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Aug 14, 2014

Beijing residents will have to wait at least another 16 years to breathe healthy air

Posted by in category: environmental

By Lily Kuo — Quartz

Over the past six years, Beijing has seen at least 1,812 days of “unhealthy” air quality, and that trend isn’t going to get better any time soon. Pan Tao, head of the Beijing Municipal Research Institute of Environmental Protection, estimates that air pollution in the capital won’t be reach safe levels until at least 2030.

China’s president Xi Jinping has called air pollution the “most prominent challenge” Beijing faces. Foreign firms are paying their workers “hardship” salaries to be posted in the city. In February a report from the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences said that pollution in the capital is “near a level that is no longer livable for human beings.”

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Aug 13, 2014

Lifeboat Foundation Worldwide Ambassador White Swan Update and Published Amazon Author by Andres Agostini at www.amazon.com/author/agostini AND www.linkedin.com/in/andresagostini

Posted by in category: futurism

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As Data Overflows Online, Researchers Grapple With Ethics http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/13/technology/the-boon-of-onl…e&_r=0

Can Tech Innovation Help End Cancer? http://asmarterplanet.com/blog/2014/07/can-tech-innovation-help-end-cancer.html

This Doctor Thinks We May Achieve Immortality, But Isn’t Sure We’d Want To www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/12/david-casarett-shocked-imm…mg00000046

Brain regeneration: Crayfish turn blood into neurons http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26042-brain-regenerati…-u2nGMb8my

Continue reading “Lifeboat Foundation Worldwide Ambassador White Swan Update and Published Amazon Author by Andres Agostini at www.amazon.com/author/agostini AND www.linkedin.com/in/andresagostini” »

Aug 13, 2014

Americans are fine with drone strikes. Everyone else in the world? Not so much.

Posted by in category: drones

— Washington Post

Despite plenty of debate in Congress, a majority of the American people (52 percent) remain in favor of using drones against extremists on foreign soil.

On that count, though, the United States is in the distinct minority on the Planet Earth.

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Aug 12, 2014

Big Corporations Have An OVERWHELMING Amount Of Power Over Our Food Supply

Posted by in category: food

By Michael Snyder — Washington’s Blog

From our fields to our forks, huge corporations have an overwhelming amount of power over our food supply every step of the way. Right now there are more than 313 million people living in the United States, and the job of feeding all of those people is almost entirely in the hands of just a few dozen monolithic companies. If you do not like how our food is produced or you don’t believe that it is healthy enough, it isn’t very hard to figure out who is to blame. These mammoth corporations are not in business to look out for the best interests of the American people. Rather, the purpose of these corporations is to maximize wealth for their shareholders. So the American people end up eating billions of pounds of extremely unhealthy food that is loaded with chemicals and additives each year, and we just keep getting sicker and sicker as a society. But these big corporations are raking in big profits, so they don’t really care.

If we did actually have a capitalist system in this country, we would have a high level of competition in the food industry. But instead, the U.S. food industry has become increasingly concentrated with each passing year. Just consider the following numbers about the U.S. agricultural sector…

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Aug 11, 2014

Solar panels light the way from carbon dioxide to fuel

Posted by in categories: energy, solar power

Princeton

Research to curb global warming caused by rising levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, usually involves three areas: Developing alternative energy sources, capturing and storing greenhouse gases, and repurposing excess greenhouse gases. Drawing on two of these approaches, researchers in the laboratory of Andrew Bocarsly, a Princeton professor of chemistry, collaborated with start-up company Liquid Light Inc. of Monmouth Junction, N.J. to devise an efficient method for harnessing sunlight to convert carbon dioxide into a potential alternative fuel known as formic acid. The study was published June 13 in the Journal of CO2 Utilization.

The transformation from carbon dioxide and water to formic acid was powered by a commercial solar panel generously provided by the energy company PSE&G that can be found atop electric poles across the state. The process takes place inside an electrochemical cell, which consists of metal plates the size of rectangular lunch-boxes that enclose liquid-carrying channels.

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Aug 10, 2014

Segway Inventor Dean Kamen Thinks His New Stirling Engine Will Get You Off The Grid For Under $10K

Posted by in categories: energy, engineering

Christopher Helman — Forbes

Kamen's Beacon 10 Stirling engine. (Courtesy Deka Research)
For the new issue of Forbes Magazine I wrote an article about David Crane, the visionary CEO of NRG Energy . When I met Crane for lunch a couple weeks ago, no sooner had we sat down than he began singing the praises of this new contraption he had in his basement. The machine — which can generate 10 kilowatts of continuous power, fed by Crane’s natural gas line — is a new iteration of an old creation, the Stirling engine. This version, called the Beacon 10, was created after a decade of engineering by famed inventor Dean Kamen.

I caught up with Kamen (who is best known for creating the Segway scooter) over the phone last week to ask him about the device. “We’ve turned his basement into an extension of our laboratory,” said Kamen. “It’s certainly not a machine made for the typical home, but he has a gigantic swimming pool and a huge house.”

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Aug 9, 2014

Vibrations in Vegetables: Energetics in Process of Photosynthesis Could Boost Solar Power Efficiency

Posted by in category: food

Christina Sarich — Nation of Change

Article image

For all those who think the adage, ‘everything is vibration’ is a bunch of bunkum, check this out: biophysics researchers have discovered that molecular vibrations deep within our vegetables help them to process light for photosynthesis, the primary way a plant metabolizes energy from the sun. This discovery could lead to more efficient solar arrays and better energy storage.

Utilizing short pulses of light to peer inside spinach leaves to see how the mechanics of photosynthesis really work, researchers from the University of Michigan have discovered that the vibrations of plant molecules aid in energy conversion of light into power a plant can sustain itself with.

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Aug 8, 2014

Tesla Versus Chevy Volt, Case Study Part 2

Posted by in categories: business, disruptive technology, economics, finance, innovation, policy

A presentation of the future strategic options available to both Tesla and Chevy Volt, using the Holistic Business Model, as published in the book, Reengineering Strategies & Tactics. Note, correction that GM will be investing an $449 million not $1.4 billion I had stated in the video.

Continue reading “Tesla Versus Chevy Volt, Case Study Part 2” »

Aug 8, 2014

Tesla Versus Chevy Volt, Case Study Part 1

Posted by in categories: business, economics, education, innovation, policy

A presentation of the future strategic options available to both Tesla and Chevy Volt, using the Holistic Business Model, as published in the book, Reengineering Strategies & Tactics. Note, correction that GM will be investing an $449 million not $1.4 billion I had stated in the video.

Continue reading “Tesla Versus Chevy Volt, Case Study Part 1” »

Aug 8, 2014

The Brilliant Machine That Could Finally Fix Airport Security

Posted by in category: security

By — Wired
Fans at a World Cup game at Arena de Baixada stadium in Curitiba, Brazil use the Qylatron to go through security.
Australian fans pumped to see their team take on Spain during the first round of the World Cup were intrigued by the honeycomb-like machine that had replaced the standard manual search process at Arena de Baixada stadium in Curitiba, Brazil. They were less thrilled when the machine spotted the toy kangaroos they were trying to sneak into the match.

That machine is the Qylatron Entry Experience Solution, and it could soon replace a crappy experience of going through security checks at airports and other venues with one that’s faster and less invasive. Instead of having a human poke around in your bag, the machine scans it for a variety of threats in just a few seconds. Searching those Aussies and other soccer fans may prove to be a watershed moment for the system, a successful test of how well it can spot trouble and move people through security, efficiently and with their dignity intact.

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