Impact Lab – Page 351 – A Laboratory of the Future Human Experience

Telemedicine Has a New Tool: World’s First 3D-Printed, Connected Stethoscope

October 11, 2021

Ultrafast polymer 3D printers from Nexa3D and performance-matched materials developed by Henkel are key to achieving annual production goals of 100,000 units.

By Norbert Sparrow

The Chinese word for “crisis” is composed of two characters, one meaning “danger” while the second one signifies “opportunity.” One can feed off the other, in other words. That came to mind as I learned about the world’s first additively manufactured, connected stethoscope developed through a partnership between Nexa3D, a startup that makes ultrafast polymer 3D printers; global giant Henkel; and French medtech startup WeMed. The medical device OEM saw an opportunity in the rapid adoption of telemedicine and remote diagnostics as COVID-19 — the crisis — marched across the globe.

Produced on the NXE400 ultrafast 3D printer using performance-matched Henkel materials, the WeMed Skop is the world’s first connected stethoscope to be additively manufactured in its entirety at scale. Annual production volumes will exceed 100,000 units, according to Nexa3D, which will showcase Skop at RAPID + TCT 2021 at McCormick Place, Chicago, on Sept. 13 to 15.

AI

New AI-based Hospital-at-Home Network

October 11, 2021

Nanowear, a hospital-at-home and remote diagnostic platform informed by proprietary cloth nanotechnology and AI, today announced that it received its third FDA 510(k) clearance and first software-only clearance as an end-to-end digital platform, illustrating unique capabilities available to enterprise customer channels across a broad spectrum of diagnostic and monitoring verticals.

This clearance enables Nanowear to implement standalone AI and deep learning algorithms that will inform remote diagnoses as Software-as-a-Medical Device (SaMD). Future clearances include, but are not limited to, diagnosing or monitoring of hypertension, COPD, sleep apnea, worsening heart failure and post-surgical recovery.

drones

Matternet’s automated drone-docking station makes its real-life debut in Switzerland

October 10, 2021

No one knows exactly how drone delivery will fit into the future of logistics, but one thing is for sure: The aircraft aren’t going to drop off important payloads directly onto someone’s lawn. Matternet’s Station, an automated landing space and payload control tower, may be the solution, and the flower-like structure has finally made the jump from render to reality at a medical facility in Switzerland.

The Station was teased early last year, but one never knows with these concept renders whether the final result will be anything like the idea. In this case it’s dead on, looking for anything like a prop from a ’60s sci-fi flick.

The unusual shape serves a purpose, however, providing a safe place for a cargo drone to land and swap its battery out, protected from the elements and the type of ne’er-do-wells who would snatch a medical payload from an innocent robot.

Health

$1B science fund seeks blockchain projects to expand human lifespan

October 10, 2021

Longevity Science Foundation accepts crypto donations and aims to use technology to advance healthy human longevity.

By ERHAN KAHRAMAN

Scientists are continuously pursuing ways to lengthen the human lifespan, and blockchain might have been a missing part of the puzzle. The Longevity Science Foundation, a Swiss entity launched by a consortium of biotech founders, clinicians and leading longevity research institutions, aims to spend more than $1 billion over the next 10 years to find tech-based means to achieve a 120-year human lifespan.

The foundation seeks to fund research, institutions and projects that use blockchain and other next-gen technologies to find new horizons in four critical areas of the field; namely, therapeutics, personalized medicine, artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive diagnostics. The announcement states that such projects can make a significant difference in people’s lives, even within a five-year timeframe.

Robots, Science & Technology News

Honda is working on small rockets, electric aircraft and robots for the Moon

October 10, 2021

It wants to send humans to the ‘fourth dimension.’ Yeah, it’s pretty weird.

By RONAN GLON

Honda builds a surprisingly diverse selection of products that includes cars, motorcycles, generators, lawn mowers and planes. It will branch out into even more sectors over the coming years by adding robots, small rockets, and a second plane.

The expansion is part of Honda’s 2030 Vision of serving people worldwide with what it calls “the joy of expanding their life’s potential” — even if that means putting down the snowblower (built by Honda, of course) and taking a quick jaunt to outer space. The firm explained that it wants to expand the potential of mobility in the third dimension before turning its attention to the fourth dimension, which we’re told defies the constraints of time and space, and ultimately head into space.

Honda, which has made the HondaJet for years, will initially develop an electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft that won’t be as electric as its name suggests. Shown in the gallery above, it will be propelled by a hybrid powertrain built around a gas turbine, and it will have enough range to carry passengers from one city to the next. On paper, it sounds a lot like the flying taxis that several other carmakers are hoping to pelt into the sky at some point in the future. Like many of its rivals, Honda plans to create an ecosystem in which its aircraft can operate while connecting it to some of its land-bound products.

Profitably building and operating an eVTOL makes autonomous driving look easy; the technology isn’t ready, the regulations are murky, and the infrastructure is nearly non-existent beyond helipads and airports. And yet, Honda’s entry into this much-hyped segment is more credible than most. It operates a successful plane-building division that makes the HondaJet, which was recently updated with more range.

Driverless vehicles

New Citroen Skate is autonomous platform with swappable pods

October 10, 2021

Urban mobility concept can drive itself around a city, hosting travel compartments designed by different companies

By Felix Page

Skate, a new platform concept, is Citroën’s vision for the future of autonomous shared mobility in cities and forms part of a revolutionary “open-source” model that the firm says could improve traffic fluidity by 35%.

The platform, equipped with level-five autonomous capabilities to move around urban areas with no human input, can operate “almost continuously” 24/7, charging itself at dedicated hubs.

t has a maximum speed of 3mph or 16mph, depending on its surroundings, and is equipped with Citroën’s Advanced Comfort hydraulic cushion suspension set-up for optimum ride quality. Bespoke motorised spherical wheels designed by Goodyear allow for 360deg manoeuvrability, “just like a computer mouse”.

Medical Breakthrough

First Prototype Bioartificial Kidney Successful: Man-Made Organ May Solve Medical Problems, Giving Hope to Dialysis Patients

October 10, 2021

By Ron Jefferson

The first bioartificial kidney developed by The Kidney Project earned a $650,000 prize from the KidneyX’s Artificial Kidney Prize. The man-made kidney technology is expected to be among the most promising solutions in today’s medical advancements that could end challenging kidney problems. Among the key interests of the bioartificial kidney is to implant the device on patients instead of treating them through dialysis machines and decrease the patients on the waiting lists of transplant procedures. The Kidney Project was led by UC San Francisco and Vanderbilt University Medical Center experts Shuvo Roy and William Fissel.

Alternative Transportation

Cityhawk, An Electric Flying Car Without Wings That Already Takes To The Skies

October 10, 2021

By Leonard Manson

Cityhawk: For about 4 years, we are seeing more and more ‘flying cars’. More and more companies, companies, projects that are with this concept underway. In some cases it is that literal concept, like the Klein Vision AirCar, a car with folding wings that can fly like a plane and be driven on the highway. In others, it’s basically a huge drone with seats. And in today’s case, a vehicle that looks like something out of an 80s Sci Fi film.

DNA

How Genetic Testing Will Create Personalized Therapeutics for Rare Diseases

October 8, 2021

“Personalized medicine represents a better paradigm in medicine than one-size-fits-all, trial-and-error, which is what most medicine is.”

By Audrey Carleton

For patients with rare symptoms, landing on a course of treatment often comes only after a long, winding road of doctor’s visits, consultations, lab work and experiments. It’s costly, emotionally turbulent, and tiresome.

It’s what many in the world of medicine call the “diagnostic odyssey,” referring to the time it takes from the initial onset of symptoms to final diagnosis. And it’s a path that, for the average patient, takes about 8 years.

“You go from doctor to doctor for years and years, and you don’t figure out what’s going on,” Edward Abraham, founder of the Personalized Medicine Coalition (PMC), an education and advocacy group, told Motherboard. “All of that is expensive.”

It’s a cycle Abraham’s group, which consists of both non- and for-profit organizations from across the healthcare industry, is striving to do away with. Their solution? Improving access to genetic testing to allow for the creation of personalized therapeutics.

The traditional approach to medicine, Abraham describes, is one-size-fits-all. When a patient presents a rare, difficult-to-diagnose symptom, their healthcare provider may try a slew of treatments with varying effectiveness, all of which have been developed to treat the largest number of patients at once, rather than to suit the needs of a specific individual.

With personalized medicine, hard-to-diagnose symptoms are inspected by going straight to the source — the human genome. With genetic sequencing, a sample of a patient’s DNA is taken through blood, skin, or tissue, for example. Then, their entire genetic code, all 3.2-billion base pairs, are analyzed for signs of mutations that may be causing a symptom or underlying disorder. With this information, a doctor is better equipped to search for a personalized treatment for an individual disorder, or to create one from scratch.

Aviation

Airbus gears up for hydrogen jet as fuel of future edges closer to reality

October 8, 2021

According to Airbus, the moment of hydrogen is approaching rapidly. Guillaume Foley, chief executive officer of an airplane maker, has been talked about as a fuel for the future for years, but by the end of the decade the company will manufacture hydrogen-powered commercial airliners. He said he was ready to start.

European aerospace champions are skeptical among other industry leaders about how quickly gas can affect aviation emissions, but the 2035 will be the “ for hydrogen planes to go into service. I am more and more convinced that it is a fair and realistic perspective.

“You don’t have to change the laws of physics to deal with hydrogen. Hydrogen has three times the energy density of kerosene — [technically it] Foley told reporters at an Airbus event on sustainability in Toulouse.

Foley’s comments show Airbus’ growing confidence that it can tackle the complex engineering and safety challenges needed to make hydrogen-powered aircraft work. However, Foley warned that government and regulatory support would be needed.

Airbus needs to have “some degree of certainty” about the regulated environment and fuel availability by 2027/28, when the company must decide whether to invest billions of dollars in its new hydrogen airplane program. Said there is.

“this [decarbonisation] The challenge is not just for airplanes, but for getting the right fuel, the right hydrogen, at the right time, at the right place, at the right price, which aviation cannot manage on its own, “he said.

Foley’s remarks underscore the growing urgency of the aviation industry as it strives to reach its zero-emissions goal by 2050. Before the pandemic led to many landings of the world’s aircraft fleet, aviation accounted for about 2.4% of the world’s emissions.

Augmented Reality, Science & Technology News

Atari Founder Is Launching Augmented Reality NFTs on Ethereum

October 8, 2021

Nolan Bushnell’s NFT arcade cabinets can be viewed in 3D in your own home, plus there are some real-world perks attached.

By Andrew Hayward

ATARI’S PONG IS GETTING THE NFT TREATMENT.

In brief

Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari, will release NFTs based on classic arcade machines via MakersPlace.
All of the NFTs let owners view the arcade machine in 3D via augmented reality technology.

As the founder of legendary video game company Atari, Nolan Bushnell helped bring arcade gaming to the masses. And now with the advent of NFTs, he plans to bring some of those formative early machines into homes as digital, augmented reality collectibles.

Today, Bushnell and NFT marketplace MakersPlace announced The Arcade OG Series, a set of Ethereum-based collectibles. An NFT is a token that can be used to prove ownership of a verifiably scarce digital item—in this case, a video clip displaying a 3D rendering of an Atari “Pong” or Syzygy (Bushnell’s Atari precursor) “Computer Space” arcade game cabinet.blob:

Each Arcade OG Series collectible is more than just a simple video clip, however: it also comes with an augmented reality experience that lets you view the 3D rendering of the arcade cabinet within any real-world space. Owners will be able to drop the digital cabinet into place and then walk around it, viewing it up-close from all angles.

brain hacking

Samsung wants to reverse engineer human brain and replicate it on 3D chip

October 7, 2021

By Asif S.

Samsung has announced a new way to reverse engineer the human brain and mimic it with semiconductor chips. The world’s biggest memory chip maker has collaborated with Harvard University researchers to share a new approach that takes the world one step closer to making neuromorphic chips.

Harvard scholars and Samsung engineers have published a new perspective paper titled ‘Neuromorphic electronics based on copying and pasting the brain’ on Nature Electronics.