Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Blog – Page 2661

Tesla’s vehicles come with various unique features, including the ability to use the mobile app to perform several different functions remotely. In a repost of another account pointing to the ability to set cabin temperature remotely, Tesla highlighted that preconditioning will also warm up the vehicle’s battery, helping to optimize range and overall performance.

On Wednesday morning, Tesla reposted a @WholeMarsBlog post on X describing the ability to pre-set cabin temperature remotely using the mobile app when it’s hot outside, meaning owners will “never get into a car that’s too hot or too cold again.”

Tesla piggybacked on the concept, pointing out that when users remotely precondition their cars during the winter, their batteries will also be warmed to the ideal temperature to improve vehicle performance.

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Engineers at MIT and in China are aiming to turn seawater into drinking water with a completely passive device that is inspired by the ocean, and powered by the sun.

In a paper appearing in the journal Joule, the team outlines the design for a new solar desalination system that takes in saltwater and heats it with natural sunlight.

The configuration of the device allows water to circulate in swirling eddies, in a manner similar to the much larger “thermohaline” circulation of the ocean. This circulation, combined with the sun’s heat, drives water to evaporate, leaving salt behind. The resulting water vapor can then be condensed and collected as pure, . In the meantime, the leftover salt continues to circulate through and out of the device, rather than accumulating and clogging the system.

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Water is still an issue around the world.

Engineers at MIT and China have jointly developed a solar-powered system that extracts fresh water from seawater so efficiently it is “cheaper than tap water,” says one of the researchers who invented the system. The inventors say the system could provide clean drinking water sustainably to off-grid coastal communities and families living near a sea water source.

From MIT News:

The configuration of the device allows water to circulate in swirling eddies, in a manner similar to the much larger “thermohaline” circulation of the ocean. This circulation, combined with the sun’s heat, drives water to evaporate, leaving salt behind. The resulting water vapor can then be condensed and collected as pure, drinkable water. In the meantime, the leftover salt continues to circulate through and out of the device, rather than accumulating and clogging the system.

Continue reading “New solar device makes desalinated seawater cheaper than tap water” | >

Pat Bennett’s prescription is a bit more complicated than “Take a couple of aspirins and call me in the morning.” But a quartet of baby-aspirin-sized sensors implanted in her brain are aimed at addressing a condition that’s frustrated her and others: the loss of the ability to speak intelligibly. The devices transmit signals from a couple of speech-related regions in Bennett’s brain to state-of-the-art software that decodes her brain activity and converts it to text displayed on a computer screen.

Bennett, now 68, is a former human resources director and onetime equestrian who jogged daily. In 2012, she was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a progressive neurodegenerative disease that attacks neurons controlling movement, causing physical weakness and eventual paralysis.

Our brains remember how to formulate words even if the muscles responsible for saying them out loud are incapacitated. A brain-computer hookup is making the dream of restoring speech a reality.

Continue reading “Brain implants, software guide speech-disabled person’s intended words to computer screen” | >

The human brain, with its intricate network of approximately 86 billion neurons, is arguably among the most complex specimens scientists have ever encountered. It holds an immense, yet currently immeasurable, wealth of information, positioning it as the pinnacle of computational devices.

Grasping this level of intricacy is challenging, making it essential for us to employ advanced technologies that can decode the minute, intricate interactions happening within the brain at microscopic levels. Thus, imaging emerges as a pivotal instrument in the realm of neuroscience.

The new imaging and virtual reconstruction technology developed by Johann Danzl’s group at ISTA is a big leap in imaging brain activity and is aptly named LIONESS – Live Information Optimized Nanoscopy Enabling Saturated Segmentation. LIONESS is a pipeline to image, reconstruct, and analyze live brain tissue with a comprehensiveness and spatial resolution not possible until now.

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