Military

UK’s future force to lean heavily into robotics, AI and hybrid power

A British soldier launches a drone during an exercise on the Defence Ministry’s training area at Salisbury Plain on Oct. 13, 2020.

By Jen Judson 

WASHINGTON — The British Army is leaning heavily into robotics, artificial intelligence and hybrid-power technology as part of a new acquisition process dubbed Mercury, according to a British Army leader involved in future procurement planning.

The Army is grappling with how to acquire technologies that it believes it will need in the future, how to spiral in those technologies across its equipment programs and how to cultivate skills in its soldiers to use capabilities as they come online, Col. Christopher Coton, the service’s assistant head for concepts, said at the DSEI defense exhibition in London on Sept. 15.

Driving innovation to achieve its goals, the Army must better identify technologies that will likely change the way the service operates and fights, Coton said. This would be done by drawing on traditional and nontraditional suppliers, the officer added, and the service needs to better articulate what it needs to both small and large companies capable of helping to co-develop technology along the way.

Continue reading… “UK’s future force to lean heavily into robotics, AI and hybrid power”
3D Printer

An entire street of 3D printed homes in Texas are move-in ready

Written by KC Morganon

This is East 17th Street, a collection of homes that range in size and style. It’s got beautiful construction, lovely walkways and landscaping. But what truly makes this Austin, Texas project unique is that these are the first 3D-printed homes for sale in America. Yes, you read that correctly. These homes were all made with a 3D printer.

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Alternative Transportation

Chinese manufacturer vows flying cars by 2024

A Xpeng Motor Heitech flying vehicle on display in Shanghai in April.

Xpeng Heitech, a flying car start-up backed by electric vehicle maker Xpeng Inc, says it will deliver flying cars to customers in 2024.

The start-up, founded in 2013 and funded by Xpeng and Xpeng’s chief executive He Xiaopeng, employs 400 people and will expand its workforce to have 700 people by the end of this year, company founder Zhao Deli told World New Energy Vehicle Congress.

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Augmented Reality

VIRAL PANTHERS CLIP A ‘MILESTONE IN AUGMENTED REALITY’

The Carolina Panthers’ viral moment was months in the making. COURTESY CAROLINA PANTHERS

BY JACOB FELDMAN

People had gotten used to virtual fans—floating heads along the sideline of the NBA Finals or avatars in the outfield bleachers at MLB games. But on Sunday, with NFL stadiums full again, augmented reality took center stage once more, this time in the form of a CGI panther standing on the 50-yard line.

By Tuesday, Carolina’s mixed reality clip of a massive feline leaping around Bank of America Stadium, and seemingly shredding a Jets banner in the process, had drawn more than 10 million views online. The video received more impressions than any other NFL team post during Week 1, according to Zoomph. Meanwhile, Panthers executives were already fielding requests from potential sponsors, as they plan to bring the project back for future home games.

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Augmented Reality

Companies are coworking in the metaverse to stave off Zoom burnout and spark new types of collaboration

by Alexander Lee

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many companies have adopted virtual communication tools to make up for in-person collaboration, but those channels have come with limitations: the nonverbal cues that make in-person meetings useful are difficult to discern on Zoom, and there’s no virtual replacement for water cooler conversations. 

As the pandemic drags on, some firms are addressing these shortcomings by coworking in the metaverse.

It doesn’t help that Zoom burnout is real. Struggling to pick up on nonverbal communication, constantly having to look at oneself and conversing in immobile digital environments are all contributing factors to a national rise in “Zoom fatigue” over the past year, according to a February study by Stanford University’s Virtual Human Interaction Lab. “We can’t just open up new lines of communication organically in Zoom,” said Daniel Liebeskind, CEO of metaverse platform Topia. “It’s just not possible.”

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DNA

Firm raises $15m to bring back woolly mammoth from extinction

The remains of a well-preserved baby mammoth, named Lyuba, displayed in Hong Kong in 2012. 

By Ian Sample

Scientists set initial sights on creating elephant-mammoth hybrid, with first calves expected in six years.

Ten thousand years after woolly mammoths vanished from the face of the Earth, scientists are embarking on an ambitious project to bring the beasts back to the Arctic tundra.

The prospect of recreating mammoths and returning them to the wild has been discussed – seriously at times – for more than a decade, but on Monday researchers announced fresh funding they believe could make their dream a reality.

The boost comes in the form of $15m (£11m) raised by the bioscience and genetics company Colossal, co-founded by Ben Lamm, a tech and software entrepreneur, and George Church, a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School who has pioneered new approaches to gene editing.

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Tourism

World’s Largest Diving Pool With an Entire Sunken City Opens in Dubai

By Jessica Stewart 

Dubai is known for its over-the-top attractions and now, with the opening of Deep Dive Dubai, it can add a world record to its list of achievements. As the world’s deepest swimming pool for diving, Deep Dive Dubai features a “sunken city” among 3.6 million gallons (14 million liters) of water.

The amount of water in the pool is the equivalent of six Olympic swimming pools and, with a depth of 196 feet (60 meters), it is four times larger than its nearest competitor. It contains an apocalyptic sunken city for divers to explore, which evolves as divers sink further into its depths. The concept is that nature has slowly taken over this forgotten city, with storefronts, homes, cars, and arcade games slowly deteriorating.

Along the way, there are two diving habitats that allow divers to rest and chat. This unique feature of Deep Dive Dubai is a dry air space where divers can even remove their equipment and get completely out of the water. Developed as a world-class destination for divers, there are options for everyone. Beginners and expert divers can both enjoy the experience, and there is also a comprehensive development program for those looking to up their skills.

The facility’s director, Jarrod Jablonski, is a world-record-holding cave diver and is proud of Deep Dive Dubai’s commitment to safety and best practices.

“By design, Deep Dive Dubai offers something truly unique for everyone and our team is committed to ensuring a memorable experience, with outstanding service, for everyone, every time,” says Jablonski. “For those seeking a unique experience, Deep Dive Dubai provides an exceptional, safe, and controlled environment to learn all about diving. For experienced members of the freedive and scuba dive communities, it’s a facility and experience like no other.”

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Space Flight

This Luxury Space Balloon Lets You Glide 100,000 Feet Above the Earth With a Cocktail in Hand

By Michael Verdon

“If you’re looking for the fury and vibration of a rocket, you’ve come to the wrong place,” says Jane Poynter, cofounder of Space Perspective. “Our Spaceship Neptune offers a gentle ride into space that lets clients absorb the astronaut experience.” 

The football-field-sized space balloon carrying the bulbous cabin into the sky at 12 mph (picture the pace of a leisurely bike ride) is in market contrast to the thunderous Flash Gordon blastoffs of Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin. Spaceship Neptune’s swanky, pressurized lounge is a panopticon of windows and includes a bar and bathroom. There’s even Wi-Fi. Instead of g forces gluing fliers to their seats, eight passengers and one pilot will sit in recliners, chatting and sipping cocktails as they gradually zoom out on Kennedy Space Center—Spaceship Neptune’s home port—until it becomes the Florida peninsula, then the East Coast and, eventually, a grand view of Earth itself. 

“Some people would love to go pre-dawn,” says Poynter, “so you can really experience the extraordinary sky and see the iconic blue line that separates the Earth below and space. There’s almost a crazy rainbow effect.”

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Amazon.com

Amazon’s cashierless ‘Just Walk Out’ tech is coming to Whole Foods stores

Grab your kombucha or coconut chips and just… walk out. 

By Steve Dent

After launching it in Go stores and then bringing it to larger Fresh supermarkets, Amazon’s cashierless “Just Walk Out” tech will soon arrive in two Whole Foods locations. The service, which lets you pick up goods from shelves and (yep) just walk out, is coming to new stores in Washington DC and Sherman Oaks, California next year, the company announced. 

“By collaborating with Amazon to introduce Just Walk Out shopping at these two Whole Foods Market stores, our customers will be able to… save time by skipping the checkout line,” said Whole Foods co-founder John Mackey. 

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Aviation, Science & Technology News

Bell’s Plan To Finally Realize A Rotorcraft That Flies Like A Jet But Hovers Like A Helicopter

After 50 years of sporadic development, Bell thinks it can build a survivable, long-range, high-speed, VTOL aircraft adapted to tomorrow’s wars. 

Bell has provided The War Zone with exclusive details about its recently revealed concepts for future High-Speed Vertical Take-Off and Landing, or HSVTOL, aircraft, which we looked at initially in this previous article. While being able to takeoff and land vertically using rotors and fly at jet speeds in forward flight sounds far-fetched, it turns out that there is decades of elaborate risk reduction work and general research already done on this exact concept. As such, actually realizing such a capability set may be far less of a technological revolution than one would think at first glance. 

The War Zone sat down, virtually at least, with Jeff Nissen, Senior Manager Advanced Technology at Bell Flight, to talk about how the company has got to this point in its HSVTOL endeavors, as well as looking at some of the details of its latest concepts and how they could find a place in the U.S. military’s inventory.

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AI

RUSSIA IS ON ITS WAY TO RULE SPACE WITH ITS NEW AI POWERED SPACE STATION

THE AI-POWERED SPACE STATION IS ON THE WAY.

by Satavisa Pati

At present, AI is being used in almost every industry on earth and now it’s time for it to go to space. Russia’s new space station will operate autonomously to a large extent, using artificial intelligence as well as include extravehicular robots. The system aims to demonstrate the intelligence of the highest level. The Roscosmos (a state corporation of the Russian federation) chief has added that robotics should be used aboard Russia’s new orbital station. The new orbital outpost in conjunction with the Zeus nuclear-powered space tug can serve as a prototype for future systems of lengthy inter-planetary flights, he said.

The agency aims to develop the new space station with a higher efficiency factor than that of the current International Space Station (ISS). In April, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov announced that the condition of the ISS left much to be desired and Russia might focus on creating its own orbital outpost. The country wants to make a station whose efficiency factor will be several orders of magnitude higher than that of the ISS.

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Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer’s can be ‘stalled or reversed’ using oxygen

Hyperbaric chambers have been posited as a means of solving one of medicine’s great challenges.

By Tim Kiek

Therapy mimics state of ‘hypoxia’ and is similar to that employed by deep-sea divers.

Alzheimer’s disease can be effectively treated by giving oxygen to patients in pressurised chambers, a study from Tel Aviv University suggests.

Over the course of three months, for 90 minutes a day, five days a week, six elderly patients exhibiting the early signs of dementia were administered oxygen in a hyperbaric chamber.

Researchers said the results showed blood flow increased to the triallists’ brains from 16 per cent to 23 per cent and all demonstrated significantly improved brain function.

Memory test scores increased by 16.5 per cent, attention by six per cent, and information processing speeds by 10.3 per cent.

The chamber works by mimicking the state of oxygen shortage or ‘hypoxia’, effectively changing the structure of vessels in the brain. This means that when those in the chamber are fed oxygen, their tissue absorbs it at a faster rate and in a greater volume.

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