Elon Musk – Page 5

Coronavirus, Elon Musk, Healthcare, People Making a Difference, Science & Technology News

Elon Musk has made 250,000 scarce N-95 masks. Sending them out tomorrow

March 23, 2020

Elon Musk has shifted his work and is making ventilators and N95 masks at a time when they are in greatest need in the fight against Covid-19.

Ventilators are needed, but the N95 masks are in short supply and desperately needed by health care workers all over the country. In fact, the lack of N95 masks is called one of the biggest bottlenecks in the fight to treat patients and prevent vital workers from becoming carriers.

So news that Elon Musk has made these, using his Tesla and SpaceX businesses, could not have come at a better time.

Continue reading… “Elon Musk has made 250,000 scarce N-95 masks. Sending them out tomorrow”

Elon Musk, Science & Technology News, Space Flight, SpaceX

Elon Musk says he’s ‘definitely going to be dead’ before humans ever reach Mars — unless the pace of innovation picks up

March 16, 2020

An illustration of a woman orbiting Mars inside a SpaceX vehicle. Elon Musk/SpaceX

Elon Musk said he’s “definitely going to be dead” before humans reach Mars unless innovation speeds up.

The SpaceX CEO made the comments on Monday while speaking to attendees of the Satellite 2020 conference in Washington, DC.

Musk said the biggest obstacle is designing and building a large and “rapidly reusable” rocket.

Continue reading… “Elon Musk says he’s ‘definitely going to be dead’ before humans ever reach Mars — unless the pace of innovation picks up”

Electric Automobile, Elon Musk, Record Breaker, Science & Technology News, Tesla

Tesla produces its 1 millionth electric car

March 14, 2020

Tesla announced that it produced its 1 millionth electric car — becoming the first automaker to achieve the milestone.

Only a few years ago, many people didn’t believe that Tesla could produce electric vehicles in any meaningful numbers, but the automaker managed to ramp up three electric vehicle programs: Model S, Model X, and Model 3.

Now it is about to launch its fourth electric vehicle, the Model Y, and it is doing it on the momentum of a new milestone.

Today, CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla produced its 1 millionth car and released a picture of the car, a Model Y, and the team who made it:

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Elon Musk, Science & Technology News, Space, SpaceX, Tourism

You can now book an all-inclusive 10-day trip to the International Space Station for $55 million

March 13, 2020

The trip is expected to launch during the second half of 2021.

It may not be a trip to the moon, but Axiom Space is offering deep-pocketed customers a trip to space. And no, we’re not talking a quick little jaunt into orbit either. Instead, the company is offering an all-inclusive stay on the International Space Station for the humble sum of $55 million.

On Thursday, Axiom announced it had signed a contract with SpaceX that will allow a trained commander and three private astronauts the chance to hitch a ride to the space station aboard one of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsules, reports the New York Times. Expected to take place next year, the trip could very likely be the first fully private human spaceflight to orbit.

Currently scheduled to launch during the second half of next year, the trip will give customers the chance to “experience at least eight days of microgravity and views of the Earth that can only be appreciated in the large, venerable station,” according to a press release from Axiom. In addition to the two days of travel and room and board on the ISS, the company will also provide training, planning, life support, medical support, crew provisions, certifications, on-orbit operations and overall mission management.

Continue reading… “You can now book an all-inclusive 10-day trip to the International Space Station for $55 million”

Batteries, Electric Vehicles, Elon Musk, Science & Technology News

Elon Musk’s million-mile battery dreams are about to come true

March 12, 2020

Researchers have developed a new battery for electric vehicles that can last 1 million miles.

Researchers have been working on increasing the power and life cycle of the batteries we use in electric vehicles while maintaining safety standards for years. A battery reaching its end of life, with diminishing returns, would be a long term nightmare for both customers and companies.

A team in Penn State’s Battery and Energy Storage Technology (BEST) Center claims to have developed a powerful battery that can last for 1 million miles. Elon Musk promised last year that Tesla cars would at some point have batteries that last a million miles, and it seems this battery can do just that.

As Tesla learned years ago, a lithium-ion battery that has a high energy density can catch fire or even explode in certain circumstances. That’s obviously something any electric vehicle manufacturer wants to avoid, but we also want our electric vehicles to have batteries that are powerful and long-lasting. Researchers at Penn State appeared to have created a battery that’s stable, powerful and has a very long life using a counterintuitive approach.

Continue reading… “Elon Musk’s million-mile battery dreams are about to come true”

Elon Musk, NASA, Science & Technology News, Space

Terraforming Mars might be impossible… for now

March 11, 2020

Making Mars more Earth-like would be a gargantuan task. From giant mirrors to tiny microbes, here’s the thinking behind making Mars habitable for humans.

This story is part of Welcome to Mars, our series exploring the red planet.

At the end of 1990’s sci-fi adventure Total Recall, all it takes is the push of a button. In a matter of minutes, Mars’ sky transforms from a hellish red to an Earth-like blue. After nearly suffocating on the Martian surface just moments before, Arnold Schwarzenegger takes in lungfuls and lungfuls of that sweet, sweet breathable Martian air.

This is terraforming, the concept of making a planet more hospitable to humans, and it’s been cropping up in pop culture since the early 1900s, everywhere from books to movies to video games. Once upon a time, the idea of turning Mars into Earth 2.0 might have been merely a fanciful notion, as theoretical as actually going to the planet at all.

But in 2020, Mars is very much on the agenda. NASA, SpaceX, Virgin Galactic — they all want to put space boots on the ground, and in some cases as soon as the 2030s. But as scientists work toward blastoff, the concept of terraforming will most likely be a case of “failure to launch.”

Continue reading… “Terraforming Mars might be impossible… for now”

Aviation, drones, Elon Musk, military drones, Science & Technology News, Weapons

Elon Musk: ‘F-35 fighter jets would have no chance against drones’

March 10, 2020

Elon Musk has suggested Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Lightning II fighter jets, which are a key part of the Morrison government’s $200 billion investment in defence, would “have no chance” against an autonomous drone in the battlefield.

“The fighter jet era has passed,” Mr Musk said at the US Air Force’s Air Warfare Symposium in Florida.

“Drone warfare is where the future will be. It’s not that I want the future to be this – it’s just, this is what the future will be.”

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Elon Musk, Science & Technology News, Space Flight, SpaceX

SpaceX will launch private citizens into orbit

February 27, 2020

SpaceX is planning to send up to four private citizens into space to take a trip around Earth sometime at the end of 2021 or in early 2022. The spaceflight company announced an agreement on Tuesday with Space Adventures, a space tourism business that has helped seven different private citizens take trips to (and from) the International Space Station aboard Russia’s Soyuz rocket and spacecraft.

Space Adventures said the price of the mission will not be disclosed, and the two companies were light on other details, like what kind of preparation the tourists will have to go through. The companies did say Tuesday that the tourists will fly in the human-rated version of SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft and that they will orbit Earth at two to three times the roughly 250-mile height of the ISS.

SpaceX has spent the last few years building and testing out this new version of Dragon as part of a contract with NASA to shuttle astronauts to and from the ISS, after years of using the spacecraft to shuttle cargo to the space station. The private spaceflight company recently completed the second major flight test of the Crew Dragon, as it’s called, which demonstrated the capsule’s ability to escape an exploding rocket.

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communication, Elon Musk, Internet, Science & Technology News, SpaceX

SpaceX launches 60 new Starlink satellites, sticks rocket landing at sea

February 3, 2020

Watch: SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches 60 satellites into orbit

Following the successful launch, the rocket’s first stage gently touched down on a SpaceX drone ship landing platform.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — SpaceX successfully launched its fourth batch of Starlink satellites into orbit and landed a rocket landing Wednesday following days of weather delays for the mission.

A sooty Falcon 9 rocket — which made its third flight with this launch — roared to life at 9:06 a.m. ET, lifting off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station here in Florida. The rocket carried 60 Starlink satellites for SpaceX’s growing constellation, the second such launch by the company this month.

Last week, strong upper level winds forced the private spaceflight company to postpone the Starlink-3 mission’s launch. SpaceX then aimed for the backup launch date of Jan. 28, but rough seas where the drone ship was waiting may have thwarted any attempt at a landing.

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Elon Musk, Science & Technology News, Space Flight, SpaceX

SpaceX is about to launch a historic mission with actual people on board Crew Dragon

January 31, 2020

SpaceX is poised to launch its first astronauts into space this spring: Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley.

Their flight on the company’s Crew Dragon spaceship will mark the first time an American spacecraft has carried NASA astronauts since the Space Shuttle program ended in 2011.

Behnken and Hurley’s liftoff is expected to launch a new era of US spaceflight, since it will allow NASA to stop relying on Russian launch systems to get astronauts into space. It will probably also make the two astronauts the first to ever fly a commercial spacecraft.

“Bob and I were lucky enough to be selected together,” Hurley told The Atlantic in September. “As we get closer to launch, things in the last year have actually been pretty hectic. We’ve been spending increasing amounts of time in California, because that’s where most of the work is being done for Dragon.”

In preparation, they have run through emergency procedures, undergone extensive training the Crew Dragon’s mechanisms, worn their new spacesuits, and met with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.

Continue reading… “SpaceX is about to launch a historic mission with actual people on board Crew Dragon”

Batteries, Elon Musk, Science & Technology News, Tesla

Tesla patents new chemistry for better, longer-lasting and cheaper batteries

December 30, 2019

Tesla has made a lot of battery moves this year and it is closing the year by filing a patent on a new chemistry for better, longer-lasting and cheaper batteries.

Earlier this year, we reported on Tesla’s battery research partner, Jeff Dahn and his team at Dalhousie University, unveiling the impressive results of tests on a new battery cell that could last over 1 million miles in an electric vehicle.

The new battery tested is a Li-Ion battery cell with a next-generation “single crystal” NMC cathode and a new advanced electrolyte.

Since then, Tesla has been filing US and international patents on the new battery chemistry.

Continue reading… “Tesla patents new chemistry for better, longer-lasting and cheaper batteries”

brain-computer interfaces, Breakthrough Thinking, Elon Musk, Science & Technology News

Elon Musk’s company Neuralink plans to connect people’s brains to the internet by next year using a procedure he claims will be as safe and easy as LASIK eye surgery

December 14, 2019

Elon Musk on Tuesday announced in a livestream that his neurotechnology startup, Neuralink, hoped to begin implanting devices into human brains as early as next year.

Musk has invested $100 million into the secretive company since its founding in 2016, according to The New York Times, and he says he hopes it will achieve “symbiosis with artificial intelligence.”

Musk said the Neuralink system would allow for a tiny chip, known as a brain-machine interface, to be implanted into the minds of willing subjects.

The chip would be designed to stimulate the brain’s neurons using tiny flexible threads of electrodes that would be inserted into the brain in a procedure Musk said would be as safe and painless as LASIK eye surgery.

Continue reading… “Elon Musk’s company Neuralink plans to connect people’s brains to the internet by next year using a procedure he claims will be as safe and easy as LASIK eye surgery”