Lifeboat Foundation

EU betting big on Quantum Technology.

The European Union (EU) aims to embark on an ambitious common strategy on quantum technologies, European Commissioner for digital economy and society Gunther Oettinger said here Tuesday.

At a conference which brought together some of the world’s leading experts in the field of quantum technology, European scientists and entrepreneurs launched a “Quantum Manifesto” laying out future priorities and activities to create a new “knowledge-based industrial ecosystem” in Europe.

“We aim to launch an ambitious large-scale flagship initiative to unlock the full potential of quantum technologies, accelerate their development, and bring commercial products to public and private users,” Oettinger told the conference.

For the first time, scientists at IBM Research have demonstrated reliably storing 3 bits of data per cell using a relatively new memory technology known as phase-change memory (PCM).

The current memory landscape spans from venerable DRAM to hard disk drives to ubiquitous flash. But in the last several years PCM has attracted the industry’s attention as a potential universal memory technology based on its combination of read/write speed, endurance, non-volatility and density. For example, PCM doesn’t lose data when powered off, unlike DRAM, and the technology can endure at least 10 million write cycles, compared to an average flash USB stick, which tops out at 3,000 write cycles.

Continue reading “IBM scientists achieve storage memory breakthrough” »

A proposed Japanese accelerator could solve those mysteries the LHC did not.

By Howard Baer, Vernon D. Barger, Jenny List on June 1, 2016.

Whether these Universes are similar or different to our own, whether they have the same physical laws and properties, whether they have the same fundamental constants, particles and interactions, we do not know.

And at the same time, our very best laws of nature tell us that this is reality: we are a tiny fraction of our observable Universe, which is a tiny bit of the unobservable Universe, which is just one of a tremendous number of Universes in a multiverse that’s constantly generating new ones, and has been for billions of years. And that’s the Multiverse we live in, to the best of our knowledge!

Continue reading “What is the Multiverse, and why do we think it exists?” »

ACTON, Australia, May 16 (UPI) — A pair of physicists in Australia have trained an artificial intelligence system to replicate the experiment that won the 2001 Nobel Prize.

The experiment involves what is known as a Bose-Einstein condensate, the trapping of an ultra-cool gas in a series of lasers.

At just a billionth of a degree above absolute zero, Bose-Einstein condensates constitute some of the coldest temperatures in the universe — colder than interstellar space.

Continue reading “Researchers teach AI system to run complex physics experiment” »

DUBLIN, Ireland, May 17 (UPI) — Researchers in Ireland have discovered a new form of light. Their discovery is expected to reshape scientists’ understanding of light’s basic nature.

Angular momentum describes the rotation of a light beam around its axis. Until now, researchers believed the angular momentum was always a multiple of Planck’s constant — a constant ratio that describes the relationship between photon energy and frequency, and also sets the scale for quantum mechanics.

The newly discovered form of light, however, features photons with an angular momentum of just half the value of Planck’s constant. The difference sounds small, but researchers say the significance of the discovery is great.

Continue reading “Scientists discover new form of light” »

“Speaking to The Verge, Farady Future’s vice president of global marketing Dag Reckhorn said that the company has big plans to beat the competition on distance per battery charge. The company plans to release its first car within the next two years.”

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New MMTP Interview on Fightaging! discussing longevity, advocacy and the urgent need to support research!

By way of following on from today’s AMA over at /r/futurology, I recently had the chance to ask a few questions of the Major Mouse Testing Program (MMTP) volunteers, a mix of scientists and advocates who aim to do their part to speed up progress towards effective treatments for the causes of aging. The group formed six months ago or so, and are presently seeking funds for their first mouse studies through crowdfunding with the Lifespan.io organization. The initial focus is on senolytic treatments capable of removing senescent cells from old tissues. I encourage you all to take a look at the details of their research proposal.

Growth in the number of dysfunctional, senescent cells is a contributing cause of degenerative aging, involved in the progression and pathology of all of the common age-related diseases. A growing body of evidence supports the outright removal approach as a way to minimize or eliminate this portion of the aging process. Unfortunately there is — as ever in the aging research field — a paucity of funding and always the need for more and better animal data in order to pull in other players with deep pockets. At this stage in the progression from laboratory to clinic, prior to the involvement of any large institutions or companies, all such efforts are important work. I’m pleased to have been able to contribute to this Major Mouse Testing Program fundraiser, and hope to see great things from this group in the future.

Continue reading “An Interview with the Advocates of the Major Mouse Testing Program Team” »

What I really want to do is to use the machine to complete the Sagrada Familia. And to build on the moon.

Why carry building materials from Earth into space, when we can build structures by 3D printing using materials found out there?