Researchers released drugs into a cockroach using only the thoughts of a man hooked up to an EEG machine.
Read more
Scientists have managed to develop a novel method to grow stable, ultra-long 1D carbon chains of a material that is twice as strong as carbon nanotubes and far stronger than diamonds.
Elemental carbon is extremely versatile, and scientists have long been able to create new carbon allotropes that make for super durable and multi-functioning materials—such as everyone’s favorite material, graphene.
The “carbon family” is one very resourceful family. But even with all these developments, carbyne remained elusive. In fact, it is the only form of carbon that has not been synthesized, even though researchers have been studying its properties for over 50 years.
Read more
Russia is working to deploy a revolutionary hypersonic maneuvering strike missile by 2020, according to a Russian defense industry leader.
Boris Obnosov, director of the state-run Tactical Missiles Corp., told a Russian news agency the new hypersonic missile will be capable of penetrating advanced missile defenses and represents a revolutionary advance in military technology.
“It’s obvious that with such speeds—when missiles will be capable of flying through the atmosphere at speeds of seven to 12 times the speed of sound, all [air] defense systems will be weakened considerably,” Obnosov told the Rambler News Service this week.
Read more
Interesting read on IPC Systems Inc. is partnering with U.K. startup Post-Quantum to (in their own words) “offer its clients encryption, biometric authentication and a distributed-ledger record-keeping system that the software company says is designed to resist hacking — even by a quantum computer.” — I will be researching this more.
(Bloomberg) — When it comes to cybersecurity, no one can accuse IPC Systems Inc., the New Jersey-based company that builds communications networks for trading firms and financial markets, of preparing to fight the last war.
Read more
To help stem the tide of rhino poaching, some biotech companies such as Pembient are seeking to develop and manufacture synthetic horns that are biologically identical to the real thing. The thinking behind this is that the availability of bio-identical fake horns at a substantially lower price than wild horns would cause demand to shift towards the synthetic substitutes, which would reduce people’s incentives to poach rhinos.
I have argued previously that—from the perspective of what would be most effective in curbing poaching—the synthetic horns should not be made to be perfect fakes, i.e., bio-identical. Instead, the synthetic horns should be engineered to be (i) difficult to distinguish from wild horns but (ii) undesirable or unappealing in some respect so that buyers would place little value on them. This proposal makes use of a phenomenon in economics known as adverse selection, which occurs when buyers in a market are unable to distinguish between high- and low-quality products, and their lack of information drives down demand—and, hence, prices—enough that high-quality products (which would be wild horns in the context of rhino horns) cease to be supplied by sellers.
For conservationists and others who are concerned about the fate of the rhinos, it is critical to understand why biotech companies would prefer making bio-identical synthetic horns—rather than undesirable fakes—because of the implications this has for conservation policies. Simply put, it would be more profitable to produce and sell perfect fakes rather than synthetic horns that would be considered undesirable. All else being equal, putting out undesirable fakes that buyers cannot distinguish from the real ones, by reducing demand for horns, would lead to lower prices in the horn market compared to the case with bio-identical synthetic horns. This, of course, would generate less revenue for the producers of synthetic horns.
Read more
Check it out! Finally! Now get ready to mass produce synthetic diamonds for QC, medical tech, etc.
Every additive manufacturing (AM) system offers the potential for endless creativity. As designers learn to embrace the possibilities offered by digital design and AM, the number of applications for the technology increases. Everything has its limits, however, and for AM those limits are sometimes related to materials.
3D printing has already come a long way from the days when it was primarily a plastic process. You can find AM systems that print in wood, ceramics, metal and much, much more. According to a patent filed with the US Patent & Trademark Office, Lockheed Martin may be developing a method that will add synthetic diamond to that list.
Hacking microbes
Posted in biotech/medical, engineering, food
Biology is the world’s greatest manufacturing platform, according to MIT spinout Ginkgo Bioworks.
The synthetic-biology startup is re-engineering yeast to act as tiny organic “factories” that produce chemicals for the flavor, fragrance, and food industries, with aims of making products more quickly, cheaply, and efficiently than traditional methods.
“We see biology as a transformative technology,” says Ginkgo co-founder Reshma Shetty PhD ’08, who co-invented the technology at MIT. “It is the most powerful and sophisticated manufacturing platform on the planet, able to self-assemble incredible structures at a scale that is far out of reach of the most cutting-edge human technology.”
Read more
More on the UN’s concern on the next gen technologies.
UN Photo/Rick Bajornas
Of all the initiatives and developments in the 3D printing world, none have caused as much headaches as 3D printed guns. And regardless of where you stand on the issue of gun rights in America, it’s no secret that completely untraceable plastic guns are bringing security issues to the table. Especially law makers in the US have been scratching their heads about what to do with them. Among others, the US State Department has been trying to limit the spread of 3D printable gun designs, while a new law passed in California last month requires 3D printed guns to be registered.