A robot surgeon is now performing successful eye operations.
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Researchers from the University of Antwerp and KU Leuven (University of Leuven), Belgium, have developed a process that purifies air, and at the same time, generates power. The device must only be exposed to light in order to function.
“We used a small device with two rooms separated by a membrane,” explained professor Sammy Verbruggen (UAntwerp/KU Leuven). “Air is purified on one side, while on the other side, hydrogen gas is produced from a part of the degradation products. This hydrogen gas can be stored and used later as fuel, as is already being done in some hydrogen buses, for example.”
In this way, the researchers respond to two major social needs: clean air and alternative energy production. The heart of the solution lies at the membrane level, where the researchers use specific nanomaterials. “These catalysts are capable of producing hydrogen gas and breaking down air pollution,” explains professor Verbruggen. “In the past, these cells were mostly used to extract hydrogen from water. We have now discovered that this is also possible, and even more efficient, with polluted air.”
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Rejuvenaction — Posts
Posted in life extension
You can see how deep-rooted is the wish of some to just ignore the problem of ageing when they say that rejuvenation won’t happen in time for them, and that there’s thus no reason they should concern themselves with the whole issue. This article on rebuts this meta-objection and discusses its origins.
People’s last line of defence to keep ignoring the problem of ageing and rejuvenation is often the meta-objection ‘it won’t happen in my lifetime’. Let’s have a look at what’s wrong with this reasoning, and why some people think this way.
#aging #crowdfundthecure
https://rejuvenaction.wordpress.com/answers-to-objections/ob…-lifetime/
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–In a DAO, a blockchain-based organization, you don’t have a boss or a CEO. What you have is a dynamic set of working relationships continuously and dynamically self-organized around outcomes and projects.
If you’re tired of going to unproductive meetings, commuting in to work just to put in face time, or following commands from a boss you don’t have much confidence in, you may be the right kind of employee for a new type of work environment called a DAO, or Decentralized Autonomous Organization.
We’re in the early stages of seeing these futuristic types of companies roll out already. These early players have run into some missteps, but that’s to be expected. What’s important in the concept of a DAO is the D: “decentralized.”
In a DAO, a blockchain-based organization, you don’t have a boss or a CEO. What you have is a dynamic set of working relationships continuously and dynamically self-organized around outcomes and projects.
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NASA just announced several bounties to improve its FUN3D software, which is used to simulate fluid dynamics. The system is used internally at NASA, as well as by companies like Boeing and Lockheed, to develop and optimize new vehicles and engines.
The FUN3D project was started back in the 1980s, and it has been in active development for decades, but NASA’s looking for help to optimize the code. It’s offering $15,000 and $10,000 prizes to the top two contributors of code optimizations, and is also offering another bounty for more general optimization suggestions.
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A team of astronomers is set to build a new exoplanet hunter. In theory, this instrument could lead to finding the first truly habitable world beyond Earth.
NASA and the National Science Foundation (NSF) have selected a team of astronomers to build their new exoplanet hunter. In order to get the best minds on the job, the scientists were selected after holding a national competition. The resulting team will be led by Penn State University assistant professor Suvrath Mahadevan.
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My new article at Wired UK: http://www.wired.co.uk/article/basic-economy-neural-prosthetics #Future #BasicIncome
But it’ll take more than just a mind tapped into the cloud to be widely competitive in the overall job market. Augmented limbs, bionic organs, and widespread use of exoskeleton technology will be needed to compete against robotic strength.
For years I’ve been supportive of a basic income, which would provide a monthly income for the poor – mostly because I saw it as the only logical way to keep people fed and housed, while still allowing for technological and economic evolution. Now, with neural prosthetics and upgraded bodies, I see the future may, instead, be full of capitalistic enterprise, fuelled by transhumanist technologies that allow us to more closely resemble the machines.
That’s not to say I’m abandoning my views on basic income. Instead, I believe there will be another aspect to the future economy that isn’t only for the robot and AI manufacturers, but for hundreds of millions – maybe billions – of people willing to use tech to compete against machines. A future motto of humanity and capitalism might be: “If you can’t beat a machine, become one.” As a radical science and technology advocate, that’s a philosophy I can support.
Zoltan Istvan is a futurist, author of The Transhumanist Wager, and a Libertarian candidate for California Governor.
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By Irene Klotz
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) — The U.S. military’s experimental X-37B space plane landed on Sunday at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, completing a classified mission that lasted nearly two years, the Air Force said.
The unmanned X-37B, which resembles a miniature space shuttle, touched down at 7:47 a.m. EDT (1147 GMT) on a runway formerly used for landings of the now-mothballed space shuttles, the Air Force said in an email.
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