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Category: internet – Page 217

There’s nothing quite like a maddening math problem, mind-bending optical illusion, or twisty logic puzzle to halt all productivity in the Popular Mechanics office. We’re curious people by nature, but we also collectively share a stubborn insistence that we’re right, dammit, and so we tend to throw work by the wayside whenever we come upon a problem with several seemingly possible solutions.

This triangle brain teaser isn’t new—shoutout to Popsugar for unearthing it a couple years ago—but based on some shady Internet magic, the tweet below reappeared in my feed today and kick-started a new debate on our staff-wide Slack channel, a place traditionally reserved for workshopping ideas, but instead mostly used for yelling about other stuff that we occasionally turn into content.

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Business districts may be bustling in the daytime, but they can often be near-deserted in the evenings. These fluctuations in population density pose a challenge to the emergence of 5G networks, which will require more hardware than ever before to relay massive amounts of data. Here’s the rub: To ensure reliable service, mobile networks must either invest in and deploy many more hardware units–or find ways to let the hardware move with the crowds.

One group of researchers is proposing a creative solution: installing small radio units on cars and crowdsourcing the task of data transmission when the vehicles are not in use. That approach relies on the fact that more cars tend to be parked in highly populated areas.

The most common network model that service providers are considering for 5G networks involves C-RAN architecture. Central units coordinate the transmission of data; the data is disseminated through distribution units and is further processed and transmitted by fleets of radio units. Those units convert the information to usable formats for mobile users.

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Update January 29th, 10:10AM ET: SpaceX successfully launched its Falcon 9 rocket on time this morning, deploying all 60 satellites into orbit. The rocket also performed another landing on the company’s drone ship in the Atlantic after launch. While SpaceX did catch one half of the rocket’s fairing, the other half just missed its boat.

Original story: A week after performing a crucial test flight for NASA, SpaceX is poised to launch yet another Falcon 9 rocket from Florida. This mission is tasked with sending up the latest batch of internet-beaming satellites for SpaceX, adding on to the roughly 180 satellites the company already has in orbit.

Today’s flight is the fourth launch for SpaceX’s Starlink project, a massive constellation of satellites that aims to provide internet coverage to every point on the globe. SpaceX has permission to launch nearly 12,000 satellites and has expressed interest in launching 30,000 more. To fulfill its licensing obligations, SpaceX has to launch nearly 6,000 within the next five to six years. The company plans to launch up to 24 Starlink missions this year.

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Chip Walter discusses his book, “Immortality, Inc”, at Politics and Prose.

Living forever has always been a dream, but with today’s science, technology, and visionary billionaires, it may be a distinct possibility. At the very least, as Walter reports in this compelling investigation, immortality researchers are changing the way we view aging and death. Looking at the science, business, and culture of this radical endeavor, Walter, a science journalist, author of Last Ape Standing, and former CNN bureau chief, lays out the latest research into stem cell rejuvenation, advanced genomics, and artificial intelligence; talks to key thinkers such as Ray Kurzweil and Aubrey de Grey; and takes us into the Silicon Valley labs of human genomics trailblazer Craig Venter and molecular biologist and Apple chairman Arthur Levinson. Walter is in conversation with Hilary Black, executive editor at National Geographic Books.

https://www.politics-prose.com/book/9781426219801

CHIP WALTER is a science journalist, filmmaker, and former CNN bureau chief whose books include Last Ape Standing and Thumbs, Toes, and Tears. His writing has appeared in The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, Scientific American, and National Geographic, to which he contributed the January 2015 cover story “The First Artists.” He has been interviewed on “All Things Considered” and Michio Kaku’s “Science Fantastic.”

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Updated at 9:50 p.m. Eastern.

WASHINGTON — A green propulsion startup with more than $1 million in sales says it is gaining traction in the smallsat market while funding its own small launch vehicle.

Dawn Aerospace, based in New Zealand and the Netherlands, has its first propulsion system launching in March on a D-Orbit cubesat aboard a Vega rocket. A second is scheduled to launch on an Indian PSLV in the second quarter of 2020 on a cubesat for Hiber, a Dutch Internet of Things startup. Dawn Aerospace also has contracts from the New Zealand Space Agency and the U.S. Air Force, Dawn Aerospace CEO Jeroen Wink said in an interview.

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According to Nikkei, various countries have begun to target the next generation of communication technologies after 5G. Japan plans official-civilian cooperation to formulate a comprehensive strategy for “post-5G” (6G technology). It plans to achieve communication speeds that are 10 times faster than 5G by 2030. China, South Korea, and Finland have also started research, development, and investment. If you have patents related to communication standards, you can make huge profits through the sale of equipment and software. Japan, which is slowing down in 5G development, strives to catch up.

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