Lifeboat Foundation

Building integrated solar provides businesses with new bottom line opportunities to leverage their properties to attract a new generation of sustainability-focused consumers, and that leaves little space for fossil energy to maneuver.

More than 20 billion square feet of windows are installed every year, and the leading firm Andersen Corporation apparently plans to make some of those billions into energy efficient, transparent solar energy generators that could kick the pace of global energy decarbonization into high gear. The well-known maker of windows and doors just chipped in for a $30 million Series B funding round that will help push the not-so-well-known transparent solar innovator Ubiquitous Energy out of the startup shadows and into the bright sunshine of the global building industries marketplace.

Ubiquitous Energy Hearts Transparent Solar Windows

Continue reading “Energy Efficient, Transparent Solar Windows: You Really Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet” »

Inspired by the growth of bones in the skeleton, researchers at the universities of Linkoping in Sweden and Okayama in Japan have developed a combination of materials that can morph into various shapes before hardening. The material is initially soft but later hardens through a bone development process that uses the same materials found in the skeleton.

When we are born, we have gaps in our skulls that are covered by pieces of soft connective tissue called fontanelles. It is thanks to fontanelles that our skulls can be deformed during birth and pass successfully through the birth canal. Post-birth, the fontanelle tissue gradually changes to hard bone. Now, researchers have combined materials that together resemble this natural process. “We want to use this for applications where materials need to have different properties at different points in time. Firstly, the material is soft and flexible, and it is then locked into place when it hardens. This material could be used in, for example, complicated bone fractures. It could also be used in microrobots — these soft microrobots could be injected into the body through a thin syringe, and then they would unfold and develop their own rigid bones”, says Edwin Jager, associate professor at the Department of Physics, Chemistry and Biology (IFM) at Linkoping University.

The idea was hatched during a research visit in Japan when materials scientist Edwin Jager met Hiroshi Kamioka and Emilio Hara, who conduct research into bones. The Japanese researchers had discovered a kind of biomolecule that could stimulate bone growth under a short period of time. Would it be possible to combine this biomolecule with Jager’s materials research, to develop new materials with variable stiffness? In the study that followed, published in Advanced Materials, the researchers constructed a kind of simple “microrobot”, one which can assume different shapes and change stiffness. The researchers began with a gel material called alginate. On one side of the gel, a polymer material is grown. This material is electroactive, and it changes its volume when a low voltage is applied, causing the microrobot to bend in a specified direction.

Tech companies continued to draw criticism for their roles in political and social scandals, most notably when whisteblower and former Facebook employee Frances Haugen testified to lawmakers. Undeterred, Facebook rebranded itself Meta and said it would now focus on building the metaverse. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey stepped down and likewise changed the name of his company Square to Block in a not-so-subtle nod to the blockchain.

Meanwhile, volatile cryptocurrencies set new records, their prices jumping and crashing on a tweet. NFTs, a once-obscure type of cryptoasset, went on an eye-watering tear as redditors pushed meme stocks skyward. It was also the year of ever-bigger AI. Machine learning models surpassed a trillion parameters, designed computer chips, and tackled practical problems in biology, math, and chemistry. Elsewhere, billionaires went to space, regular folks bought 3D printed houses, fusion power attracted billions in investment, gene editing trials hit their stride, and “flying car” companies hit the New York Stock Exchange.

For this year’s list of fascinating stories in tech and science, we sifted our Saturday posts and selected articles that looked back to where it all began, glanced ahead to what’s coming, or otherwise stood out from the chatter to stand the test of time.

Keytruda actually treats 16 types of cancer.

Learn about how KEYTRUDA® (pembrolizumab) works as an immunotherapy to help fight certain cancers.

The volar aircraft has a sleek, aerodynamic form that’s more akin to a supercar than other eVTOLs currently in development.

Over the last several decades, I’ve witnessed a lot of change in the fields of machine learning (ML) and computer science. Early approaches, which often fell short, eventually gave rise to modern approaches that have been very successful. Following that long-arc pattern of progress, I think we’ll see a number of exciting advances over the next several years, advances that will ultimately benefit the lives of billions of people with greater impact than ever before. In this post, I’ll highlight five areas where ML is poised to have such impact. For each, I’ll discuss related research (mostly from 2021) and the directions and progress we’ll likely see in the next few years.

Although multimorbidity differs for each person, we know that patients tend to suffer from the same groups of diseases — known as “clusters”. This suggests that each cluster may share a common underlying cause. For example, a person with multimorbidity may suffer from heart problems (such as heart disease and high blood pressure) and diabetes, which may all stem from the same cause — such as obesity.

Identifying and treating the cause of a patient’s disease clusters would allow us to more effectively combat several — or even all — of the diseases a patient has using a single treatment. This would both reduce the number of medical appointments a person needs to attend and the number of medications they may need to take.

Ageing is the single biggest risk factor for developing multimorbidity.

Continue reading “Tackling ageing may be best way to prevent multiple chronic conditions from developing in older people” »

Next Fiat Panda aims for ‘most affordable EV’ title with customizable, clever crossover that will slot below 500e.

What’s the most affordable EV you can buy? If rumors out of Fiat are to be believed, the answer to that question will soon be “the new Fiat Panda” as Stellantis targets the bottom end of the booming electric car market.

Set to arrive as soon as this spring, the new Fiat Panda will be an EV-only offering from Stellantis’ “entry” Italian brand, and is expected to slot in below the ell-electric Fiat 500e, price-wise, in the company’s lineup. Its main objective, as the brand’s President, Oliver Francois, told AutoExpress UK, is to “awaken the sleeping giant” he believes Fiat to be. “That’s exactly my point of view,” he says, when discussing new models. “We have not even started awakening the giant.”

Continue reading “Next Fiat Panda aims for ‘most affordable EV’ title, will slot below 500e” »

The idea that our genes are our fate” is dead. Exciting new discoveries in the field of epigenetics have proven that our lifestyle and environment can turn off and on many of the genes that control our health and wellbeing. Simple things like where we live, what we eat, pollution, stress, and exercise all impact which genes are silenced and expressed throughout our lives.

Research has shown that that the current dramatic rise in obesity, heart disease, diabetes and Alzheimer’s all have epigenetic mechanisms at play. Not only that but many epigenetic changes are actually passed to future generations: your grandmother’s dietary deficits may have caused your diabetes. Your father’s smoking may have turned on your marker for obesity or ADHD. Three generations later the descendants of holocaust survivors are still suffering stress disorders.

Continue reading “Why Are We Genetically Modifying Humans? | Epigenetics | Spark” »