Lifeboat Foundation

Brendan Byrne — Value Walk

The 3D-printed plastic body is mounted on a carbon fiber chassis, which keeps the weight of the vehicle to a minimum. “Despite being an urban concept car, it is no slouch and can reach a top speed of 60 kilometers per hour, while maintaining low-energy consumption,” said computer engineering student Ilmi Bin Abdul Wahab, who currently lives in a GEM Singapore condo, and led the development of NV8.

A separate group of students at the university built another car, named NTU Venture (NV) 9. This three-wheeled racer makes use of tilting technology inspired by motorcycle racing to allow it to take corners at high speeds.

“The resulting design looks like a fusion between a F1 race car and a glider plane, with an all surround canopy for increased visual awareness,” said NV9 team manager Winston Tan, who is studying electrical and electronic engineering.
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By Steven Kotler — Newsweek

The impact that 3-D printing is having on our world is impossible to ignore. It’s not new technology, but its 30-year history has been characterized by deceptively slow growth —until now. 3-D printing has recently emerged as a force poised to disrupt a significant portion of the $10 trillion global manufacturing industry.

Already, the printing of standard consumer products—bowls, plates, smartphone cases, bottle openers, jewelry and purses (made from mesh)—has gone from a hobby to a nascent industry. Dozens of websites now sell goods made with 3-D printers, and retailers are starting to get in on the action.

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By Jason Dunn — Singularity Hub

One day everything in space will be made in space, and this will radically increase the potential for human space exploration.

I recently read a novella that explores this very idea (see below for an excerpt). Cory Doctorow’s “The Man Who Sold The Moon” appears in Hieroglyph: Stories and Visions for a Better Future, an anthology of hopeful, ambitious, technically-grounded science fiction stories set in the near future. In the story, a small team takes on the daunting mission of launching a machine to the Moon that collects lunar regolith (moon dirt) and 3D prints structural housing panels for a future settlement.

Continue reading “A 3D Printed Moon Base: Science Fiction or Science Fact?” »

Voxel8

Voxel8 has created the world’s first 3D electronics printer from the ground-up. Novel conductive materials and 3D printing technology from the Lewis Research Group at Harvard University. New software crafted for the Voxel8 printer called Project Wire by Autodesk.

The Voxel8 printer truly allows you to combine electronics with novel mechanical forms. Visit voxel8.co for more information. What would you print?

http://www.voxel8.co/

Quoted: “Legendary cyberculture icon (and iconoclast) R.U. Sirius and Jay Cornell have written a delicious funcyclopedia of the Singularity, transhumanism, and radical futurism, just published on January 1.” And: “The book, “Transcendence – The Disinformation Encyclopedia of Transhumanism and the Singularity,” is a collection of alphabetically-ordered short chapters about artificial intelligence, cognitive science, genomics, information technology, nanotechnology, neuroscience, space exploration, synthetic biology, robotics, and virtual worlds. Entries range from Cloning and Cyborg Feminism to Designer Babies and Memory-Editing Drugs.” And: “If you are young and don’t remember the 1980s you should know that, before Wired magazine, the cyberculture magazine Mondo 2000 edited by R.U. Sirius covered dangerous hacking, new media and cyberpunk topics such as virtual reality and smart drugs, with an anarchic and subversive slant. As it often happens the more sedate Wired, a watered-down later version of Mondo 2000, was much more successful and went mainstream.”

Read the article here >https://hacked.com/irreverent-singularity-funcyclopedia-mondo-2000s-r-u-sirius/

Luke Thu — conversations.nokia.com

Like many young stargazers, James Parr was ten years old when he first had fantasies of going to space.

Thirty years later, the stars have aligned and James is finally realizing his dream. But not as you’d imagine. Working with Microsoft and the biggest names in space exploration, James has created the first ever 3D-printed automated robotic observatory.

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by Bridget Butler Millsaps — 3Dprint.com

It’s not every day that you have the FAA looking over your shoulder while you are designing a complex part for 3D printing. It’s also not every day that you have to design a part which, no matter how basic it might sound, must be failsafe, for not only flying, but also in working seamlessly with all the other rigorously tested parts of an aircraft that is going to fly all over the world on charitable medical missions.

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Published by Sandra Helsel — inside3dprinting.com

(3Ders.org) — Researchers at the Intelligent Motion Laboratory at Indiana University developed a method to create inexpensive, table-top-sized robot models called ROBOPuppets to provide teleoperate input control to full-sized robots. RoboPuppet is a 3D-printed miniature replica of the target robot, which uses encoders embedded in the joints to translate the user’s physical action with the puppet into the motion on the robot. The kinesthetic mode of operation is familiar to those who played with action figures and dolls as children. It lets users control complex motions in a cheap and more intuitive way than traditional joysticks or joint level control.

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By Michael Molitch-Hou — 3D Printing Industry

Kai Parthy, inventor of the original Laywoo-D3 and Laybrick filaments, is back with an exciting new material for desktop filament fabricators. An extension of his foam PORO-LAY line, Kai has developed a sponge filament he calls Layfomm. Though objects printed with Layfomm are pretty ordinary and stiff, upon initial printing, when they’re dipped in water for two to three days, they become soft and flexible.

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