Lifeboat Foundation

Early space aliens wouldn’t need to have worried about iron-poor blood astrophysicists now report. Apparently, iron was distributed uniformly throughout the cosmos quite quickly.

The implications for #astrobiology are obvious.

Iron — a building block of everything as we know it — was ubiquitous much earlier in the cosmos than anyone could have imagined, astrophysicists now report.

Continue reading “Universe Was Rife With Iron Early On, Say Astrophysicists” »

This leg brace stores and saves your energy.

Amazon’s next warehouse could be in the skies.

Thales Alenia Space has seen massive savings in time and cost for the manufacturing of its products thanks to 3D printing, said Florent Lebrun, who heads space antenna development at the company. With this new manufacturing process, not only can Thales cut production lead time for certain components from months to weeks, it can save up to 50 percent on expenditure per part, he said.

Thales began experimenting with 3D printing, or additive manufacturing, in 2013, when it produced its first few demonstrator products. In 2015, it implemented a 3D-printed part for the first time on a telecommunications satellite — an antenna horn mounting strut for TurkmenAlem52E/MonacoSat. The company also produced eight titanium antenna fittings for Arabsat 6B that year, Lebrun said.

Now, two years later, after the launch of SGDC 1, Telkom 3S and Koreasat 7, Thales has orbited around 80 3D-printed parts, with more than 120 additional parts produced this year for future applications.

Continue reading “Is 3D Printing the Future of Satellite Manufacturing?” »

Often one hears others saying they want to work to live, not live to work. Do you agree? If so, try reading this. It might give you food for thought.

There’s this thing people say about work. I’m sure you’ve heard it countless times, and maybe you’ve said it yourself. I’ve heard it a lot too, and I’ve nodded at it more than once. As an expression, it may well be old enough to qualify as common wisdom.

“I want to work to live, not live to work.”

Continue reading “Imaginary points” »

“A report outlining how blockchain technology will usher in a new era of the internet has been published by the World Economic Forum at its 11th Annual Meeting of the New Champions, taking place on 27–29 June in Dalian, People’s Republic of China.”

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“The point is that wearables, bionics, AI, virtual/mixed/augmented reality – all bleeding edge technologies that (literally) are reshaping how we work, interact, learn, and live – are doing so as ‘other’ to our individual, biological selves.”

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Transhumanism and my work in the Wall Street Journal today (with about 2.4 million copies in print too—largest US paper by circulation I think). It’s hard to tell, but this might be the first time the WSJ has covered the #transhumanism movement at all. Sorry, there is a pay wall to read full article on the digital side for now.

Spending time with eco-warriors, transhumanists, anti-Islamist activists and other disgruntled opponents of the status quo. Brian C. Anderson reviews “Radicals Chasing Utopia: Inside the Rogue Movements Trying to Change the World” by Jamie Bartlett.

From Islamists to angry populists to militant environmentalists, liberal democratic societies face growing pressure from movements that want to shatter the status quo and replace it with a new and (to them) better order. In “Radicals Chasing Utopia,” the British journalist Jamie Bartlett sets out to describe and understand this new spirit of radicalism. The consensus that defines “ ‘normal’ political ideas,” he says, has been blown apart—and that’s a good thing. Not everyone will agree.

Continue reading “They Think We Can Do Better” »

The government’s mission to put the UK at the forefront of commercial spaceflight has been given a big boost after plans were announced to build the world’s first private space research centre in Bedfordshire. The £120 million Blue Abyss facility will be constructed at RAF Henlow, providing domestic and international companies with access to the world’s biggest 50 metre deep pool, a 120 room hotel, an astronaut training centre and a “human performance centre” that will help divers, astronauts and athletes train at the very top level.

The base, which is set to fully close in 2020, already houses some of the facilities that paid-for astronauts need to acclimatise to the rigours of space. Its centrifuge base, for example, will expose space-goers to extreme G forces as part of their commercial astronaut training programme. The idea is to provide the necessary services needed by private spaceflight providers to get their passengers launch ready.

Continue reading “The first commercial astronaut training center will be built in the UK” »