Lifeboat Foundation

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, drinkable water. In the meantime, the leftover salt continues to circulate through and out of the device, rather than accumulating and clogging the system.

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:

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.

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.

BBC News

The elusive substance holds the key to discovering how the Universe was formed.

David Imbaratto / Stellar Exploration / The Planetary Society.

Solar sails were first demonstrated in space by the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 mission, which raised a small CubeSat’s orbit by 1.9 miles (3.2 km) using only the propulsive force of photons, or light beams, from the Sun.

😗😁Year 2022

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They are cheaper and don’t require the large, incredibly powerful magnets used in traditional fusion experiments. Ultimately, they may also provide a quicker route to achieving commercially viable nuclear fusion, a press statement reveals.

Continue reading “A magnet-free reactor that fits in a garage could provide limitless energy” »

Following in footsteps of National Ignition Facility, companies aim to trigger rapid-fire fusion blasts.

Once we fully we understand intelligence it could be essentially increased to nearly infinite levels once everything is quantified like this article talks about 😗😁.

Modern humans have a gene mutation that boosts the growth of neurons in the brain neocortex, a brain region associated with higher intelligence.

By Michael Le Page

Continue reading “A single gene mutation may have made us smarter than Neanderthals” »