Lifeboat Foundation

New method to make purify water and eliminate clean water shortages in the future by purifying waste water via artificial leafing.

For years, scientists have been pursuing ways to imitate a leaf’s photosynthetic power to make hydrogen fuel from water and sunlight. In a new twist, a team has come up with another kind of device that mimics two of a leaf’s processes — photosynthesis and transpiration — to harness solar energy to purify water. Their development, reported in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, could help address issues of water scarcity.

More than 1 billion people around the world live in areas where clean water is hard to come by, and that number will likely rise as the population grows.

Continue reading “Purifying Water with Leaf-mimicking Device” »

I shared this same point of view yesterday; and glad to see Princeton shares the same perspective on Quantum and it’s abundant capabilities. Again; Quantum is going to truly change (if not everything) almost everything that we consume, use, and interact with even in raw material enrichment will benefit from Quantum.

Claire White, an assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering and the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment, studies ways to make building materials more sustainable. It turns out that cement production creates a lot of carbon dioxide, so much that it accounts for roughly 5 to 8 percent of man-made carbon dioxide emissions globally. White and her team are developing new types of cement using industrial byproducts such as coal fly ash and blast-furnace slag. They make these materials more durable by adding nanoparticles.

Continue reading “Princeton research benefits sustainability, cybersecurity and other societal goals” »

Traditional farming has challenges that are now being overcome by innovative and sustainable solutions. One instance is a floating island that is powered by solar energy and has several farms that were created by the Forward Thinking Architecture. The islands are designed to work in an energy efficient manner where rainwater and sunlight are harvested so that the farming is done in a sustainable manner. The floating farms are designed to produce vegetables of the amount twenty tons every day. The advantage of this approach is that it has paved the way for farms such as this to be built and run across the world, even in places that are not accessible or do not have the right resources for farming. Locals can grow the food they need and reduce the need to import food and other goods which can then save money and provide opportunities for local employment. The floating farms and their amazing technology and possibilities are shown below. There are links given as well for those who wish to know more. It surely will revolutionize the problems of food production that has been plaguing many countries.

Read more

Becoming immortal is one of mankind’s many quixotic notions that most people will relegate to the world of fantasy and science fiction. However, there is a subset of prominent scientists who believe that immortality is not only attainable, but it is something that will come to fruition in as little as 25 years. This idea is shared by men like Google’s Director of Engineering, Ray Kurzweil; Tesla Motors CEO, Elon Musk; and one of the most interesting presidential candidates outside of Donald Trump and Deez Nuts, Zoltan Istvan. All three men identify as trans-humanist, and for those who don’t know, trans-humanism is the idea that mankind will one day be able to transcend our biological limitations through the use of science and technology; not to mention, the movement has accumulated over 3 million supporters worldwide. So the question remains, with the multitude of prominent intellectuals who believe immortality is a tangible goal, just how will they go about achieving it? Well, the six answers below could possibly hold the key to everlasting life.

Number Six: Uploading Minds to Computers. Futurists believe that at some point in the near future we will be able to copy and scan all of the data that exists in our brains and upload the information into a computer. This will allow us to perpetually exist as incorporeal inhabitants of cyberspace. Of course, the idea of mind uploading is still purely science fiction, but if it ever becomes tangible, progeny could possibly live in a limitless world, that echoes notions expressed in the Matrix; minus the robot despots.

Read more

A Japanese firm said Monday it would open the world’s first fully automated farm with robots handling almost every step of the process, from watering seedlings to harvesting crops.

Kyoto-based Spread said the indoor grow house will start operating by the middle of 2017 and produce 30,000 heads of lettuce a day.

It hopes to boost that figure to half a million lettuce heads daily within five years.

Read more

As solar power becomes a bigger and bigger part of the overall energy landscape, engineers around the world are busy working out how to build plants that are large and efficient enough to keep up with demand. Now Japanese electronics giant Kyocera is starting construction on what it says will be the largest floating solar power plant (in terms of overall capacity) in the world.

It’s the fourth such floating plant Kyocera has worked on so far, but this one promises to be the most impressive yet: the facility is going to be built on the Yamakura Dam reservoir to the south-east of Tokyo in Japan, and will pump out 13.7 megawatts (MW) of power once it’s completed in March 2018. Some 51,000 photovoltaic panels will be stitched together to cover around 180,000 square metres (about 44.5 acres) of space.

That’s roughly the same area as 18 soccer pitches, so you get a sense of the sort of scale we’re talking about here. Kyocera says the new plant will provide enough power for 4,970 average households and offset around 7,411 tonnes of CO₂ emissions every year that it’s in operation (equivalent to 19,000 barrels of oil).

Read more

My parents love their farm life, etc. However, as they are get older, and they need a way to maintain their land, etc. Maybe robots are the perfect solution. Certainly worth looking into.

Japan plans to open the first farm run completely by robots growing vegetables.

Read more

Elon Musk, CEO of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Tesla Motors, Inc, was at Startmeup Hong Kong and talked about what he thought were areas of technological opportunity.

At 37 minutes into this video Elon Musk talks about high potential technology like Hyperloop which he currently does not have time to address electric aircraftgenetics is thorny but is our best shot at many tough diseasesbrain computer interfaces at the neuron level has potential for intelligence augmentationNeural Lace was mentioned.

Scientists from China and the US have found a pioneering way to inject a tiny electronic mesh sensor into the brain that fully integrates with cerebral matter and enables computers to monitor brain activity.

Continue reading “Elon Musk identifies electric aircraft, genetics and neuron scale brain computer interfaces as high potential technologies” »

Hope it is a success; he will need it.

Reports claim that the Tesla Model 3, the Palo Alto automaker’s long-awaited electric car for the masses, will be unveiled in March. Better yet, the company also has a Model Y compact crossover planned for the future, though details on this vehicle are largely limited to the type of vehicle it would be.

March’s Model 3 launch will focus exclusively on the new EV – an electric sedan like the Model S, but this time sold at a more affordable price point. Tesla CEO and founder Elon Musk called the vehicle “probably the most profound car that we make” and a “very compelling car at an affordable price,” and that only adds to the hype of a car that’s expected to drive Tesla sales to 500,000 in 2020, from a mere 50,000 in 2015.

Continue reading “Tesla Model 3 will be unveiled in March, with budget Model Y CUV to follow” »