual couples.
Lexus, better known for its luxury cars, just released a teasing video unveiling what looks like a genuine hoverboard. But is it the real deal or some lame marketing stunt? I feel like the latter, while a possibility, would severely backfire for Lexus, a highly respectable brand. On the other hand, I guess the kid in me is just rooting for this whole thing to be real.
A group of UK teenages have invented a condom that changes colors and glows if you/he have/has an STD. Aptly named the S.T. EYE, the condom has a built-in chemical detector that detects infections such as chlamydia and syphilis, and lets you (and your partner) know.
With an already saturated market for bikes, companies are coming up with more and more creative options, but it’s becoming more and more difficult for a particular bike to stand out. The Mango Footloose however does so, not only because it’s an electronic bike and it folds (that’s not extremely uncommon nowadays), but because it […]
Don't you just hate it when you're looking for support for a service or app you bought, only to be greeted by some monosyllabic robot ? Ok, that can happen just as well when dealing with outsourced tech support, but at least you know you're talking to a real person. Well, that might change sooner than you might think. The singularity is getting closer by the moment. Just take a look at Google's new chatbot which according to the developers has moderate "natural language understanding". In other words, it can roll with the punches and continue the conversation by itself without following predefined question - answer. Of course, after a while you can still tell it's not human (fails Turing test), but that doesn't mean it isn't entertaining. Have a look at how it answers to "what's the purpose of life?".
A group of international researchers unveiled the world's thinnest light bulb. Remarkably it uses a carbon-based filament, just like Thomas Edison used in 1879 for the first truly commercially-viable incandescent bulb. Unlike Edison, however, the group used carbon in its pure form and ultimate size limit - one atom-thick graphene sheets. Remarkably, the tiny bulb emits light visible to the naked eye. Of course, these sort of designs aren't about setting milestones, though it's always interesting to see how low or high down the scale you can go with engineering. Mostly, graphene-based light sources might prove useful for optical communications where bits are transmitted via packets of photons, instead of electrons.
A recent study involving a Papua New Guinea tribe that practiced cannibalistic funeral customs sheds new light on prion-related conditions such as mad cow disease.
Daimler, the giant auto maker from Germany, is releasing its own version of a large-storage battery on the heel's of Tesla's heralded Powerwall. Branded under Mercedes-Benz, the battery pack is destined for both automobiles and home use. So far, a 2.5 kWh each version has been made public, with Deimler claiming it can be packaged in up to eight modules bringing the total capacity to 20kWh worth of energy - more than enough to power a typical home or even a small business.
A group at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology developed a sophisticated facial recognition software specially designed to identify birds for photos. Called the Merlin Bird Photo ID, the software works its magic by employing a combination of image recognition algorithms, deep learning techniques (so it learns from its mistakes and gets better in time) and human collaborators who upload photos and help the software by first identifying the key features that makes a species distinct. The team is now working at turning the software into an app, so that anyone with a smartphone can take photos of a lingering avian wonder then instantly come to know which species it is.
Paleontologists have discovered the wonderfully preserved fossil of a prehistoric bird which flew through the forests of the ancient supercontinent Gondwana, some 115 million years ago. The humming bird-sized bird had a spotted, ribbon shaped tail. The remains were discovered in a sedimentary hotspot in nowadays Brazil. It's the first of its kind discovered in South America and one of the oldest birds discovered from Gondwana, a supercontinent that once encompassed Africa, Antarctica, Australia, India and South America.
Microscopic swirls from gold might be the key to protect your cash and credit cards in the future, making identity theft virtually impossible. Researchers at Vanderbilt University developed the "Archimedes spirals" and report that they produce four times more blue light per unit volume than currently existing frequency amplifiers; they could be printed on currency, ID cards and pretty much everything that's important to prevent counterfeiting.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison designed an innovate and sustainable solution to the global electronic waste problem: make the substrate of computer chips out of cellulose nanofibril (CNF), a biodegradable material from wood. The team collaborated with the the Madison-based U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Products Laboratory (FPL) to build their device.
