Tesla’s potential market size for its humanoid robot, Optimus, presents a massive opportunity worth trillions of dollars, far surpassing the impact of their electric vehicles.
Questions to inspire discussion.
What is the potential market size for Tesla’s humanoid robot, Optimus?
—The potential market size for Optimus presents a massive opportunity worth trillions of dollars, far surpassing the impact of Tesla’s electric vehicles.
Tesla is working on a $25,000 car expected to be released in 2024, which could potentially drive stock valuation and face potential demand issues.
Questions to inspire discussion.
When is Tesla expected to release a $25,000 car?
—Tesla is expected to release the $25,000 car in 2024, with the possibility of manufacturing and delivery by the end of the year.
If you want to improve the output of solar energy systems, why not also run them at night? That’s the question researchers in Qatar and Jordan addressed as they successfully devised a system that promises to more than double energy output of current solar power stations.
By combining two concepts—a solar updraft system and a cooling downdraft structure—researchers designed a model that could generate 753 MWh of energy annually. That’s enough to power roughly 753 homes for about five weeks or 1,500 60-watt light bulbs nonstop for a year.
The origins of the system, referred to as Solar Tower Power Plant, go back to 1982 when Spanish engineers constructed a chimney-like tower with a mechanical turbine at its base. Air within the tower was warmed by absorbing solar radiation, similar to a greenhouse. As the air heated, it created an updraft that rose and activated wind turbines that in turn generated electricity.
NASA has awarded Blue Origin a $35 million contract to further develop a technology that creates solar cells out of lunar regolith — the dust and crushed rock blanketing the moon’s surface.
“[W]e’re inspired and humbled to receive this investment from NASA to advance our innovation,” said Pat Remias, VP of Blue Origin’s Capabilities Directorate. “First we return humans to the moon, then we start to ‘live off the land.’”
Moon or bust: NASA plans to send astronauts to the moon again as soon as 2025, with the goal of establishing a long-term presence on the lunar surface soon after. For that to work, it’s going to need a way to provide astronauts with a steady supply of everything they need to survive and thrive, from food and water to oxygen and electricity.
Future quantum computers are expected to revolutionize problem-solving in various fields, such as creating sustainable materials, developing new medications, and unraveling complex issues in fundamental physics. However, these pioneering quantum systems are currently more error-prone than the classical computers we use today. Wouldn’t it be nice if researchers could just take out a special quantum eraser and get rid of the mistakes?
Reporting in the journal Nature, a group of researchers led by Caltech is among the first to demonstrate a type of quantum eraser. The physicists show that they can pinpoint and correct for mistakes in quantum computing systems known as “erasure” errors.
“It’s normally very hard to detect errors in quantum computers, because just the act of looking for errors causes more to occur,” says Adam Shaw, co-lead author of the new study and a graduate student in the laboratory of Manuel Endres, a professor of physics at Caltech. “But we show that with some careful control, we can precisely locate and erase certain errors without consequence, which is where the name erasure comes from.”
NASA has awarded GE Aerospace a contract to continue working on the HyTEC program, which aims to create more fuel-efficient and eco-friendly engines for commercial aircraft.
NASA has renewed a contract with GE Aerospace to continue the HyTEC program, which aims to create more fuel-efficient engines for commercial aircraft.
According to a new study in Nature, China could be facing an impending wind turbine waste problem if it cannot find ways to deal with it.
While China has forged ahead with its renewable energy infrastructure, it must find ways to deal with the waste from older installations, study finds.
Elon Musk plans to start a new STEM-focused university in Austin, while also addressing criticisms and misinformation about Tesla and promoting a healthy lifestyle for productivity and fulfillment.
Questions to inspire discussion.
What is Elon Musk planning to start in Austin?
—Elon Musk plans to start a new STEM-focused university in Austin, beginning with a stem focused primary and secondary school, and has sent $2.2 billion in stock to his foundation for this purpose.
Batteries that exploit quantum phenomena to gain, distribute and store power promise to surpass the abilities and usefulness of conventional chemical batteries in certain low-power applications. For the first time, researchers, including those from the University of Tokyo, take advantage of an unintuitive quantum process that disregards the conventional notion of causality to improve the performance of so-called quantum batteries, bringing this future technology a little closer to reality.
When you hear the word “quantum,” the physics governing the subatomic world, developments in quantum computers tend to steal the headlines, but there are other upcoming quantum technologies worth paying attention to. One such item is the quantum battery which, though initially puzzling in name, holds unexplored potential for sustainable energy solutions and possible integration into future electric vehicles. Nevertheless, these new devices are poised to find use in various portable and low-power applications, especially when opportunities to recharge are scarce.
At present, quantum batteries only exist as laboratory experiments, and researchers around the world are working on the different aspects that are hoped to one day combine into a fully functioning and practical application. Graduate student Yuanbo Chen and Associate Professor Yoshihiko Hasegawa from the Department of Information and Communication Engineering at the University of Tokyo are investigating the best way to charge a quantum battery, and this is where time comes into play. One of the advantages of quantum batteries is that they should be incredibly efficient, but that hinges on the way they are charged.