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The first RISC processor, although it didn’t use that name, was the IBM 801. There is a sense in which people today don’t count it since it was not a microprocessor. That was because it was developed in the 1970s, long before integrated circuits were large enough to fit a whole microprocessor. Don’t forget that…
Aptly named the Adaptable THruster based on Electrospray powered by Nanotechnology, or ATHENA, the compact unit relies on micro and nanotechnology to produce a silicon wafer featuring seven emitter arrays, fitted with a combined total of more than 500 of the tiny emitters that fire a spray of ions that are accelerated by an electrostatic field…
My children are hopelessly addicted to their gaming devices. This is a problem, but not one that I can directly solve because the school mandates that they have both an Android smartphone and a Windows laptop. Rather than to meet the problem head on I figured the better way to address it is to replace consumption with…
Driven by the hackerspace movement and the broader community, we, Libre Space Foundation, are actively building our own satellites, space technologies, sharing knowledge and resources, and pushing the boundaries of space exploration. Our mission is to democratize space, making it available to everyone, regardless of background or resources. This emerging movement faces unique challenges, including…
This a project close to my heart… For our final project, we built Computron, a parallel computer consisting of Raspberry Pi Picos that communicate over a I2C bus. To demonstrate the power of parallel computation among these devices, the Mandelbrot set is computed across Picos. Every Pico computes a portion of the set, while one…
If you’re wondering why perovskite solar cells are not yet widely available 14 years after that first paper was published, that’s a good question. Silicon is a more expensive energy-capturing material, but its durability has made it the go-to photovoltaic material of choice. Perovskites are relatively inexpensive, but they are unstable. Their crystalline structure shifts…
Meanwhile, electric cars are already upending America. In 2023, our battery-powered future became so much more real—a boom in sales and new models is finally starting to push us into the post-gas age. Americans are on track to buy a record 1.44 million of them in 2023, according to a forecast by BloombergNEF, about the…
Dream Chaser’s maiden flight next year will be a collaboration between flight and ground controllers at the Dream Chaser Mission Control Center in Louisville, Colorado, NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Texas. During this flight, Tenacity will conduct a myriad of in-flight tests after launch and prior to docking with the…
According to Helicity, the core technology behind their fusion drive efficiently converts electricity into plasma heating, using a unique approach to scale fusion conditions and directly produce thrust. Their method, distinct from conventional magnetic or inertial (laser) fusion, employs self-organized Taylor relaxation and magnetic reconnection physics, combined with a peristaltic magnetic compression scheme. In very…
For MY2022, the EPA says that the average real-world CO2 emissions for all new vehicles fell by 10 g/mile to 337 g/mile, the lowest average it has ever measured. Similarly, real-world fuel economy increased by 0.6 mpg for MY2022, to 26 mpg—this, too, is a record high and the single-largest year-on-year improvement for both CO2 and mpg…
Dave5 