This week on We are Living in the Future: crystals that imitate some aspects of life, doctors who offer healthcare via robot telepresence, and bacteria that extract gold from sediment. While life has several characteristics that define it, including reproduction, metabolism, and mobility, most people agree that crystal and fire are not lifeforms. But scientists [...]
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Living in the Future: Life-saving Foam, Gravity Powered Lights, and Speedy Airships
This week on We are Living in the Future: Foam that saves lives when injected into the body, lights powered only by gravity, and modern-day airships that can travel at upwards of 130 mph!
Living in the Future: Driverless cars, Bridging longer spans, and negative temperatures
Driverless cars – also called self-driving cars – are now legal in three states – Nevada, Florida, and California. As a result, testing by the major automakers has been going on to make these vehicles safe, and auto makers Toyota and Audi are ready to reveal their driverless cars next week at the Consumer Electronics [...]
Living in the Future: Silk-Steel, Spray-on Skin, and Commercial 3d Printing
First up: Genetic modification on silkworms creates silk stronger than steel. This strength has long been part of Spider silk, but spiders don’t spin enough of it for industrial production. So, a year ago, scientists and researchers at the University of Wyoming announced a hybrid silkworm that uses spider proteins for stronger silk. This silk [...]
Living in the Future: Thorium Reactors, Muscular Robots, and Moon Crashings
The country of Norway has elected to replace old second-gen nuclear reactors with a thorium fuel supply. Unlike traditional Uranium reactors, Thorium cannot be used to produce plutonium, and is more commonly found in the Earth’s crust. It’s been used before, but because it doesn’t make plutonium, it was dismissed during the arms race of [...]
Living in the Future: Warp Drive, Green Bean Galaxies, and Nighttime Solar-Planes
Harold White, a physicist with NASA, has announced that he and his team have begun work on a warp drive. Anyone who has seen Star Trek has heard of this device, but how can this science-fiction staple become a reality? Well, the theory has been in place for years as to a device that can [...]
Living in the Future: Simulated Brains, Origami Kayaks, self-filling waterbottles
Have you ever wondered if we could build a brain? Chris Eliasmith of the University of Waterloo has built a large-scale model of the human brain, using a computer to simulate the nerve clusters. Semantic Pointer Architecture Unifed Network, or SPAUN, has 2.5 million simulated neurons, as well as one simulated eye and one simulated [...]
New-To-You Music Monday
New music, tips to make your weekend work for you all week long, the box office report from this past weekend, the Monday thing.
