Monthly Archives: June 2017

In Brief Japanese car giant Toyota has officially divested from Tesla as of the end of last year. The company has begun its own electric car division and may also be helping to bring a flying car into reality.

Toyota officially ended its relationship with Elon Musks Tesla by selling off its remaining shares of the company by the end of last year. The Japanese automaking company began with a $50 million investment for a three percent stake in the company.

In a statement, Toyota spokesman Ryo Sakai said, via Reuters, Our development partnership with Tesla ended a while ago, and since there has not been any new developments on that front, we decided it was time to sell the remaining stake. Interestingly, late last year, Toyota formed an electric car division of its own. So, it looks like Japans biggest automobile company is looking to compete for Teslas market share.

News from the BBC points to Toyota investing in Cartivatorto develop a flying car. The startuphas been crowdfunding their vehicle, the Skydrive, which has projected speeds of about 100 km/h (62 mph) and the ability to fly 10 meters (33 feet) off the ground.

Credit: Cartivation

This move directly opposes previous statements made by Elon Musk regarding flying cars. In an interview with Bloombergearlier this year he said, Obviously, I like flying things. But its difficult to imagine the flying car becoming a scalable solution.

Electric cars have quickly become the clear front runner in the future of personal transportation. Still, it is exciting to see that flying cars may not altogether be DOA.

Continued here:
Toyota Severs Ties With Tesla, Launches Their Own Electric Car Division - Futurism

In Brief IBM has unveiled the world's first 5nm silicon chip. The chip offers a 40% performance boost at the same power, or consumes 75% less power at the same level of performance, enabling more powerful devices that are smaller. Scaling Down, Powering Up

In partnership with GlobalFoundries and Samsung, IBM has unveiled the worlds first 5nm silicon chip. The chip is notable in that it is smaller than previous versions yet more dense and powerful, therefore offering higher performance. Its also the first practical application of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography and horizontal gate-all-around (GAA) field effect transistors (FETs).

Tri-gate finFETs, now used in most chip designs sized at 22nm and below, will probably be unsuitable at around 7nm. In contrast, GAAFETs particularly in tandem with EUV could work all the way down to 3nm. Below that size, no one yet knows what will function properly. FinFETs originally solved the volume issues older 2D transistors faced because they are 3D, increasing the volume of silicon atoms which can carry electricity by protruding from the substrate. GAAFETs can revert back into 2Ds using stackable silicon nanowires.

According to IBM, the new 5nm tech offers a 40 percent performance boost at the same power, or a 75 percent drop in power consumption at the same performance. Density is also significantly improved: IBM states that it can now fit up to 30 billion transistors onto a chip 50-square-millimeters across about the size of a fingernail. In the past, a similarly sized chip would hold 20 billion transistors at most.

As this technology continues to shrink, we will be able to fit more of it into less space. This will mean computers and other devices can becomemore powerful,but at the same time smaller and more portable. IBM is already on the job, having pointed out that GAAFETs are ripe for scaling down even further.

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IBM Created a Chip the Size of a Fingernail That Holds 30 Billion Transistors - Futurism

In Brief Elon Musk's SpaceX successfully launched its Dragon spacecraft on its second mission to the International Space Station. The launch further solidifies SpaceX's goal to make space travel cheaper and more accessible. History in the Making

SpaceX is wasting no time on their mission to reinvent and revitalize space travel. The company has once again made history by successfully launching the previously-flown Dragon Cargo ship.The crafts first mission, back in September 21, 2014, successfully delivered 2.5 tons of cargo to the International Space Station.

According to CBSNews, for todays launch,the craft was filled with nearly 6,000 pounds of cargo including supplies, equipment, special telescopes to study neutron stars, mice, and even thousands of fruit flies.The craft launched from the historic Kennedy Space Centers launch pad 39A, the same pad from which the Apollo 11 mission launched in 1969.

The craft was successfully launched today, June 3rd at 5:07 PM EDT. Falcon 9 has just touched back down at the time of publishing and Dragon is well on its way in itstwo and a half day journey to the ISS.

TheDragon spacecraft now joins a prestigiousgroup of multi-orbit space flight craft like NASAs Atlantis, Challenger, Columbia, Discovery, and Endeavour firmly planting SpaceX as a formidable force in the new space race.

This is just the latest move by SpaceX that is poised to completelytransform spaceflight. In March, the company made history by successfully launching and landing a recycled rocket for the first time. The relaunch of the Dragon has proven that SpaceX can continue to make missions to space cheaper, and therefore, more accessible.

SpaceXs plans dont just stop at restocking the ISS. The company has much bigger plans involving putting people back on the moon next year and sending the first humans to Mars by 2025. While SpaceX is no doubt celebrating this latest achievement, they are hard at work preparing their next feat: launching theFalcon Heavy rocket this summer.

The SpaceX team is truly revolutionizing space travel for the betterment of all of humanity. Witha clear goal to make history and push the boundaries of whats possible on Earth and in space, SpaceX is rapidly cementing its legacy while becoming a forerunner in the race toward the future.

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The Launch was Successful. SpaceX Just Made History. - Futurism

In Brief Spintronic researchers have found a material that possesses the exact properties that are needed for the data storage and transferal process to work. This could lead to more efficient technology. A Miracle Material for Spintronics

A team lead by the University of Utah has discovered a new group of materials called organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites that could bring spintronics from a largely conceptual concept into reality. Spintronics aims to use the magnetic properties of electrons rather then their ability to conduct electricity to store and transmit information. Instead of using the ebb and flow of electrical current (charge, recorded using ones and zeros) through thousands of electrons, spintronics uses the up or down orientation of far fewer electrons.

The problem spintronics has encountered is that a material could not be found that could have its spin changed easily and retain the change in spin.Sarah Li, assistant professor of the Department of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Utah and lead author of the study, told Newswise thatwhat makes this discovery special is that the material can be manipulated and, at the same time, have a long spin lifetime.

The electrons in perovskites can be changed many times within a nanosecond, meaning they can have lots of information imparted and altered in them. This was surprising, as perovskites are a heavy metal, which usually has good spin alterability, but a bad spin lifetime.

Spintronic materials can be used to process much more information than classical materials that use charge because they can operate more reliably on a smaller scale. Although Moores Law states that transistors (whichcontrol the current) per square inch in integrated circuits approximately double every year, we are currently approaching the limit.Li says, The silicon technology, based only on the electron charge, is reaching its size-limit. The size of the wire is already small. If gets any smaller, its not going to work in a classical way that you think of.

Spintronics could, therefore, allow data to be processed faster and increase random-access memory (RAM, which allows you access the specific pieces of information you want on computers and phones). This would have the effect of increasing the efficiency, speed, and memory capacity of nearly all computational devices, which would use less power and increase battery life. Finally, materials that spintronics usedont emit an external magnetic field, even though they use magnetism on an atomic level; this means that they do not interfere with other devices and should make it harder for them to be spied on.

If mass production is possible, spintronics could mark the end of the silicon transistor age.

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This Could Mark the End of the Silicon Age - Futurism

In Brief Nerdalize has developed a system that uses the heat produced by data servers to warm water in households in Holland. Not only does it help homeowners and companies in need of data storage save money, it also reduces CO2 emissions. Rethinking Data Storage

Nerdalize, a Dutch startup, has found a practical use for the huge amount of energy wasted in the cloud storage sector. Theyre installing cloud servers in households and using the heat to warm water.

According to the companys website, Combined, data centers use up more electricity than India and generate more CO2 emissions than the airline industry. A significant proportion of this electricity is used to cool servers, so rather than attempt to negate this heat, Nerdalize decided to develop a beneficial way to use it to heat water is peoples homes.

Through this system,Nerdalize will make a profit by selling data space; homeowners will save an estimated 300 ($337) a year in heating costs; and companies will save 50 percent on their data storage expenses. Beyond the financial benefit, the system also reduces the carbon emissionsof each house by up to three tons.

While some logistical aspects of the system may prove trickier than others such as maintaining the security of the servers and fixing them when they break the idea has proven wildly popular. A second pilot trial will start in 42 homes in August, and the companysSymbid crowdfunding campaignfar exceeded its target with weeks to spare.

The tech elite have pioneered a number of high-profile systemsto combat climate change, from Elon Musks electric cars and solar panel roofsto Bill Gates Breakthrough Energy Ventures. However, thetech world also has a whacky and innovative underbelly of which Nerdalize is a good example.

Students and startups, researchers and renegades are coming up with wonderful ideas. NET Power, formed by a retired chemist, a lawyer, and a chemical engineer, hasfound a way touse C02 emissions to produce energy,students from the Universit Laval have developed a car that gets 2,713 miles to the gallon, and the creators of theMashambas Skyscraper plan to use it to grow food tens of stories above the ground.

We clearlyneed a green energy revolution, and the only way to get there is to incorporate as many revolutionary ideas as possible. The innovative concepts proposed by companies like Nerdalize are vital for the future of our planet.

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A New Trial Is Using Data Servers to Heat Homeowners' Water Supplies - Futurism

In BriefThe world's first commercial carbon capture plant is nowonline in Switzerland. Its operators emphasize that both carboncapture systems and a low-carbon economy are essential to meetingclimate change goals. The CO2 Collector

Yesterday, the worlds first commercial carbon capture plant began sucking carbon dioxide (CO2) out of the air around it. Perched atop a Zurich waste incineration facility, the Climeworks carbon capture plant comprisesthree stacked shipping containersthat hold six CO2 collectors each. Spongey filters absorb CO2 as fans pull air through the collectors until they are fully saturated, a process that takes about two or three hours.

The container then closes, and the process reverses. The collector is heated to 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit), and the pure CO2 is released in a form that can be buried underground, made into other products, or sold.

According to Climeworks, the startup that createdthis carbon capture facility, hundreds of thousands more like it will be needed by midcentury if we want to remain below the limits set by the Paris Agreement. However, to keep the planets temperature from increasing bymore than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit), well need to do something more than simply lowering global emissions.

We really only have less than 20 years left at current emission rates to have a good chance of limiting emissions to less than 2C, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment director Chris Field told Fast Company. So its a big challenge to do it simply by decreasing emissions from energy, transportation, and agriculture.

Other innovative efforts to reduce global CO2 levels are already underway all over the world. Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), have found a way to turn captured carbon into concrete for building, while scientists from Rice University have found that doping graphene with nitrogen allows it to convert CO2 into environmentally useful fuels. If enacted, various proposals to preserve wetlands, old growth forests, and other areas could alsoreduce CO2 levels.

Climeworks plant is particularly appealing because it can be used repeatedly, produces something commercially useful, and is about 1,000 times more efficient at CO2 removal than photosynthesis.

You can do this over and over again, Climeworks director Jan Wurzbacher told Fast Company. Its a cyclic process. You saturate with CO2, then you regenerate, saturate, regenerate. You have multiple of these units, and not all of them go in parallel. Some are taking in CO2, some are releasing CO2.

Even so, Field emphasizes that the possibility of carbon capture should not be seen as a license to emit more CO2. We need to combine the technology with a low-carbon economy to ensure our planets survival. Its not either/or, according to Field. Its both.

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A Plant 1000 Times More Efficient at CO2 Removal Than Photosynthesis Is Now Active - Futurism