Science, Space, & Robotics - Page 9

A group of researchers have discovered a submerged temple that is believed to be more than 2,000 years old and built by Arabian immigrants.

The discovery was detailed in a new article by the Cambridge University Press that states the 2,000-year-old temple was discovered off the Phlaegrean coast near Naples, Italy. The city was discovered off the coast of the Pozzuoli, a town near Campi Flegrei, located approximately 10 miles east of Naples. The article states the city was called Puteoli during its Roman-era occupation, and by mapping the seabed, the researchers were able to discover a collection of walls that measured 32 feet by 15 feet.

The article states they appear to make up two large rooms, and along with this discovery was the finding of two white marble altars, each of which were leaning against the wall of one of the rooms. The temple was reportedly built by Arabian immigrants from the Nabataean culture, and the location was once a popular harbor that conducted maritime trade, which the study states was primarily in grain. Due to the popularity of the trading location, the port was outfitted with a series of warehouses, the foundations of which can be identified in the above image.

NASA has confirmed it has received a message from an interstellar traveler that is more than 15 billion miles away from Earth, and the message was good news.

That interstellar traveler is none other than NASA's Voyager 1, which used its backup radio transmitter, which hasn't been activated since 1981, to send a message back to Earth. The message came after Voyager 1 experienced an issue that temporarily paused communications, as the spacecraft put itself into a protective power state to preserve the health of its instruments and to converse power. The power state and the severing of communications were caused by instructions NASA sent via its Deep Space Network on October 16 that told Voyager 1 to turn off one of its heaters.

On October 18, NASA realized that one of the spacecraft's antennas, which was its primary X-band radio transmitter, was inactive. NASA believes the spacecraft's fault protection system triggered two more times, resulting in Voyager switching to its S-band radio transmitter, which hadn't been used since 1981. At this point NASA was metaphorically sweating as the S-band frequency is much harder to detect due to its fainter signal.

Beijing has claimed it has discovered "underwater lighthouses" and other devices that are allegedly being used for surveillance purposes by China's adversaries.

China's Ministry of State Security took to WeChat to make the accusations, explaining Chinese authorities discovered several devices that were all designed to gather information on their surrounding area, which was in the ocean. More specifically, China explained that it found drifting devices capable of "detecting and grasping the real-time situation in the sea area," with others that acted as "underwater 'lighthouses' to show the direction of submarines of other countries that have intruded into China's waters."

Beijing said the discovered devices were designed with the purpose of "covertly collecting marine hydrological information and data on the activities of various ships around them and serving the preset of the battlefield environment." Additionally, China alleged it discovered a base embedded into the seafloor, which is reminiscent of an allegation the nation made back in May of this year where it said it discovered "maritime espionage" within its waters when a fishermen allegedly said he found the above device.

Water is something we interact with every day, but where does it come from and how is it formed? Researchers have captured the event of a water molecule forming on the nanoscale, showcasing hydrogen and oxygen fusing together to form H20.

Researchers from Northwestern University penned a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America and a press release on the Northwestern website discussing the scientific achievement in more natural language. According to the press release, this is the first time researchers have witnessed the formation of tiny water bubbles in real-time or the evolutionary process of two hydrogen atoms merging with an oxygen atom to form H20 or water.

The team was able to do this through the use of a rare metallic element called palladium, which catalyzes the gaseous reaction to form the water molecule. Here's what happened. Using a special ultra-thin glassy membrane that can contain the molecules and be attached to a high-vacuum electron microscope, the researchers were able to see the two hydrogen atoms enter the palladium element, expanding its material structure. Shortly after, a water bubble formed on the surface of the palladium.

Elon Musk's brain implant company Neuralink has some new competition as a company whose founding members were previously at Neuralink announced a new eye implant capable of enabling blind people to read once again.

Former President of Neuralink and now current CEO of California-based brain-computer interface company Science Corporation, Max Hodak, acquired the new technology from Pixium Vision earlier this year, and according to reports the specific implant is referred to as the Prima. Notably, the implant doesn't stimulate the retina, but instead bypasses it and directly communicates with the brain through electrical signals.

Here's how it works. The Prima is placed under the retina in the backmost part of the eye over just an 80-minute procedure. The patient wears a pair of glasses that capture visual information and then convert that information into patterns of infrared light that are processed on the tiny implanted 2 mm chip. The implant has 378 light-powered pixels, and once the chip has converted the infrared light pattern into electrical signals, they are sent to the brain. The electrical pulses from the chip mimic natural sight electrical pulses, and as a result, the user can achieve "form vision," or the perception of shapes, patterns, and objects.

As technology advances and becomes more sophisticated, researchers are able to view the world differently, revealing aspects of it that have previously gone unnoticed.

An example of that is the recent discovery of a 250-year-old lost city within Brazil's Amazon rainforest, which Brazil's Metropoles publication has detailed in a recent report. According to the news site the team of archaeologist was led by University of Sao Paulo archaeologist Eduardo Neves, and the discover was made possible through the use of advanced sensing technology called Light Detection and Ranging, or LiDAR.

This form of remote sensing uses light in the form of a pulsed laser to measure ranges. The light is fired by a laser within the instrument and then it measures the time it takes for the reflected light to return back to the receiver. With these measurements, researchers are able to produce a high-resolution 3D image or map of the targeted area. The researchers took advantage of Brazil's National Space Researchers Institute's LiDAR equipment and flew over a swath of the Amazon rainforest, scanning as they went.

A team of international researchers has discovered that the vast majority of the asteroids that collide with Earth come from just three families of asteroids, which can all be traced back to a cataclysmic event approximately 40 million years ago.

A new paper that has been published in the scientific journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, along with two other papers recently published in Nature, outlines that 70% of all known meteorites, asteroids that make it to the surface of Earth, come from the following asteroid families: Karin, Koronos, and Massalia. These families were formed approximately at different times, such as Karin five million years ago, Koronos at seven million, and Massalia at forty million. Notably, Massalia was the source for 37% of all known meteorites.

These asteroid families formed in our solar system's main asteroid belt, which is located some 700 million miles from Earth. As for the meteorites discovered on Earth, cataclysmic events caused by collisions with other asteroids within the asteroid belt resulted in fragments of asteroids being scattered into the solar system. Researchers used simulations to rewind the clock on some of the discovered meteorites and found the source of their origin.

SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk celebrated the successful launch and catch of Starship, the world's largest and most powerful rocket, by sharing some extremely high-detail footage captured with an expensive camera lens.

The footage was captured by Andrew McCarthy, an astrophotographer who captures incredibly detailed images of astronomical objects from his backyard in Arizona. McCarthy posts the photos and videos to his Instagram account "cosmic_background," which has gained more than 1.6 million followers as of the time of reporting. As for Starship, McCarthy explained via X that he rented a $17,000 lens to capture SpaceX's milestone rocket launch and catch. The results simply speak for themselves.

McCarthy explains in captions within the video that each frame seen is hand-tracked and hand-stabilized. Additionally, the astrophotographer was able to track Starship all the way to orbit at 50 miles altitude, and capture the stage separation moment when Super Heavy disconnected from Starship to make its descent journey back down to Earth and eventual landing on the launch pad it took off from.

For the first time, a team of researchers successfully used lasers to generate sound waves on the surface of a microchip, opening the door for completely new microchip design considerations that abandon electricity.

In a new study published in the APL Photonics journal of the American Institute of Physics, a team of researchers details the process of generating sound waves on a microchip and the benefits of the new technology. According to the press release about the study, the team used a technique called stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS), which is created through a feedback loop between photons (light) and phonons (sound). More specifically, as light moves around the chip or an optical fiber it creates sound vibrations.

Notably, researchers initially believed these sound vibrations to be an obstacle, but after further consideration, it was realized they could be coupled with light waves, which enhances the vibration. Moreover, the team discovered this vibration could be used as a new way to transport and process information.

Amazon is investing big in nuclear energy as the company believes that growing energy demands caused by expanding data centers will be need to be met with small nuclear reactors.

It was only last week that Google announced it was pursuing nuclear power to support the growing demand for data centers, and now Amazon is following suit. The exponentially growing energy demand is undoubtedly caused by the increasingly sophisticated artificial intelligence data centers that require immense amounts of energy to operate. Amazon explains in the above video it has signed three agreements to support the development of small nuclear reactors called "Small Modular Reactors (SMRs)".

Amazon names Energy Northwest, which will develop four advanced SMRs that will be able to generate approximately 320 megawatts of capacity or enough to power 770,000 US homes. Additionally, Amazon has tapped X-energy, a company specializing in SMR reactors and fuel. X-energy's advanced SMR reactor design will be used in the Energy Northwest project. Additionally, Amazon has signed an agreement with Dominion Energy to implement an SMR project near Dominion's existing North Anna nuclear power station, which will have the goal of adding an additional 300 megawatts of power to the Virginia region.

Google has signed the world's first corporate agreement to purchase nuclear energy from multiple small modular reactors (SMR) to be developed by Kairos Power.

The company says that the initial phase of work will bring Kairos Power's first SMR online quickly and safely by 2030, followed by additional reactor deployments through 2035. Overall, this deal will enable up to 500MW of new 24/7 carbon-free power to US electricity grids, with Google adding that this will "help more communities benefit from clean and affordable nuclear power".

Google explains why the company is supporting new advanced nuclear energy: "This agreement is part of our efforts to develop and commercialize a broad portfolio of advanced clean electricity technologies to power our global data centers and offices. This approach will complement our use of variable renewables, like solar and wind, and help us reach our ambitious 24/7 carbon-free energy and net-zero goals".

NASA has taken to its blog to confirm the Sun has now reached the peak of its 11-year solar cycle, meaning we can expect a lot more activity out of our local star.

The space agency informed reporters on Tuesday, along with representatives from the Solar Cycle Prediction Panel and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), that the Sun has entered its solar maximum period, which can continue throughout next year. NASA explains that during the Sun's solar maximum, the Sun's magnetic activity is at its highest, which increases the number of sunspots that lead to solar eruptions that can and have impacted Earth.

Solar activity can affect critical infrastructure on Earth, such as communications systems, satellites, and power grids, which can all be disrupted during intense geomagnetic storms caused by solar blasts. On the positive side, increased solar activity means the frequency of auroras have increased. An example of the Sun's 11-year solar cycle paying off in the form of impressive auroras only occurred in May this year when Earth was hit with a barrage of coronal mass ejections (CMEs), or blasts of charged particles that created the strongest geomagnetic storm Earth has experienced in the last two decades.

Elon Musk has been accused of ripping off the popular blockbuster movie "I, Robot" starring Will Smith with his Tesla Optimus robot designs, which were recently showcased at a Tesla event.

Alex Proyas, the director of the cult-classic movie I, Robot, has taken to his personal X, formerly Twitter, account to share an image that directly compares scenes from the movie with mockups of Tesla designs. Proyas wrote, "Hey Elon, Can I have my designs back, please?" The only real product Tesla has made in the image or at least is planning on bringing to market in the immediate future is the humanoid robot the company calls Optimus.

It was only recently that Musk showcased the Optimus robot at the Robotaxi event, where they were seen serving drinks, dancing, answering questions, and playing games. While it may have appeared that these Optimus robots roaming around the event were fully autonomous, they were actually being remotely controlled by humans, which explains the almost uncanny response time when it came to speech. As for the similarities with I, Robot, Tesla hasn't officially said Optimus' design is inspired by I, Robot, but the company did name the event "We, Robot".

It isn't unusual for researchers to take something incredible in nature, such as a cat's eye or vision system, and attempt to create that in the laboratory.

Biologically inspired engineering happens all the time, and researchers from South Korea have become another example of it with a new artificial vision system inspired by Feline or cat eyes. For those that don't know, cats have a very impressive vision system that enables them to see very well in well-lit environments and also in complete darkness. Cats are able to do this through an eye adaptation that changes their pupil slit to vertical during the day, which helps to reduce glare, while at night, their pupils widen.

Additionally, at night a cat's eyes will develop a reflective layer called the tapetum lucidum, which boosts night vision performance and gives the eyes the reflective glow. The South Korean researchers penned a new study published in the journal Science Advances that details a new artificial vision system directly inspired by a cats vision system. The team created a slit-like aperture designed to filter unnecessary light and assist in focussing on key objects, while also creating a special reflective layer that is similar to the one found on a cats eye. The team says its artificial protective layer also boosts nighttime vision performance.

SpaceX achieved what previously only appeared to be possible in science-fiction movies with the launch and catch of the world's most powerful rocket, Starship.

Starship launched from Starbase on October 13, and after seven minutes of flight, the 233-foot-tall booster called Super Heavy descended back to the launch pad to be perfectly caught by the launch tower named Mechazilla. The tower's arms, or as SpaceX calls them, "chopsticks," act as support for Super Heavy as it slowly touched back down on the launch pad. The success of Flight 5 puts the company one step closer to achieving rapid reusability of Starship, which is a critical component in SpaceX's overarching quest to put humans on the surface of Mars.

To celebrate the monumental achievement of Super Heavy touching back down on the launch pad, SpaceX has released some video footage of the launch and catch that shows what both events would have looked like if you were positioned on the launch tower. It shouldn't be understated what an achievement this catch is, as Super Heavy is a 233-foot-tall rocket booster, which is the equivalent of a 20-story building, and at the time of catch, it weighs multiple tons. Perhaps an analogy that lines up with SpaceX's description of Mechazilla's arms is Mr. Miyagi from The Karate Kid catching a fly mid-air with his chopsticks.

SpaceX has achieved a milestone in its quest to put humans on the surface of the Red Planet, with the company etching itself into the history books once again with the first attempt and success of the Starship rocket on the Mechazilla launch tower.

SpaceX has been working toward this moment for many years, and with the fifth launch of the world's largest and most powerful rocket, Starship, the Elon Musk-led company has landed the approximately 250-foot-tall booster Super Heavy back on the launch pad at Starbase. The moment was witnessed by thousands of onlookers and quickly became a viral sensation as Mechazilla's arms, referred to by SpaceX as its "chopsticks," slotted and caught the massive booster for a smooth touchdown.

Why is this important? Flight 5 was the highest stake flight of Starship yet as failure would have resulted in a potentially destroyed Mechazilla tower, launch pad, and launch site - all of which would have further postponed the development of Starship. However, that didn't happen, and SpaceX landed it on the first go, meaning the company is one step closer to achieving rapid reusability with Starship.

At Tesla's Cybercab event last week, the company made headlines for not only its new vehicles, but it's humanoid robots that were roaming around the event interacting with the public.

Numerous videos of the robots interacting with guests in various ways have begun circulating online, with some impressive footage showing Tesla's Optimus robots serving drinks, answering questions, dancing, and playing games. Footage of these Optimus robots responding to guests was particularly impressive as the response time was almost identical to that between two humans conversing.

Typically, when verbally interacting with a voice-activated device, there is a noticeable gap of time between the question being asked and the answer, as the device needs time to process the request, generate its response, and then speak it. However, Optimus's responses were near-perfect timing-wise. However, there was a reason for that as each of the Optimus robots were being remotely operated by humans who were responding to questions asked to them by guests via headsets.

An entirely new organism has been created by combining living cells with dead cells, birthing what is being called a "third state" of existence.

A team of researchers penned a new study review in the journal Physiology where they detail a method to achieving this state that is separate from life and death, which they believe will challenge many scientists' general understanding of cell evolution. According to the study's co-authors, biologists Peter Noble and Alex Pozhitkov, who explained in The Conversation, cells are capable of mechanisms even after the death of the host organism, and a widely known example of that is organ transplants.

The biologists set out to determine what it takes to trigger cell activity after an organism has died, and according to the study, cells can be reactivated into multicellular organisms through various stimuli, such as nutrients, oxygen, bioelectricity, or biochemical cues. The team found that skin cells extracted from deceased frog embryos were capable of adapting to new conditions and spontaneously reorganizing into multicellular organisms called xenobots. The researchers wrote these xenobots were capable of mechanisms far beyond their original predetermined biological roles.

Tesla held its recent "We Robot" special event in California, unveiling its new Optimus Gen 2 humanoid robot that will cost $20K to $30K and help you around your house, and so much more.

First, these robots weren't running autonomously like some people think... they were walking on their own, but being controlled by a human operator through a VR headset, microphone, and headset. This means you're virtually operating an Optimus robot, with the robot being the physical avatar in your virtual world.

The possibilities of this and the future of employment are huge, as robots aren't replacing jobs -- yet -- but rather, human operators will "use" the robot and have it perform functions that they otherwise couldn't. Think of heavy lifting, dangerous environments, etc where humans can't do those jobs (or not as good as an infinitely strong, never-tired robot). This will eventually all be done over Starlink, connecting human operators to Optimus robots.

Spider-Man is one of, if not the most popular superhero on the planet, and anyone who is a fan of Peter Parker has once imagined what it would be like to be able to shoot a web out of their wrist and swing through the concrete jungle of New York City taking down bad guys.

While we are still many years away from that becoming a reality, the foundations of Spider-Man's web fluid have been officially created. According to a team of researchers out of Tufts University Silklab that penned a study published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials, the first web-slinging technology has been created in the form of a fluid material that immediately solidifies after being shot out of a needle. Researchers took silky fibers from moth cocoons, which can then be reduced to its building block fibers called fibroin.

The fibroin is then combined with specific adhesives and shot of a needle tip device to create a stream. Shortly after the web fluid is fibered, it sticks to objects and then solidifies, making it possible to tether to objects. The researchers attribute their inspiration for this device to the incredible strength of spiderwebs, which are 1,000 times stronger than the artificial web created by the researchers in this study, and comic books. While the researchers' web isn't anywhere near as strong as a spiderweb it can still pick up objects over 80 times its own weight under various conditions.