Lifeboat Foundation

AUSTIN, Texas — As much as a third of the world’s population does not have access to clean drinking water, according to some estimates, and half of the population could live in water-stressed areas by 2025. Finding a solution to this problem could save and improve lives for millions of people, and it is a high priority among scientists and engineers around the globe.

Scientists and engineers at The University of Texas at Austin have created a hydrogel tablet that can rapidly purify contaminated water. One tablet can disinfect a liter of river water and make it suitable for drinking in an hour or less.

“Our multifunctional hydrogel can make a big difference in mitigating global water scarcity because it is easy to use, highly efficient and potentially scalable up to mass production,” said Guihua Yu, an associate professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering’s Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering and Texas Materials Institute.

Intel has introduced Loihi 2 its second-generation neuromorphic research chip, featuring eight times the computational neurons compared to the earlier Loihi 1.

Geared toward improving spacecraft navigation, the technology demonstration operated far longer than planned and broke the stability record for atomic clocks in space.

Mercury will be at its greatest western elongation on October 25.

Mercury is at greatest western elongation on October 25 2021, giving the best view of the Solar System’s smallest planet. Here’s your guide to see it shine.

How do you settle an argument with someone who’s clearly in the wrong? Well, you show them a live demonstration, even if it means putting your life on the line but in the end, you have to show them who’s the boss am I right?

That’s exactly what Destin Sandlin from SmarterEveryDay YouTube channel did by shutting off the helicopter midair to prove a point. A few years ago, Neil deGrasse Tyson had made a statement that “An airplane whose engine fails is a glider. A helicopter whose engine fails is a brick.” which did not sit well with the Youtuber and he decided to prove Tyson and everyone once and for all, that that statement was in fact wrong and the reality was different. The video was shot in 2016 but it has been making the rounds once again.

Continue reading “Watch A YouTuber Shut Off A Helicopter Engine Mid-Air — Just To Prove Neil deGrasse Tyson Wrong” »

A shipping-container hosting the world’s first zero-emissions, solar powered desalination technology is bringing clean water to rural Kenya.

Can the AI as a service paradigm curb big tech’s tendency towards iterative hardware? Perhaps it’s time we moved beyond the iPhone model.

We humans like to take our time when it comes to growing up. Among the great apes, only chimpanzees come close to stretching out the years between key developmental milestones.

But even chimps are ready to get crunching with a full set of chompers by the time they’re sexually mature. Homo sapiens don’t grow their last few teeth until they’re nearly out of the teenage years.

This mystery of the molars is a tricky one to solve, in spite of their emergence playing such a critical role in tracking shifts in our evolution. But researchers from the University of Arizona in the US now think they might have cracked it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ds9EcRBZzWE

One of the most critical aspects of SpaceX’s quest for the reusability of its space hardware is the recovery of its booster. To achieve this, SpaceX decided to land its boosters on the sea. However, the boosters land on large drone ships to prevent losing the booster and transport it back to land.
After many successful landings and recovery of the boosters, the large and dependable drone ships have become a vital link in SpaceX’s dream to make space travel affordable. SpaceX recently added another drone ship to the pair it had in service.
Join us as we explore SpaceX’s insane new drone ship!
To the armchair engineer, landing a rocket in the sea is suicide as many things can go wrong. To start with, when floating on the sea, the drone ship or barge is small compared to all the land available for the booster to land on.
Compounding the problem is that the drone ship itself can be rocked about on the sea, more than 300 km off the coast.
So, combining the size and instability of the drone ship, the booster can miss the drone ship and crash into the sea, making it harder or even impossible to recover.
However, many things have gone wrong as SpaceX tried to land a rocket on land, with several boosters crashing and bursting into flames.
Apart from that, SpaceX has very good reasons to prefer a sea landing for its boosters, and the reason has to do with fuel.
Fuel is a critical component on any mission because the engineers have to balance carrying enough quantity of it and keeping the rocket as light as possible. As you can imagine, the Falcon 9 rockets are heavy, at more than half a million kilograms which means fuel is a premium.
This is how it breaks down:
When you launch to space and the booster returns, you need to slow down the speed from more than 8,000 km/h down to zero. This is done by reigniting the engine, and it requires fuel.
The fuel has to come from the leftover after boosting the upper stage.
This is where it gets interesting.
If you blasted a payload to low orbit, for example, you would have more than enough fuel for the landing. However, if the mission was destined for beyond Earth’s orbit, you will need more fuel because you have to launch faster. This will leave you with no fuel for the landing.
This will be a big blow to SpaceX’s dream of reusing its boosters. Recall that the company wants to launch missions to Mars, which will require lots of fuel to attain the speed necessary for launch but not enough fuel for landing.
However, there is a way out of this problem with the aid of geography.
When SpaceX launches from Florida, the rocket heads East over the Atlantic Ocean. So making the rocket land at sea and not having to return to the launch site will reduce the fuel required because the distance is shorter.
This means for more ambitious launches, it makes sense for SpaceX to land on the sea.
As Musk put it at a conference, “For half our missions, we will need to land out to sea. Anything beyond Earth is likely to need to land on the ship.”
Now, what motivation does SpaceX have to land and reuse its boosters?
The motivation is money. SpaceX wants to save money on its launches, and refurbishing a rocket saves time and costs a fraction of building a new one.
Just how much money is SpaceX saving?
We might never get an actual figure because it is a trade secret, but it is a play on several factors.
For example, to save some fuel for landing, it means you have to reduce your payload. For the Falcon 9 that means a reduction of up to 40 percent in revenue, according to Musk’s tweet:

Payload reduction due to reusability of booster & fairing is <40% for F9 & recovery & refurb is <10%, so you’re roughly even with 2 flights, definitely ahead with 3

Continue reading “FINALLY! SpaceX Is Testing Their New Starship Droneship!” »