Toggle light / dark theme

Our brains are remarkably energy efficient.

Using just 20 watts of power, the human brain is capable of processing the equivalent of an exaflop — or a billion-billion mathematical operations per second.

Now, researchers in Australia are building what will be the world’s first supercomputer that can simulate networks at this scale.

Causality is key to our experience of reality: dropping a glass, for example, causes it to smash, so it can’t smash before it’s dropped. But in the quantum world those rules don’t necessarily apply, and scientists have now demonstrated how that weirdness can be harnessed to charge a quantum battery.

In a sense, you could say that quantum batteries are powered by paradoxes. On paper, they work by storing energy in the quantum states of atoms and molecules – but of course, as soon as the word “quantum” enters the conversation you know weird stuff is about to happen. In this case, a new study has found that quantum batteries could work by violating cause-and-effect as we know it.

“Current batteries for low-power devices, such as smartphones or sensors, typically use chemicals such as lithium to store charge, whereas a quantum battery uses microscopic particles like arrays of atoms,” said Yuanbo Chen, an author of the study. “While chemical batteries are governed by classical laws of physics, microscopic particles are quantum in nature, so we have a chance to explore ways of using them that bend or even break our intuitive notions of what takes place at small scales. I’m particularly interested in the way quantum particles can work to violate one of our most fundamental experiences, that of time.”

Less than a week after announcing a Power Day 2023 event to unveil new battery technologies, ZEEKR has officially introduced its own lithium iron phosphate (LFP) cells developed in-house. While LFP batteries are generally categorized as less energy-dense, ZEEKR says its cells outperform many competitors.

While many companies have begun decelerating in 2023 as we enter the busy holiday season, ZEEKR has shown no signs of slowing down. In November, the Geely-owned automaker announced a new model called the 7, which made its public debut during the Guangzhou Auto Show. Since then, we’ve seen the company file for a US IPO and have confirmed plans for a new mass-market SUV to compete with the Tesla Model Y.

The ZEEKR 7 sedan will officially launch in China on December 27, followed by deliveries a few days later. Before then, however, ZEEKR promised a live event to debut new technology pertaining to EV batteries developed entirely in-house.

Tesla has released a new comparison report claiming Powerwall with solar is cheaper than a traditional backup generator.

For years now, Tesla has enjoyed a giant backlog of Powerwall orders, but now that production has ramped up, the automaker has worked through most of that backlog, and it has to start generating more demand for the home energy storage product.

Tesla has now released a new report that compares Powerwalls as a backup system to backup generators.

Tesla has unveiled a 3D reconstruction park assist system that serves as the long-awaited bird-eye view.

Bird’s eye view, a vision monitoring system that renders a view of a vehicle from the top to help park and navigate tight spaces, has become a popular feature in premium vehicles and it has even moved down market over the last few years.

It’s almost ubiquitous in most modern luxury cars and offered in tech packages in many less expensive vehicles.