UC Irvine's Nanowire Battery Electrode: 200,000 Cycles Explained
First published July 1, 2022. Researchers at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) built a nanowire battery electrode that survived a...
Technology & Innovation
An invention becomes interesting when we ask what it changes for people. From practical engineering to digital tools, explore ideas that promise to make work, communication or everyday tasks easier. A useful question follows every demonstration: what works beyond the prototype, and who benefits?
The Knightscope K5 Security Robot That Fell Into a DC Fountain
Originally published 2022-06-18. Dates, ages and announcements in this article refer to June 2022. On 17 July 2017 a Knightscope K5 securi...
Face Transplant Recipient Cameron Underwood's Remarkable Recovery
Originally published 2022-06-12. In January 2018, surgeons at NYU Langone Health in New York gave Cameron Underwood, a 26-year-old man f...
FAST-PETase: The AI-Designed Enzyme That Breaks Down PET Plastic
In April 2022, chemical engineers and molecular biologists at the University of Texas at Austin reported an enzyme they called FAST-PETase ...
DART Changed an Asteroid’s Orbit. What Comes Next?
Before DART became an asteroid-impact success, its first photographs were an important engineering milestone. In December 2021, roughly two ...
LOFAR’s 25,000-Source Map: More Than a Sky Full of Dots
At first glance, the LOFAR map looks like a crowded field of stars. Look again: this is a radio view of the sky, and many of its points are ...
Parker Solar Probe: What It Means to Touch the Sun
NASA announced in December 2021 that Parker Solar Probe had become the first spacecraft to ' touch the Sun ' while taking footage ...
Why Space Adventures Dropped Its SpaceX Crew Dragon Tourist Flight
Originally published 2021-11-05. In October 2021, the space tourism company Space Adventures confirmed that it was no longer planning a p...
Xpeng's Flying Car: The X2, the 2024 Plan and What Came Next
Originally published 2021-10-27. In October 2021, Xpeng, the Guangzhou-based electric car maker, announced that its flying-car affiliate H...
Ocean Cleanup's System 002: 20,000 lb of Plastic in One Haul
In 2021 the non-profit The Ocean Cleanup tested a towed plastic-catching system, nicknamed "Jenny", in the Great Pacific Garbage ...
LitterCam on the A12: Essex's Hidden Camera Trial for Litter Louts
First published October 10, 2021. In autumn 2021 Brentwood Borough Council in Essex agreed to test a hidden, AI-assisted camera called Lit...
Black Bear Films Itself With a Lost GoPro in Wyoming
In September 2021, a hunter from Laramie, Wyoming, named Dylan Schilt picked up a GoPro camera lying in the backcountry while he was out a...
The Microflier: Northwestern's Seed-Inspired Flying Microchip
First published September 24, 2021. In September 2021, engineers at Northwestern University in Illinois unveiled what they described as th...
Inspiration4: The First All-Civilian Crew to Orbit Earth
Inspiration4 was the first orbital spaceflight flown entirely by private citizens, with no professional astronaut from NASA or any other sp...
Dress for Respect: The Sensor Dress That Recorded Unwanted Touching
Originally published 2021-09-18. The Dress for Respect was a 2018 campaign by the advertising agency Ogilvy for the drinks brand Schwepp...
Solar-Charged Refrigerated Trailers: The XL Fleet and eNow Plan
Can the sun keep a truckload of food cold? In 2021, two American companies said it could help. XL Fleet, a fleet-electrification firm, agre...
Dyson Spheres Around Black Holes: Could We Spot Alien Megastructures?
Originally published 2021-09-05. Artist’s impression of a Dyson sphere enclosing a star. Image: Dotted Yeti / Shutterstock. Could an adv...
Indiana's Wireless EV Charging Road: How the Pilot Works
Originally published 2021-09-05. In July 2021, the Indiana Department of Transportation (INDOT) announced a research project with Purdue U...
China's One-Hour Gaming Rule for Minors: What It Required
First published August 31, 2021. On 30 August 2021 China's National Press and Publication Administration (NPPA), the regulator that li...
Bezos's $2 Billion Offer to NASA for a Moon Lander Contract
Originally published 2021-07-29. In late July 2021 Jeff Bezos tried to buy his way back into NASA's race to return astronauts to the M...
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Cartoonist Pablo Stanley turned John Lennon’s Imagine into a webcomic in which each line of the song is paired with a drawing of people fr... -
Brad Pitt did not write the famous list of twenty marriage tips that circulates under his name. The real author is Gerald Rogers, a Brigham... -
First published March 14, 2017. Thyme cannot cure strep throat, herpes, a yeast infection or the flu. That is the honest answer to a claim ... -
Originally published 2015-06-01. The real Illuminati were a short-lived secret society founded in Bavaria on 1 May 1776 by Adam Weishaupt, ... -
First published January 14, 2017. Many people who describe themselves as empaths say they feel tense, tongue-tied or worn out around someo...
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Originally published 2017-12-02. "If you love her, don't destroy her" is the title of a widely shared 2017 letter by the Leb... -
Originally published 2017-02-09. Letting go means deciding to stop carrying something that drains you: an expectation, a grudge, a habit o... -
Originally published 2020-04-27. "Weightless" is an eight-minute ambient track by the Manchester band Marconi Union , written wi... -
If you want a home workout that needs no equipment, five moves cover almost the whole body: the plank, the squat, the bird-dog, the glute b... -
These nine before-and-after comics compare life while dating with life after marriage: sleeping, flirting, eating, watching films and sayin...