High Concentration Photo Voltaic Thermal (HCPVT)
IBM, the American multinational technology and consulting corporation are renowned the world over for being technology leaders and innovators with an aim to ‘shape the future of society and make the world work better and build a smarter planet.’ Their latest creation is being considered as one of their best projects yet.
Continue reading… “IBM creates a solar magnifying glass that could power the Earth”
AirHelp
It can be hard to a book flight on an airline website, so imagine how hard it must be to claim compensation for delayed, canceled or overbooked flights. Meet AirHelp, the startup that will save you all the hassle and claim money for you. AirHelp has unveiled a major new feature, making the claiming process much easier. (Video)
Continue reading… “AirHelp gets you money back for canceled or delayed flights”
flexible polymer solar cells are integrated into the textile battery eliminating the need for connecting the battery to a power outlet for recharging.
Google Glass and a wave of smartwatches are just some of the choices in wearable electronics, and they are quickly multiplying. But the batteries still need to be plugged into something to charge up. What if your watch strap could contain the battery components, along with a flexible solar cell? Voilà: No more plugging in.
Continue reading… “Solar-powered batteries woven into fabric boost wearable technology”
A nanophotonic solar thermophotovoltaic device.
Traditional photovoltaic solar cells have an inherent limit on the efficiency at which they can convert sunlight into energy. This limit—based on the bandgap of the material used and known as the Shockley-Queisser limit—is about 33.7 percent for standard solar cells. It is essentially due to any material’s inability to respond to all wavelengths of sunlight; so what if there was a way to change the wavelengths that actually reach the cell to those it converts best? MIT researchers have unveiled the best-yet version of that idea, known as solar thermophotovoltaics.
Alpha Machine
Robots are taking over even the most ignobly esteemed jobs like flipping burgers. Alpha machine from Momentum Machines cooks up a tasty burger with all the fixings. And it does it with such quality and efficiency it’ll produce “gourmet quality burgers at fast food prices.”
Continue reading… “Alpha robot serves up 360 hamburgers an hour”
Stephen Hawking
There is the realistic potential for malicious artificial intelligence to wreak havoc on humanity’s way of life. Physicist Stephen Hawking agrees it’s worth worrying about.
A young woman celebrates after winning China’s first Miss Plastic Surgery pageant on December 18, 2004 in Beijing, China.
In South Korea, plastic surgery has become so crazy that some surgeons are now issuing out special certificates to prove that patients are who they say they are.
Mink printer
Grace Choi decided to disrupt the beauty industry when she was attending Harvard Business School. She did a little research and realized that beauty brands create and then majorly mark up their products by mixing lots of colors. (Video)
Continue reading… “Grace Choi figures out how to 3D print makeup from any home computer”
A plastic panel that can harvest light when it hangs off the edge of a rooftop, redirecting sunshine down into dark urban streets below.
Cities keep getting taller as they run out of buildable space. A record number of skyscrapers are planned in London, places like Bangkok and Panama City have dozens of new towers under construction, and Mumbai is building more skyscrapers than anywhere else in the world.
Continue reading… “Simple device designed to pull sunlight down to dark city streets”
Space-based solar
Some newer clean energy sources are becoming mainstream industries with low prices and established financing models like solar panels and wind turbines. But even in this era of emerging predictable clean energy, there are some pretty weird, experimental and ambitious energy projects under development. And they’re trying to move out of the lab and off of research papers, and into actual production.
Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShip Two
NASA has lost the urgency of the space race years of the 1960’s, but today’s commercial space sector looks to be recapturing some of that fervor. On Friday, May 2nd at New York City’s historic Explorer’s Club the players in America’s private space race were out in force at this event, each one promising major breakthroughs that will arrive within the next year or two.
Continue reading… “Commercial space travel revs up”
Automation will help agriculture via large-scale robotic and microrobots.
Below are 15 emerging technologies related to agricultural and natural manufacturing under four key areas of accelerating change: Sensors, Food, Automation and Engineering.
Continue reading… “Top 15 emerging agriculture technologies that will change the world”
By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.
Learn More about this exciting program.