Hendo has a kickstarter for a magnetic hoverboard that can glide over conductive surfaces and you can have one for $10,000. While their hoverboard is primarily intended to be self-propelled, the actions which stabilize it can also be used to drive it forward by altering the projected force on the surface below. Currently, this surface …
The Navy is about to take a big step for military-kind; this summer they will add the first ship-mounted laser to their fleet. The USS Ponce will be equipped with a laser weapon. When it puts to sea this summer, the afloat forward staging base ship USS Ponce will be equipped with the Navy’s Laser …
South China Morning Post reports that Beijing-based State Nuclear plans to start construction of the first CAP1400 demonstration reactor in Shidaowan, Shandong province, this year and commission it in late 2018, according to Xinhua. The schedule is about a year behind the original target as Beijing suspended new projects for about 18 months to review …
CBS has the script from “The Cleantech Crash” which aired on Jan. 5, 2014. Lesley Stahl is the correspondent. Shachar Bar-On, producer. Silicon Valley got Washington excited about it. President Bush was an early supporter, but the federal purse strings truly loosened under President Obama. Hoping to create innovation and jobs, he committed north of …
In the past 30 years, China has suffered from air pollution and heavy haze created by fast industrial growth and economic expansion. An Environmental Chemistry Letter research journal article reviews the techniques for remediation of air pollution. A geoengineering method is proposed for mitigating air pollution and haze in China’s cities by using water to …
1. Universe Today – This was very likely the last trip around the Sun for the Earth-crossing asteroid 2014 AA, according to calculations by several teams of astronomers and published online earlier today on the IAU’s Minor Planet Center. Discovered just yesterday by the Catalina Sky Survey, the estimated 3-meter-wide Apollo asteroid was supposed to …
The latest monthly update of estimated crude oil production in the Bakken region of North Dakota and Montana shows total wellhead output topping 1 million barrels of oil per day (bbl/d) in December, 2013. The update appears in the most recent issue of the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Drilling Productivity Report (DPR). The Bakken region …
Young animals are known to repair their tissues effortlessly, but can this capacity be recaptured in adults? A new study from researchers at the Stem Cell Program at Boston Children’s Hospital suggests that it can. By reactivating a dormant gene called Lin28a, which is active in embryonic stem cells, researchers were able to regrow hair …
I have promoted this article with Asteroid size danger from regular contributor Goat Guy. There certainly have been a lot of detection events in the military surveillance satellite record, both public and secret. I’m not terribly surprised at the 1 in 15 years for “megaton class” impactors: ⅘ of the world is ocean, far from …
On October 18th it announced an agreement in principle between Canada and the European Union on a Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). More than a blessing for insomniacs, CETA is a prototype for bigger things to come, especially the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) now under negotiation between the EU and the United …
Some coal is high in fluorine and also has iron pyrite. The combination is deadly – when burned it make hydrofluoric acid. (H/T Chris Phoenix Excess fluorine consumption can often cause dental fluorinosis, a condition in which excess fluorine is deposited in the teeth, discoloring them. In more severe cases, fluorine deposition in the bones …