Science & Technology News – Page 73

Medical Breakthrough, Science & Technology News

FIRST SUCCESSFUL TRANSPLANT OF A ROBOTIC HEART

September 7, 2021

Every 10 minutes someone is added to the organ transplant waiting list in the US.

As of May 2021, there were over 100,000 people waiting for replacement organs across the country.

And countless more people in need of “spare parts” never even make it onto the waiting list. On average, 17 people die each day while waiting for an organ transplant.

As a result, hundreds of thousands of US deaths could be prevented or postponed with access to organ replacements.

That’s why the recent announcement of the first successful human transplant of an artificial heart in a US patient is such a big development.

The artificial heart used in the transplant was created by medical technology company Carmat, which won FDA approval for human trials just last year. Discussing the latest developments in biotech—using biology as technology—is a key focus of my year-round coaching program Abundance360.

In today’s blog, we’ll discuss how Carmat’s artificial heart works and how it fits into the broader objective of regenerative medicine.

Let’s dive in…

Science & Technology News, Space

Astroscale successfully demos in-space capture-and-release system to clear orbital debris

September 5, 2021

By Aria Alamalhodaei

Astroscale hit a major milestone Wednesday, when its space junk removal demo satellite that’s currently in orbit successfully captured and released a client spacecraft using a magnetic system.

The End-of-Life Services by Astroscale-demonstration (ELSA-d) mission was launched in March, with the goal of validating the company’s orbital debris removal tech. The demonstrator package, which was sent up on a Soyuz rocket that launched from Kazakhstan, included two separate spacecraft: a “servicer” designed to remove space junk, and a “client” that poses as said space junk.

“A major challenge of debris removal, and on-orbit servicing in general, is docking with or capturing a client object; this test demonstration served as a successful validation of ELSA-d’s ability to dock with a client, such as a defunct satellite,” the company explained.

The demonstration today showed that the servicer — a model of Astroscale’s future product — can successfully magnetically capture and release other spacecraft.

Science & Technology News, Space Flight

Working in space: China’s space robotic arm in 60 seconds

September 4, 2021

Chinese astronauts, or taikonauts, completed their second extravehicular stint with the help of a giant robotic arm on August 20.

Science & Technology News, Trending

Ranked: The World’s Fastest Growing Cities

September 1, 2021

By Avery Koop

By 2025, the world’s population will reach over 8.1 billion people.

Most of that population growth will be concentrated in cities across Africa and Asia. To help paint a detailed picture, this map uses data from the United Nations to rank the top 20 fastest growing cities in the world in terms of average annual growth rate from 2020 to 2025.

Automobiles, Science & Technology News

Mazda Is Working on a New Hydrogen Rotary Engine: Report

August 28, 2021

Remember the RX-8 Hydrogen RE? Probably not, but it’s proof that Mazda has done this before.

BY CHRIS TSUI

While most of the automotive world pivots toward battery-electric, Mazda is apparently following in part-owner Toyota’s footsteps in betting on hydrogen. What’s more, the Hiroshima automaker is said to be pairing the niche energy tech with another niche propulsion method: the rotary. If a new report from Japan’s Best Car Web is to be believed, Mazda is currently working on a hydrogen rotary engine, that is, a rotary engine that runs on hydrogen instead of gasoline.

Decrypted via Google Translate, “Although it is a small scale, development has progressed. As the world has suddenly turned to decarbonization, the view that ‘hydrogen rotary is an important technology’ is rapidly expanding,” a Mazda official reportedly told the publication.

drones, Science & Technology News

UK looks at drones, 3D printing to fix its dimpled roads

August 28, 2021

By Ishveena Singh

The UK Department for Transport (DfT) is launching a multimillion-pound initiative to improve local roads across England. Among other things, this program aims to explore the use of drones and 3D printing technology when it comes to finding and fixing potholes.

According to a bunch of measures announced by Transport Secretary Grant Shapps, new and innovative technology such as drones and 3D printing will take center stage in helping England to perk up its dimpled roads that many have likened to the surface of the moon.

The condition is so bad that councils in England and Wales had to fill up 1.7 million potholes in the financial year 2020-21 alone – which is equal to one being fixed every 19 seconds. So now, a red-faced government is committing funds to use advanced technology, such as drones to spot defects in roads and 3D printing to repair cracks.

drones, Science & Technology News

Qualcomm launches world’s first drone platform with both 5G, AI tech

August 27, 2021

By Ishveena Singh

Qualcomm has unveiled the world’s first drone platform and reference design that will tap in both 5G and AI technologies. The chipmaker’s Flight RB5 5G Platform condenses multiple complex technologies into one tightly integrated drone system to support a variety of use cases, including film and entertainment, security and emergency response, delivery, defense, inspection, and mapping.

The new solution is purpose-built for autonomous drones, with Qualcomm aiming to give developers an easy-to-use platform to create premium drones right out of the box.

The Flight RB5 5G Platform is powered by the chipmaker’s QRB5165 processor and builds upon the company’s latest IoT offerings to offer high-performance and heterogeneous computing at ultra-low power consumption.

Along with breakthrough camera capabilities that can deliver 4K HDR video, 200MP photo, and 7-camera concurrency, the platform supports 5G and long-range Wi-Fi 6 connectivity to enhance safer beyond visual line-of-sight (BVLOS) flights.

Science & Technology News, SpaceX

Elon Musk’s SpaceX Shoots for the Moon—by 2024 or Sooner

August 25, 2021

A SpaceX rocket, carrying astronauts, lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 23, 2021.

By Al Root

SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk said his space company can be ready to go to the moon in the next three years.

Musk said in a Saturday Twitter post responding to a question about the timeline that SpaceX’s lunar lander would be ready for its moon mission “probably sooner” than 2024.

SpaceX won NASA’s lunar lander contract in April, beating Jeff Bezos’s space company Blue Origin and Leidos (ticker: LDOS) unit Dynetics for the job.

The NASA program, dubbed Artemis, is slated to take astronauts, including women, to the moon in 2024. SpaceX will make a reusable lander it calls Starship that will eventually carry people to Mars if Musk’s ultimate ambitions are realized.

3D Printer, Science & Technology News

From Exploration to 3D Printing Colonies: NASA Wants 3D Printing Simulation Included in ISS Cargo for Materials

August 25, 2021

By Aubrey Clarke

NASA is including the Redwire Regolith Print (RRP), a printing system, in their preparation for the future Artemis lunar missions. They intend to use the moon’s dusty soil (officially known as regolith) as a printing raw material. Instead of hauling tons of heavy equipment from Earth, the plan is to use readily available resources on the moon to build what is needed.

Engineers want to 3D print with regolith from the moon for a long time, and in fact, they have proven the procedure on Earth possible. Bringing a 3D printer to ISS for testing is a significant step toward making the technology suitable for deployment. The researchers would like to know if printing without gravity is possible and what the strength of the printed material should be.

NASA is including the Redwire Regolith Print (RRP), a printing system, in their preparation for the future Artemis lunar missions. They intend to use the moon’s dusty soil (officially known as regolith) as a printing raw material. Instead of hauling tons of heavy equipment from Earth, the plan is to use readily available resources on the moon to build what is needed.

Engineers want to 3D print with regolith from the moon for a long time, and in fact, they have proven the procedure on Earth possible. Bringing a 3D printer to ISS for testing is a significant step toward making the technology suitable for deployment. The researchers would like to know if printing without gravity is possible and what the strength of the printed material should be.

Robots, Science & Technology News

Nanorobots will prevent root canal treatment failures

August 25, 2021

Nanosized robots will traverse the slender dentinal tubules and target the hard-to-reach bacteria.

By Rajeev Chitguppi

An indigenously developed nanorobotic technology will deploy nanosized robots that will traverse the slender dentinal tubules and target the hard-to-reach bacteria, which are primarily responsible for the root canal treatment failures.

Many root canal treatment cases fail due to incomplete debridement of certain pathogenic bacteria – inaccessible to instrumentation due to their deep location inside the dentinal tubules. Researchers, including those from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, have developed nanorobotic technology to solve this problem. The technology involves nanosized robots that will traverse the slender dentinal tubules and target the hard-to-reach bacteria.

AI, Science & Technology News

Samsung Introduces Its Own AI-Designed Chip

August 24, 2021

By Asif Razzaq

Samsung is making cutting edge chips by using artificial intelligence. The South Korean company has partnered with Synopsys, a leading chip design software firm, to create the new AI-powered features in their latest line of computer processor designs.

Synopsys has a new tool that can help companies design and create chips with AI. The DSO.ai software can optimise the chip designs, which will accelerate semiconductor development to unlock novel chip designs, according to industry watchers. With years of cutting-edge semiconductor designers available for training algorithms to emulate human intelligence, this could be Synopsis’s next breakthrough technology!

Robots, Science & Technology News

Skunk Works’ Factory Of The Future Will Use Roaming Robots To Rapidly Assemble Top Secret Aircraft

August 24, 2021

Skunk Works’ knack for innovation enters the “digital” age with a factory able to spit out advanced aircraft faster and cheaper than ever before.

BY JOSEPH TREVITHICK

Lockheed Martin’s famous Skunk Works advanced projects division has opened a new cutting-edge manufacturing facility at its campus in Palmdale, California, which is part of the U.S. Air Force’s Plant 42. The company says that the technologies it will employ in this new “factory of the future,” blandly named Building 648, will help it drastically speed up and otherwise improve how it designs and produces advanced aerospace vehicles, including stealth fighters and drones, hypersonic missiles, and more. Beyond that, however, this factory is the centerpiece of a larger transformation going on within Skunk Works that could potentially revolutionize the development and production of even very advanced aerospace concepts, industrial capabilities that could be increasingly essential for the U.S. military to maintain its competitive edge.

The War Zone was among a select group of outlets given an opportunity to visit Skunk Works and attend the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the 215,000-square foot Building 648, which Lockheed Martin representatives have described as an “intelligent, flexible, advanced manufacturing facility,” on Aug. 10, 2021, as well as tour other relevant portions of the overall facility at Palmdale. The factory is the “cornerstone” of approximately $400 million worth of investments the company has made to help expand its capabilities and capacity at what is formally known as Plant 10 in recent years, which has already led directly to the creation of 1,500 new jobs since 2018