Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog – Page 3,666

Get the latest international news and world events from around the world.

Log in for authorized contributors

Mars Society establishes institute to advance colony on Mars

The space advocacy movement has announced an initiative to found the Mars Technology Institute, which aims to create the technologies necessary for establishing a presence on the red planet.

The Mars Society is a space advocacy organization established in 1998 by Dr. Robert Zubrin and other members. The association studies settlement technologies for Mars and educates the public on the benefits of such missions.

In recent developments, the space advocacy movement has announced an initiative to found the Mars Technology Institute. This endeavor aims to create the technologies necessary for establishing a presence on the red planet.

Read more | >

Why is China’s trying to build an artificial sun?

China is looking for a clean, sustainable energy source and is turning to the power of nuclear fusion.

What is a clean source of power that could provide clean and unlimited energy? Nuclear energy, which uses nuclear fission, comes to mind. But there is another potential source of energy that would promote sustainability – nuclear fusion.

Nuclear fusion is the opposite of nuclear fission. Fission means splitting atoms apart, which results in the release of energy. Fusion is when two atomic nuclei combine to form a heavier nucleus. Fusion is the process that powers the Sun and the stars.

Read more | >

Telesat inks deal with SpaceX for its Lightspeed constellation

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will perform 14 launches for Telesat, taking 18 satellites each to the low-earth orbit.

Aerospace seems to be the new buzzword in the technological arena, with multiple new entrants aiming to make a mark in the industry.

To that extent, Canadian satellite operator Telesat and Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which designs and manufactures rockets and spacecraft, have agreed to deliver the former’s Lightspeed constellation to low-earth orbit.

Read more | >

European space startup partners with India for Moon mission

The Exploration Company chose to fly its upcoming Moon mission aboard an Indian rocket following delays to the debut launch of Ariane 6.

European space startup The Exploration Company has signed an agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) with a view to reaching the Moon by 2028, a report from The Next Web.

The Bordeaux and Munich-based company will partner with ISRO’s commercial arm, New Space India Limited (NSIL), and will use ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).

Read more | >

A new clue will help reveal the locations of pink diamonds

The research involved shooting laser beams thinner than the width of human hair on minerals found in an Australian diamond mine.

A collaboration between researchers in the UK, China, and Australia has found the elusive ingredient needed to turn diamonds pink in color, a press release said. This crucial information could help in finding more deposits of the rare precious stone.

It is widely known that the formation of diamonds happens deep inside the Earth. Diamond deposits and mines, however, occur at much shallower depths. This is made possible by the rapid transportation of these carbon structures by deep Earth volcanoes that bring them closer to the surface.

Read more | >

Intel’s glass substrate promises 1T transistors by 2030

Intel is trying to keep up with the exploding demand for new computing horsepower.

In what is being seen as a shift from silicon, Intel announced Monday their progress in commercializing glass substrates toward the end of the decade. The company said that glass substrates are an improvement in design, allowing more transistors to be connected in a package and will help overcome the limitations of organic materials.

As the world advances to incorporate developments in data-intensive workloads in artificial intelligence, glass substrates, in comparison to organic substrates,… More.

Intel.

Intel says its new glass substrate will help the company create more powerful processors with better production yields.

Read more | >

World’s most powerful X-ray laser fired for the first time

With up to a million X-ray flashes a second, the laser will help study mechanisms in physics, chemistry, and biology.

The US Department of Energy’s (DOE) SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory has fired the first X-rays using the upgraded Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) X-ray free-electron laser (XFEL), a press release said. The upgraded version, dubbed LCLS-II, was built for $1.1 billion.

The SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford has been building and operating powerful tools for advancing science for over six decades. The original LCLS was the world’s first XFEL, reaching its first light in April 2009.

Read more | >

Antarctica: Missing ice five times the size of British Isles

‘Antarctica could transform from Earth’s refrigerator to a radiator’ as Earth is losing sea-ice that helps maintain balance in the planet’s temperature.

Recently, satellite data depicted that the sea ice in and around the Antarctica region reached record-low levels during winter.

This is a concerning development, given Antarctica’s historical resistance to global warming, BBC reported on Sunday (September 17). Scientists caution against unstable consequences of climate change in the polar regions.

Read more | >

Neuralink is recruiting subjects for the first human trial of its brain-computer interface

The study will take six years and is looking for people with quadriplegia to test the whole Neuralink system.

A few months after getting FDA approval for human trials, Neuralink is looking for its first test subjects. The six-year initial trial, which the Elon Musk-owned company is calling “the PRIME Study,” is intended to test Neuralink tech designed to help those with paralysis control devices. The company is looking for people with quadriplegia due to vertical spinal cord injury or ALS who are over the age of 22 and have a “consistent and reliable caregiver” to be part of the study.

The PRIME Study (which apparently stands for Precise Robotically Implanted Brain-Computer Interface, even… More.

Neuralink plans for the study to take six years and wants to test every part of its system — including the robot used to implant it.

Read more | >

Deepfakes of Chinese influencers are livestreaming 24/7

With just a few minutes of sample video and $1,000, brands never have to stop selling their products.

Scroll through the livestreaming videos at 4 a.m. on Taobao, China’s most popular e-commerce platform, and you’ll find it weirdly busy. While most people are fast asleep, there are still many diligent streamers presenting products to the cameras and offering discounts in the wee hours.

But if you take a closer look, you may notice that many of these livestream influencers seem slightly robotic. The movement of their lips largely matches what they are saying, but there are always moments when it looks unnatural.

Read more | >