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Oct 5, 2015

This device could harvest energy from the air to power our home gadgets

Posted by in categories: electronics, energy, internet, mobile phones

A British tech company has come up with a new way of powering wearables and smart home devices: a device called the Freevolt, which can harvest the ambient energy from radio waves and turn it into a small amount of electricity for low-energy gadgets to tap into.

As CNET reports, this level of energy can’t keep a smartphone running, but it could be enough to power that remote sensor on your garden gate. If sensors and beacons have a wireless energy source plus wireless connectivity, it opens up more possibilities for kitting out our homes and gardens with these kind of devices.

“Companies have been researching how to harvest energy from Wi-Fi, cellular, and broadcast networks for many years,” Drayton Technologies CEO and chairman, Lord Drayson, said in a press statement. “But it is difficult, because there is only a small amount of energy to harvest and achieving the right level of rectifying efficiency has been the issue — up until now. For the first time, we have solved the problem of harvesting usable energy from a small radio frequency signal.”

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Oct 5, 2015

This is pretty amazing

Posted by in category: futurism

OIL FROM PLASTIC.

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Oct 5, 2015

Computer algorithm created to encode human memories

Posted by in categories: computing, information science, neuroscience

Researchers have developed a computer algorithm that mimics the brain’s electrical signalling and helps memory. The FT reports.

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Oct 5, 2015

“I feel like I’m driving into the future right now” — Bill Whitaker reports on self-driving cars

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, transportation

Mercedes F 015 Self Driving Car.

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Oct 4, 2015

The interfaces that bridge the human-machine divide

Posted by in category: computing

First it was toggle switches. And then keyboards, the mouse and other standard interface devices gave us control of computers and the digital world. From the tangible, to hands-free and beyond, the ways in which we control digital systems are expanding. We’ve collected just a few of the interesting products and concepts that are breaching the two-dimensional world of computing and merging it with our physical reality.

[Image: Jinha Lee / MIT Media Lab].

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Oct 4, 2015

Sweden sets its sights on becoming the world’s first fossil fuel-free nation

Posted by in category: sustainability

The Swedish government announced this week that they will be spending an extra US$546 million on renewable energy and climate change action in their 2016 budget, with the aim of becoming one of the world’s first nations to end its dependence on fossil fuels. They haven’t set a deadline for this ambitious goal just yet, but last year the country announced plans to make its capital Stockholm fossil fuel-free by 2050, so we’re imagining a similar time frame.

It may seem like a pretty big task, but the Scandinavian country already gets two-thirds of its electricity from non-fossil fuel energy sources — predominately hydroelectric and nuclear — and it will now be focussing on increasing its solar and wind energy potential, as well as making its transport industry more sustainable. The majority of the budget increase will be financed by heavier taxes on petrol and diesel fuel.

“Sweden will become one of the first fossil-free welfare states in the world,” Prime Minister Stefan Löfven told the press. “When European regulations do not go far enough Sweden will lead the way.”

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Oct 4, 2015

Why The Internet Needs IPFS Before It’s Too Late

Posted by in category: internet

IPFS isn’t exactly a well-known technology yet, even among many in the Valley, but it’s quickly spreading by word of mouth among folks in the open-source community. Many are excited by its potential to greatly improve file transfer and streaming speeds across the Internet.

From my personal perspective, however, it’s actually much more important than that. IPFS eliminates the need for websites to have a central origin server, making it perhaps our best chance to entirely re-architect the Internet — before its own internal contradictions unravel it from within.

How, and why? The answer requires a bit of background.

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Oct 4, 2015

Spooky Quantum Action Might Hold the Universe Together

Posted by in categories: quantum physics, space

Caption: Tensor networks could connect space-time froth to quantum information. Hannes Hummel for Quanta Magazine.

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Oct 4, 2015

Scientist who injected himself with 3.5 MILLION year old germs says they give ETERNAL LIFE

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

“Dr Brouchkov, the head of the Geocryology Department at Moscow State University, first injected himself with the bacteria two years ago.

He claims he has not had flu since, and that he has also been able to work harder and longer without getting tired.”


A RUSSIAN scientist claims he has cracked the secret of ETERNAL LIFE after injecting himself with primordial GERMS.

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Oct 4, 2015

Signals from empty space

Posted by in category: quantum physics

What are the properties of the vacuum, the absolute nothingness? So far, physicists have assumed that it is impossible to directly access the characteristics of the ground state of empty space. Now, a team of physicists led by Prof. Alfred Leitenstorfer at the University of Konstanz (Germany) has succeeded in doing just that. They demonstrated a first direct observation of the so-called vacuum fluctuations by using short light pulses while employing highly precise optical measurement techniques. The duration of their light pulses was ensured to be shorter than half a cycle of light in the spectral range investigated. According to quantum physics, these oscillations exist even in total darkness, when the intensity of light and radio waves completely disappears. These findings are of fundamental importance for the development of quantum physics and will be published in the journal Science; an advance online version has appeared on October 1, 2015.

The existence of vacuum fluctuations is already known from theory as it follows from Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, one of the main pillars of quantum physics. This principle dictates that electric and magnetic fields can never vanish simultaneously. As a consequence, even total darkness is filled with finite fluctuations of the electromagnetic field, representing the quantum ground state of light and radio waves. However, until now direct experimental proof of this basic phenomenon has been considered impossible. Instead, it is usually assumed that vacuum fluctuations are manifested in nature only indirectly. From spontaneous emission of light by excited atoms e.g. in a fluorescent tube to influences on the structure of the universe during the Big Bang: these are just some of the instances that highlight the ubiquitous role the concept of vacuum fluctuations plays in the modern physical description of the world.

An experimental setup to measure electric fields with extremely high temporal resolution and sensitivity has now made it possible to directly detect vacuum fluctuations, despite all contrary assumptions. World-leading optical technologies and ultrashort pulsed laser systems of extreme stability provide the know-how necessary for this study. The research team at the University of Konstanz developed these technologies in-house and also an exact description of the results based on quantum field theory. The temporal precision achieved in their experiment is in the femtosecond range — a millionth of a billionth of a second. The sensitivity is limited only by the principles of quantum physics. “This extreme precision has enabled us to see for the first time that we are continuously surrounded by the fields of electromagnetic vacuum fluctuations” sums up Alfred Leitenstorfer.

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