Lifeboat Foundation

Soft robots are a class of robotic systems made of compliant materials and capable of safely adapting to complex environments. They have seen rapid growth recently and come in a variety of designs spanning multiple length scales, from meters to submicrometers.

In particular, small soft robots at millimeter scale are of practical interest as they can be designed as a combination of miniature actuators simply driven by pneumatic pressure. They are also well suited for navigation in confined areas and manipulation of small objects.

However, scaling down soft pneumatic robots to millimeters results in finer features that are reduced by more than one order of magnitude. The design complexity of such robots demands great delicacy when they are fabricated with traditional processes such as molding and soft lithography. Although emerging 3D printing technologies like digital light processing (DLP) offer high theoretical resolutions, dealing with microscale voids and channels without causing clogging has still been challenging. Indeed, successful examples of 3D printing miniature soft pneumatic robots are rare.

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Quiet supersonic jets may one day fly over land to offer faster commercial and passenger flights. Before that can happen, however, the FAA will need to establish new rules regarding these typically noisy flights. To help usher in that era, NASA plans to test Lockheed Martin’s X-59 QueSST, an experimental supersonic jet that produces a ‘thump’ instead of a ‘boom,’ something the space agency will verify using a microphone array that is 30 miles long.

From afar, Olli resembles many of the “future is now!” electric autonomous shuttles that have popped up in recent years.

The tall rectangular pod, with its wide-set headlights and expansive windows nestled between a rounded frame, gives the shuttle a friendly countenance that screams, ever so gently, “come along, take a ride.”

Continue reading “Meet Olli 2.0, a 3D-printed autonomous shuttle” »

The two million event goers won’t be able to Naruto-run past this.

Facebook has removed a mega-viral event called “Storm Area 51,” claiming it violated community standards. Before it was removed, the tongue-in-cheek event amassed more than 2 million Facebook users, grabbing the attention of the mainstream media.

The idea, according to the even description, was to invite an army of memelords and alien enthusisasts to raid the top-secret Air Force military base in the middle of Nevada’s desert. “Let’s see them aliens,” the event description read.

Continue reading “Facebook Removes ‘Storm Area 51’ Event” »

The Moon’s subsurface is the key to its longterm development and sustainability, says NASA scientist.

A view of the Apollo 11 lunar module “Eagle” as it returned from the surface of the moon to dock with the command module “Columbia”. A smooth mare area is visible on the Moon below and a half-illuminated Earth hangs over the horizon. Command module pilot Michael Collins took this picture.

The quantum internet promises absolutely tap-proof communication and powerful distributed sensor networks for new science and technology. However, because quantum information cannot be copied, it is not possible to send this information over a classical network. Quantum information must be transmitted by quantum particles, and special interfaces are required for this. The Innsbruck-based experimental physicist Ben Lanyon, who was awarded the Austrian START Prize in 2015 for his research, is investigating these important intersections of a future quantum Internet.

Now his team at the Department of Experimental Physics at the University of Innsbruck and at the Institute of Quantum Optics and Quantum Information of the Austrian Academy of Sciences has achieved a record for the transfer of quantum entanglement between matter and light. For the first time, a distance of 50 kilometers was covered using fiber optic cables. “This is two orders of magnitude further than was previously possible and is a practical distance to start building inter-city quantum networks,” says Ben Lanyon.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of one of the most pivotal moments in human history. Stepping onto the moon, Neil Armstrong in 1969 uttered those now infamous words: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.”

The next fifty years did not see space travel become routine, with many coming to believe that NASA is just too slow. But space-related research and innovation are enjoying a new revival, inspired by SpaceX, Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, and other private firms that are making commercial space travel a reality. Along with rockets, hundreds of companies across the world are working feverishly toward developing infrastructure for space tourism, novel methods of growing food off-Earth, and sustainable building materials, to name only a few. All this with a tantalizing goal: to open up other planets and extraterrestrial bodies for exploration — and perhaps even residence — by everyone, not just astronauts.

Such work has not only moved us closer to our goal of one day living and playing off-Earth, but has also benefited our lives right here, right now. Scratch-proof glass, some biopharmaceuticals, and GPS navigation all derive from space-based research. The innovation happening today is incredibly exciting, and the future possibilities are seemingly endless. Here are five companies working on technologies that can help us thrive both on- and off-Earth.