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Tomorrow’s Cargo Drones Won’t Look Much Like Today’s Helicopters

Boeing unveils a squarish, skeletal quadcopter to try out new unmanned-delivery concepts.

Boeing’s newest prototype drone is a skeletal, squarish quadrotor built as a “flying test bed to mature the building blocks of autonomous technology for future applications,” the aircraft maker said in a statement.

Measuring 15 feet wide and 18 long, the Cargo Air Vehicle represents Boeing’s next step in its quest for next-generation vertical-takeoff-and-landing drones. Last year, the company acquired Aurora Flight Sciences, one year after the Virginia-based company established itself as one of the most interesting in the field by winning DARPAs VTOL X-Plane competition.

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The Future of Military IT: Gait Biometrics, Software Nets, and Photon Communicators

DISA director Lt. Gen. Alan Lynn talks about the tech he’s eyeing, some of which is barely out of the theoretical realm.

Tomorrow’s soldiers will wield encrypted devices that unlock to their voices, or even their particular way of walking, and communicate via ad-hoc, software-defined networks that use not radio waves but light according to Lt. Gen. Alan Lynn, who leads the Defense Information Systems Agency, the U.S. military’s IT provider. On Tuesday, Lynn talked about next-generation technologies that DISA is looking into, some of which are barely experimental today.

Here are few of the key areas:

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Rotation of fast radio burst reveals origins of the cosmic blast

Jan. 10 (UPI) — By analyzing the unique rotation of FRB 121102, a fast radio burst discovered by Cornell astronomers, scientists have been able to study the nature of its cosmic origin.

While studying the giant pulse of radio waves, researchers realized the waves gyrate, or “twist and shout,” as they pass through a veil of magnetized plasma. The twists represent what’s called Faraday rotation, while the shouts describe the bursts.

By measuring these two phenomena, scientists can better understand the cosmic conditions that inspired the massive pulse of radio waves.

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White graphene makes ceramics multifunctional

A little hBN in ceramics could give them outstanding properties, according to a Rice University scientist.

Rouzbeh Shahsavari, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering, suggested the incorporation of ultrathin hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) sheets between layers of calcium-silicates would make an interesting bilayer crystal with multifunctional properties. These could be suitable for construction and refractory and applications in the nuclear industry, oil and gas, aerospace and other areas that require high-performance composites.

Combining the materials would make a ceramic that’s not only tough and durable but resistant to heat and radiation. By Shahsavari’s calculations, calcium-silicates with inserted layers of two-dimensional hBN could be hardened enough to serve as shielding in nuclear applications like power plants.

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Google bought a UK startup that turns screens into speakers

Over the past year, Google has demonstrated its desire to step up its hardware game. The company bought HTC’s Pixel team for $1.1 billion, designed its own imaging chip for the Pixel 2 and also hired a key Apple chip designer. Bloomberg reports that in its bid to gain an edge on the competition, Google has quietly snapped up UK startup Redux, a small team focused on delivering sound and touch feedback via mobile displays.

According to filings, Google took control of the startup back in August and then subsequently shut down the company’s website. Previous demonstrations show Redux playing back music via a tablet device, which possesses tiny actuators that vibrate the screen and effectively turn it into a loudspeaker. By eliminating the need for smartphone speakers, Google may be able free up more space for batteries and other important components inside future smartphones.

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Meet the selfie drone that lives in your phone case

Imagine you and a group of friends are at the peak of a mountain after a long hike. It’s sunset and the sky is alight; you want to take a photo. You pull out your smartphone, but instead of flipping it around to take a long-armed selfie, you unclip a tiny drone from the back of your phone, make it hover at the perfect height and snap a series of photos, no extendo-arms required.

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