Science, Space, Health & Robotics News - Page 14

Elon Musk has appeared in front of all SpaceX employees to congratulate them on their efforts throughout 2023, while also discussing what the company expects it will be able to achieve throughout 2024.

Musk's presentation saved Starship for last, the world's biggest and most powerful rocket, or the crown jewel of SpaceX's development. Starship is designed to be the mode of transportation to Mars, and has purposely been built with carry capacity in mind. Current estimates put Starships payload anywhere between 100 and 150 tons, which is enough to begin occupying the Red Planet with a small base. However, SpaceX needs Starship to get to orbit first.

During the presentation Musk said that Starship "down the road" will come with approximately 20 million pounds of thrust, which is three times the thrust of Saturn V, the rocket NASA used to take humans to the moon. Musk goes on to say that in the future when Starship can reach orbit it will "fly a lot", reaching "several times a day" from multiple locations around the world. Musk adds that he thinks there is a "pretty good chance" Starship will do "Earth to Earth transport as well".

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has held a meeting at SpaceX headquarters in Texas with all staff, and during this meeting, the company CEO celebrated all of the achievements the incredible team over at SpaceX made throughout 2023 while also touching on what the company wants to achieve throughout 2024.

Musk took to the stage in front of all SpaceX employees for a talk that went for just shy of an hour. During this presentation, Musk applauded all employees for their hard work in making SpaceX the world's most reliable rocket launching company. Saving the best for last, Musk began discussing SpaceX's crown jewel, Starship, and the expected improvements to be made to future iterations of the launch vehicle, as well as Starbase itself.

Musk illustrated the sheer size of Starship with the graphic below while also briefly mentioning that Starship will get bigger with future generations. Notably, Musk said that Starship's launch tower is "bigger than Mech Godzilla" and will eventually have "chopstick" arms that will catch a landing Starship rocket. Musk briefly mentioned that SpaceX would be constructing a second launch tower, which was revealed in the above graphic titled "Two Towers In Texas."

Elon Musk has addressed the SpaceX team at an All-Hands meeting that was recently posted to the company's X account. During this meeting, Musk touches on why Starship exploded during its most recent orbital launch attempt.

Starship is SpaceX's crown jewel, with it being the biggest and most powerful rocket in the world and set to be the transportation method to occupy Mars. With 150 tons of payload capacity, Starship is the biggest flying object to ever have taken to the skies, but unfortunately, both orbital launch attempts ended in critical failure or boom.

While this may be disheartening to those who want to see the human race touch down on Mars, don't lose hope, as this is simply the process with rocket development, and with each flight, SpaceX has made milestone leaps forward toward the end goal of landing on the Red Planet. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk explains that Starship was launched twice last year, and between Flights 1 and 2, there were massive improvements across the board, from Starship's internal design to the flight pad.

Samsung gave us our first look at their spherical robot companion in the early days of 2020, pre-COVID, and this year at CES, they unveiled a new look at their updated little yellow friend.

The Korean tech giant took to the stage at CES for their press conference and showed off a look at the new and improved Ballie. A prototype for Ballie was shown way back in 2020, but this new and improved model seems to be larger and has a smoother exterior as well as some quirky features.

Samsung did not bring Ballie on stage but offered a proof-of-concept trailer. In the trailer, you can see Ballie remotely warning its owner that their dog is up to no good before refilling the dog food bowl and using its projector to distract the dog, seemingly following orders and communicating through a text message-like app.

The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) hosted annually attracts some of the most cutting-edge technology, and sometimes that can come in new TVs or robotics, and other times it can come in bathroom upgrades.

Have you ever wished you could speak to your toilet? Well, if you have, Kohler, a 151-year-old company known predominantly for its plumping solutions, has showcased a new accessory called the PureWash E930 Bidet Seat, a bidet seat that incorporates many features of a smart toilet, such as voice activation for washing, warm/dry air, UV cleaning and more.

Users are able to take advantage of both the front and rear wash modes, adjust water temperature and pressure settings, swap between oscillating or pulsating sprays, a more delicate mode for children, and a boost spray to get into all those nooks and crannies. Additionally, the PureWash E930 comes with a nightlight for those nighttime trips to relieve yourself.

Ambient Photonics, a solar technology firm concentrating on clean energy solutions is slated to unveil its new solar cell technology that eliminate, or at least reduce the reliance on rechargeable, or disposable batteries.

The company is backed by Amazon's Climate Pledge Fund, along with many other venture capital firms. According to a press release Ambient Photonics will unveil its first bifacial solar cell at CES 2024, which is a new groundbreaking technology that will enable light to be harvested from both sides of the solar cell.

According to Bates Marshall, Ambient Photonics' Co-Founder & CEO, the applications for this newly improved solar cell are widespread. Additionally, the company claims these cells offer three times more generated power than competing solutions, even in environments that are extremely dim.

NASA, in partnership with Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), revealed the first look at an X-ray cosmos.

The two space agencies partnered to create the XRISM (X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission) observatory, which is designed to measure the hottest parts of the cosmos. Scientific operations for the mission began last year, and now the results have been published on NASA's website, revealing one of the targets for the mission was a star, or more accurately, a supernova remnant called N132D.

This astronomical object is located 160,000 light years away from Earth within the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy of our own Milky Way. Using XRISM instruments, researchers studied N132D and found that the once-star exhausted all its fuel around 3,000 years ago, which resulted in a supernova explosion that can still be seen today (above image).

NASA is celebrating its Mars rover named Perseverance, hitting 1,000 Martian days on the Red Planet with a 360-degree look at the Jezero Crater, the location the rover has been exploring since it touched down there in 2021.

The space agency has released a 360-degree mosaic piece of the location where Perseverance is currently stationed, and the image is composed of 993 individual pictures that were all snapped with the rover's Mastcam-Z instrument. The images were captured across a span of days, beginning on November 3 and ending on November 6. For those wondering about pixels, NASA writes the image is an insane 2.38 billion pixels.

The images and video linked here were captured by Perseverance while it was parked atop "Airey Hill." The images were captured during the solar conjunction, which is a period of temporarily severed communications with NASA due to Mars moving directly behind the Sun, obscuring any instructions sent from Earth. Notably, the Jezero Crater was once home to liquid water as Perseverance has captured signs of ancient river beds that once would have slow-flowing water that carved its way through the many rocks the rover is surrounded by.

Gene therapy is something most people would have heard of before, but what does it actually entail? Simply put, gene therapy is an innovative approach to medicine that uses genetic material to cure diseases.

This genetic material is administered to the patient via the individual cells and, depending on the gene therapy, elicits the production of specific proteins. Diseases and medical afflictions can be cured, but the patient must stay within the therapeutic window. There are still some problems that need to be ironed out with gene therapy, such as being able to reliably stay within the therapeutic window. Too much of the protein may be toxic to the patient, and too little results in no therapeutic relief.

However, researchers from the Baylor College of Medicine penned a new study published in the journal Nature Biotechnology, which claims they have been able to regulate protein production, metaphorically similar to the dimming of a light switch in a bedroom. The team modified RNA molecules that are meant to produce the therapeutic protein and inserted a "stop sign" at the beginning of the gene's life. Additionally, the researchers bound a portion of the RNA with the FDA-approved antibiotic drug tetracycline.

The recent earthquake that struck just off the coast of Japan has brought back many memories of the nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima plant following the magnitude 9.0 earthquake in 2011.

Japan's most recent earthquake occurred on New Year's Day with the 7.6 magnitude quake striking 6.2 miles on the west coast of Japan's main island, around 186 miles from Tokyo. The earthquake caused widespread damage, so far it has killed more than 80 people, and has left thousands without power. Notably, 30% of Japan's energy supply is from nuclear power, and the world's largest is the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant, owned by Tokyo Electric (Tepco).

Just days after the earthquake, regulators lifted a ban on the operation of the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, which is located only 74 miles from the epicenter. Additionally, the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant has been offline since 2012 for safety violations. Furthermore, Tepco wants to get the plant up and running by the end of 2024, but residents and activists are strongly against the idea as they want to avoid another Fukushima event. These fears have only been exacerbated by the recent earthquake.