Lifeboat Foundation

The automotive industry is knee deep in the vast transition to electric, but one place where gas is still going strong is out on the water. Seattle startup Zin Boats wants to start what you might call a sea change by showing, as Tesla did with cars, that an electric boat can be not just better for the planet, but better in almost every other way as well.

With a minimalist design like a silver bullet, built almost entirely from carbon fiber, the 20-foot Z2R is less than half the weight of comparable craft, letting it take off like a shot and handle easily, while also traveling a hundred miles on a charge — and you can fill the “tank” for about five bucks in an hour or so.

Waiting for the other shoe to drop? Well, it ain’t cheap. But then, few boats are.

This simple laser demonstration is actually a great crash course on how these anti-drone weapons work.

At first glance, this video is just a simple promotional video for Rafael’s Drone Dome, an anti-drone laser weapon. But at just two minutes long, it does a really excellent job at explaining what how a laser weapon actually takes down a drone.

Greening the Desert / De-Desertification.

Ira Pastor, ideaXme life sciences ambassador interviews Dr. Paul Elvis Tangem the Coordinator for the GGWSSI at the African Union Commission, in the executive/administrative branch of the AU, headquartered in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Continue reading “Green Wall: How to Green the Sahara” »

ADIFO stands for All-DIrectional Flying Object. This miniature prototype could someday turn into a supersonic vehicle capable of suborbital flight as well as flying upside down!

This is the episode for anyone who’s interested in learning more about our grand spiral neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy. Join my guest Lowell Observatory, astronomer Phil Massey as we discuss how our beguiling behemoth of a neighbor helped shape contemporary astronomy.

First cataloged by Al Sufi as a mere optical smudge high in the winter sky, the Andromeda Galaxy has lately been a cornerstone of everything we know about contemporary astronomy and the cosmos as a whole. Join Lowell Observatory astronomer Philip Massey as he outlines how this grand spiral neighbor changed what we know about cosmology. And if you happen to be in the Northern hemisphere, by the end of the episode, you may be ready to try and spot the galaxy with just your naked eyes.

Continue reading “Episode 25 --- Getting To Know Andromeda, Our Grand Spiral Neighbor” »

VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) drones are quite versatile, as they combine the vertical flight of a helicopter with the fast and efficient forward flight of a fixed-wing airplane. This one features an extended range, thanks to a fuel cell power system.

The experimental aircraft was developed by a team at the Netherlands’ Delft University of Technology (TU Delft), working with colleagues from the Royal Netherlands Navy and the Netherlands Coastguard. It has a 3-meter wingspan (9.8 ft), weighs 13 kg (29 lb), and features 12 motor/propeller units distributed on its two wings. Even if several of the motors fail, it can reportedly still fly and land successfully.

Continue reading “Hydrogen-powered VTOL drone flies for 3.5 hours” »

This may be good news for those who have damaged joints due to sports or old age.

😃

Human knees are notoriously vulnerable to injury or wearing out with age, often culminating in the need for surgery. Now researchers have created new hybrid bioinks that can be used to 3D print structures to replace damaged cartilage in the knee.

Continue reading “Hybrid 3D-printing bioinks help repair damaged knee cartilage” »

If there’s one major thing that’s holding back an electric revolution in the aviation world, it’s energy storage. But there are a ton of very clever people banging away at the problem of how to increase the energy density of batteries, and another growing faction working to make long-range, fast-fueling hydrogen-fuel-cell powertrains the standard for future flight.

Either way, it’s going to happen in the coming decades, and one new company out of Minneapolis is turning its attention to the other critical element of the propulsion system. H3X Technologies is bursting out of the gate with an integrated electric motor design it says can deliver the same sustained power as some of the best motors on the market at a third or less of the total weight.

Continue reading “H3X claims it’s tripled the power density of electric aircraft motors” »

It’s a bit like a Bond villain lair, only much more dangerous.

An underground missile base lurking somewhere beneath Iran looks an awful lot like a James Bond villain lair, complete with walls carved out of rock, spotlights, and a promise of “severe revenge.”

Continue reading “Iran’s New Underground Missile Base Looks Mildly Terrifying. See for Yourself” »