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Apr 5, 2019

Meat And Agriculture Are Worse For The Climate Than Power Generation, Steven Chu Says

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, food

Biotech is the solution to tackle the environmental impact of meat and the fertilizer shortage.


The world has focused first on energy in its effort to stop greenhouse gas emissions, but former Energy Secretary Steven Chu puts agriculture at the top of his list of climate challenges—particularly animal agriculture.

The Nobel Prize winning physicist surveyed the world’s carbon-polluting industries in a lecture at the University of Chicago, and he started with meat and dairy.

Continue reading “Meat And Agriculture Are Worse For The Climate Than Power Generation, Steven Chu Says” »

Apr 5, 2019

Meet the Future Unmanned Force

Posted by in categories: drones, robotics/AI

Two new autonomous aircraft concepts that promise to redefine the Air Force’s unmanned fleet are moving forward.

The latest, Skyborg, is an autonomous drone prototyping program underway at the Air Force Research Laboratory. Researchers hope to get the aircraft—expected to be cheaper than other platforms and easily replaceable—combat-ready by the end of 2023.

Air Force Acquisition Executive Will Roper revealed the program, which launched in October, at a conference in Washington last month. Skyborg must be able to autonomously take off and land, fly in bad weather, and avoid other aircraft, terrain, and obstacles, the Air Force said.

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Apr 5, 2019

AeroLiFi a pureLiFi partner is demonstrating it’s cabin LiFi solution at AIX

Posted by in categories: innovation, transportation

PureLiFi partner aeroLiFi who specialises in LiFi solutions for the aerospace industry, is exhibiting at the Aircraft Interiors Expo (AIX). aeroLiFi will present a demonstration of a multimedia LiFi network for an aircraft cabin. Merging standard LiFi technology components with latest innovations made in multicast network protocols to show the first all optical multimedia IFE solution for aircraft cabins.

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Apr 5, 2019

Sorry, graphene—borophene is the new wonder material that’s got everyone excited

Posted by in categories: chemistry, particle physics

Stronger and more flexible than graphene, a single-atom layer of boron could revolutionize sensors, batteries, and catalytic chemistry.

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Apr 5, 2019

Evolutionary changes played a crucial role in industrialization, study finds

Posted by in categories: economics, evolution, genetics

Galor says the study results, published on Monday, April 1, in Nature Ecology & Evolution, lend credence to what he and a colleague had surmised in a highly influential 2002 paper — that during the pre-industrial era, the natural selection of those who were genetically predisposed toward having fewer children was instrumental in spurring industrialization and sustained economic growth.


In a study of 200 years of pre-industrial Quebecois genealogical history, researchers at Brown found that fertility-related changes in natural selection during the pre-industrial era paved the way for economic and technological progress.

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Apr 5, 2019

Google to pull plug on AI ethics council

Posted by in categories: ethics, robotics/AI

(Reuters) — Alphabet Inc’s Google said on Thursday it was dissolving a council it had formed a week earlier to consider ethical issues around artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies.

The council had run into controversy over two of its members, according to online news portal Vox, which first reported the dissolution of the council.

The council, launched on March 26, was meant to provide recommendations for Google and other companies and researchers working in areas such as facial recognition software, a form of automation that has prompted concerns about racial bias and other limitations.

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Apr 5, 2019

Materials science is helping to transform China into a high-tech economy

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, economics, science

It’s the kind of diverse, multidisciplinary community, Chinese scientists say, that is crucial to doing great research but is often lacking in labs. “The goals of the Materials Genome Initiative in the States and in China are the same: to produce better materials more quickly that cost less. It’s very important we collaborate with overseas scientists because the materials genome is a new topic. We need to figure out the best path together,” says Zhang.


Researchers are reaping the benefits of carefully built programmes and a surge in funding.

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Apr 4, 2019

Amazon is Planning to Launch Thousands of Satellites to Offer High-Speed Internet

Posted by in categories: internet, satellites

Want one more option for home internet? Today it was announced that Amazon is planning to launch 3,236 satellites to build a network to provide global high-speed internet. Unlike current satellite internet, these devices will be in a far lower orbit and offer far faster speeds compared to current sa…

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Apr 4, 2019

Exclusive: Google cancels AI ethics board in response to outcry

Posted by in categories: ethics, robotics/AI

Instead of just getting rid of the regressive element from the Heritage Foundation, Google just cancelled the whole thing.


The controversial panel lasted just a little over a week.

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Apr 4, 2019

Scientists Say They Can Make Light Travel 30x Faster Than Normal

Posted by in category: space travel

“This is the first clear demonstration of controlling the speed of a pulse light in free space,” Abouraddy said in the statement. “And it opens up doors for many applications, an optical buffer being just one of them, but most importantly it’s done in a simple way, that’s repeatable and reliable.”

READ MORE: Researchers develop way to control speed of light, send it backward [Phys.org]

More on light: New NASA Animations Show How Slowly Light Travels Through Space.

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