Actual universal basic income going on đžđ”đ°đȘ
STIMULUS checks have given Americans a feel for universal basic income (UBI) â but folks in certain states and cities are getting used to this idea.
UBI is a set of recurring payments that individuals get from the government. These can be paid out every month, several times a year, or just once annually.
This is an idea that entrepreneur Andrew Yang, who left the Democratic party, centered his 2020 Presidential campaign around.
Solar cells are vital for the green energy transition. They can be used not only on rooftops and solar farms but also for powering autonomous vehicles, such as planes and satellites. However, photovoltaic solar cells are currently heavy and bulky, making them difficult to transport to remote locations off-grid, where they are much needed.
In a collaboration led by Imperial College London, alongside researchers from Cambridge, UCL, Oxford, Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin in Germany, and others, researchers have produced materials that can absorb comparable levels of sunlight as conventional silicon solar cells, but with 10,000 times lower thickness.
The material is sodium bismuth sulfide (NaBiS2), which is grown as nanocrystals and deposited from solution to make films 30 nanometers in thickness. NaBiS2 is comprised of nontoxic elements that are sufficiently abundant in the earthâs crust for use commercially. For example, bismuth-based compounds are used as a nontoxic lead replacement in solder, or in over-the-counter stomach medicine.
âEveryone can quantum.â
Chinese multinational technology company Baidu just released its first quantum computer on Thursday. The first superconducting quantum computer, âQian Shiâ can integrate hardware, software, and many applications. Baidu also introduced the worldâs first all-platform quantum hardware-software integration solution â Liang Xi â that provides access to various quantum chips via mobile app, PC, and cloud.
Qian Shi is expected to solve data that a standard computer cannot calculate and problems that cannot be solved. This development is also thought to be a breakthrough in artificial intelligence, computational biology, material simulation, and financial technology.
Qian Shi offers a stable and substantial quantum computing service to the public with high-fidelity 10 quantum bits (qubits) of power. Apart from Qian Shi, Baidu has recently developed the design of a 36-qubit superconducting quantum chip.
Itâs a big step forward in understanding exoplanets.
Humanityâs giant space telescope has captured evidence of carbon dioxide in a planet outside of the solar system for the first time. According to a Thursday press release.
The detection was made using Webbâs Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) and took the form of a small bump between 4.1 and 4.6 microns on the spectrum related to the exoplanetâs atmosphere. The evidence helps shine a light on how planets are formed.
NASAâs James Webb Space Telescope has captured the first clear evidence for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of a planet outside the solar system. This observation of a gas giant planet orbiting a Sun-like star 700 light-years away provides important insights into the composition and formation of the planet.
Just 1 kilo of hydrogen fuel can do the same as around 9.9 pounds of diesel.
French-based company Alstom broke new ground in transportation. The company announced the worldâs first hydrogen train, the Coradia iLint, reached Bremervörde, Lower Saxony, Germany.
This regional train only emits steam and condensed water while operating with a low noise level. With this breakthrough, it has been aimed to contribute to the greenest rail network globally, Alstom says.
Alstom contributes to the greenest rail network globally CO2-emission-free trains in service just 4 years after the start of trial operations.
The Rhythm of Crust Production on Earth
Many rocks on Earth form from molten or semi-molten magma. This magma is derived either directly from the mantleâthe predominantly solid but slowly flowing layer below the planetâs crustâor from recooking even older bits of pre-existing crust. As liquid magma cools, it eventually freezes into solid rock.
Through this cooling process of magma crystallization, mineral grains grow and can trap elements such as uranium that decay over time and produce a sort of stopwatch, recording their age. Not only that, but crystals can also trap other elements that track the composition of their parental magma, like how a surname might track a personâs family.
Aug. 24 (UPI) â A team of researchers have discovered an exoplanet about 100 light years away from Earth in the Draco constellation, and they say the world appears to be covered in a deep ocean.
The exoplanet â called TOI-1452b â is slightly larger than the Earth and is located in a âGoldilocks zone,â where temperatures are neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to exist. Therefore, astronomers think TOI-1452b could be covered in an ocean.
The exoplanet orbits âa nearby visual-binary M dwarfâ star.
Future internet connection speeds â 2030, 2040, 2050. Predictions of future internet technologies and trends. What will the internet be like in 2050?
As the world builds out ever larger installations of wind and solar power systems, the need is growing fast for economical, large-scale backup systems to provide power when the sun is down and the air is calm. Todayâs lithium-ion batteries are still too expensive for most such applications, and other options such as pumped hydro require specific topography thatâs not always available.
Now, researchers at MIT and elsewhere have developed a new kind of battery, made entirely from abundant and inexpensive materials, that could help to fill that gap.
The new battery architecture, which uses aluminum and sulfur as its two electrode materials, with a molten salt electrolyte in between, is described today in the journal Nature, in a paper by MIT Professor Donald Sadoway, along with 15 others at MIT and in China, Canada, Kentucky, and Tennessee.
Managing road intersections in crowded and dynamic environments, such as urban areas, can be highly challenging. The poor management of traffic at these can lead to road accidents, wastage of fuel, and environmental pollution.
Researchers at the University of Maryland have recently developed GAMEOPT, a new algorithm that could help manage unsignalized road intersections with high traffic more efficiently. The research team with members, Nilesh Suriyarachchi, Rohan Chandra, John S. Baras and Dinesh Manocha introduced their method in a recent paper to be published in the proceedings of the 25th IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (IEEE ITSC 2022). This method combines optimization techniques with ideas from game theory, a mathematical construct that represents situations in which different agents are competing with one another.
âForty percent of all crashes, 50% of serious collisions, and 20% of fatalities occur at unsignalized intersections,â Chandra, a member of the research team, told TechXplore. âOur primary objective is to improve traffic flow and fuel efficiency in poorly regulated or unregulated traffic intersections. To achieve this objective, we propose an algorithm that combines ideas from optimization and game theory to understand how different traffic agents cooperate and negotiate with each other at traffic intersections.â
