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Apr 9, 2021

First ever 3D atomic imaging of amorphous solid

Posted by in category: futurism

Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), have solved a 100-year-old problem in science – capturing the 3D structure of an amorphous solid, in this case metallic glass.

Apr 9, 2021

Elon Musk’s brain-chip company, Neuralink, released a video of a monkey playing video games with its mind

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, entertainment, robotics/AI

Elon Musk finally got to show off his monkey.

Neuralink, a company founded by Musk that is developing artificial-intelligence-powered microchips to go in people’s brains, released a video Thursday appearing to show a macaque using the tech to play video games, including “Pong.”

Continue reading “Elon Musk’s brain-chip company, Neuralink, released a video of a monkey playing video games with its mind” »

Apr 9, 2021

Fun While It Lasted, Falcon 9 Telemetry Now Encrypted

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, encryption, internet, satellites

A few weeks back we brought word that Reddit users [derekcz] and [Xerbot] had managed to receive the 2232.5 MHz telemetry downlink from a Falcon 9 upper stage and pull out some interesting plain-text strings. With further software fiddling, the vehicle’s video streams were decoded, resulting in some absolutely breathtaking shots of the rocket and its payload from low Earth orbit.

Unfortunately, it looks like those heady days are now over, as [derekcz] reports the downlink from the latest Falcon 9 mission was nothing but intelligible noise. Since the hardware and software haven’t changed on his side, the only logical conclusion is that SpaceX wasn’t too happy about radio amateurs listening in on their rocket and decided to employ some form of encryption.

Continue reading “Fun While It Lasted, Falcon 9 Telemetry Now Encrypted” »

Apr 9, 2021

Honeywell releases details of its ion trap quantum computer

Posted by in categories: computing, quantum physics

About a year ago, Honeywell announced that it had entered the quantum computing race with a technology that was different from anything else on the market. The company claimed that because the performance of its qubits was so superior to those of its competitors, its computer could do better on a key quantum computing benchmark than quantum computers with far more qubits.

Now, roughly a year later, the company finally released a paper describing the feat in detail. But in the meantime, the competitive landscape has shifted considerably.

Apr 9, 2021

SpaceX lands booster at sea in amazing rocket cam view

Posted by in categories: drones, internet, satellites

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 first stage landed on the “Of Course I Still Love You” drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean on April 7, 2021 shortly after launching 60 Starlink satellites. It was the “79th recovery of a orbital-class rocket,” according to SpaceX. See the rocket launch: https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-23-satellite-mission-launch-rocket-landing.

Credit: SpaceX

Apr 9, 2021

Soyuz Crew Launch to the International Space Station

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Watch a Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft lift off on a two-orbit, three-hour journey to the International Space Station! NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei and cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov of Roscosmos are scheduled to launch at 3:42 a.m. EDT, Friday, April 9, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The trio will be part of Expeditions 64 and 65 on the station, where they’ll continue work on hundreds of experiments in biology, biotechnology, physical science, and Earth science. This will be Vande Hei’s second spaceflight, Novitskiy’s third, and Dubrov’s first.

Apr 9, 2021

Connecting the dots to artificially restore vision

Posted by in category: futurism

A new retinal implant uses thousands of electrodes to stimulate retinal cells in the blind and produce dotted images.

Apr 9, 2021

Could Mario Kart Teach Us How to Reduce World Poverty and Improve Sustainability?

Posted by in categories: economics, food, sustainability

In a recent paper, Bell argues that the principles of Mario Kart—especially the parts of it that make it so addictive and fun for players—can serve as a helpful guide to create more equitable social and economic programs that would better serve farmers in low-resource, rural regions of the developing world. That’s because, even when you’re doing horribly in Mario Kart—flying off the side of Rainbow Road, for example—the game is designed to keep you in the race.

“Farming is an awful thing to have to do if you don’t want to be a farmer,” Bell says. “You have to be an entrepreneur, you have to be an agronomist, put in a bunch of labor…and in so many parts of the world people are farmers because their parents are farmers and those are the assets and options they had.” This is a common story that Bell has come across many times during research trips to Pakistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Malawi, and other countries in southern Africa, and is what largely inspired him to focus his research on policies that could aid in development.

In his new paper, Bell argues that policies that directly provide assistance to farmers in the world’s poorest developing regions could help reduce poverty overall, while increasing sustainable and environmentally friendly practices. Bell says the idea is a lot like the way that Mario Kart gives players falling behind in the race the best power-ups, designed to bump them towards the front of the pack and keep them in the race. Meanwhile, faster players in the front don’t get these same boosts, and instead typically get weaker powers, such as banana peels to trip up a racer behind them or an ink splat to disrupt the other players’ screens. This boosting principle is called “rubber banding,” and it’s what keeps the game fun and interesting, Bell says, since there is always a chance for you to get ahead.

Apr 9, 2021

Striatal dopamine mediates hallucination-like perception in mice

Posted by in categories: electronics, neuroscience

There has not been enough progress in our understanding of the basic mechanisms underlying psychosis. Studying psychotic disorders in animal models is difficult because the diagnosis relies on self-reported symptoms that can only be assessed in humans. Schmack et al. developed a paradigm to probe and rigorously measure experimentally controlled hallucinations in rodents (see the Perspective by Matamales). Using dopamine-sensor measurements and circuit and pharmacological manipulations, they demonstrated a brain circuit link between excessive dopamine and hallucination-like experience. This could potentially be useful as a translational model of common psychotic symptoms described in various psychiatric disorders. It may also help in the development of new therapeutic approaches based on anatomically selective modulation of dopamine function.

Science, this issue p. see also p. [33][2]

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Apr 9, 2021

America’s next missile warning satellite arrives in Florida

Posted by in category: futurism

The fifth Space Based Infrared System satellite was delivered to Florida ahead of an anticipated May launch.