LONG BEACH, California (Reuters) — JetPack Aviation took to the skies above the port of Long Beach, California to demonstrate their latest portable, turbine-powered backpack. According to the Los Angeles area company, the JB-10 is the smallest and lightest jetpack ever created. It can fly for around 10 minutes at altitudes over 6,500 feet (1981 meters) and speeds greater than 65 mph (104 kph). Those figures were unimaginable even ten years ago, the company’s CEO […]
Life
Future buildings could grow their own foundations
NEWCASTLE, England (Reuters) — What do you get if you put an architect, civil engineer, computer scientist, and microbiologist into a room? A future building that grows its own foundations. This might sound like a less than funny joke. In fact, it’s the result of a unique project launched by researchers at the universities of Newcastle and Northumbria, in England, to create a new generation of building materials that are partly living and able to […]
Solar panels repay their energy ‘debt’: study
by Mariëtte Le Roux PARIS, France (AFP) — The climate-friendly electricity generated by solar panels in the past 40 years has all but cancelled out the polluting energy used to produce them, a study said Tuesday. Indeed, by some calculations, the so-called “break-even point” between dirty energy input and clean output may already have arrived, researchers in the Netherlands reported. “We show strong downward trends of environmental impact” of solar panel production, the team wrote […]
Polar bear numbers to plunge a third as sea ice melts: study
by Marlowe HOOD PARIS, France ( AFP ) – Polar bear numbers could drop a third by mid-century, according to the first systematic assessment, released Wednesday, of how dwindling Arctic sea ice affects the world’s largest bear. There is a 70 percent chance that the global polar bear population –- estimated at 26,000 -– will decline by more than 30 percent over the next 35 years, a period corresponding to three generations, the study found. Other assessments have […]
Earth’s days getting longer, slower: study
PARIS, France (AFP) — Earth’s days are getting longer but you’re not likely to notice any time soon — it would take about 6.7 million years to gain just one minute, according to a study published on Wednesday. Over the past 27 centuries, the average day has lengthened at a rate of about +1.8 milliseconds (ms) per century, a British research team concluded in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A. This was “significantly […]
High-jumping robot could aid in earthquakes, building collapses
by Kerry SHERIDAN MIAMI, United States (AFP) — An agile jumping robot that was inspired by some of the animal world’s best leapers could one day help in rescue efforts after earthquakes or building collapses, US scientists said Tuesday. Known as Salto, the 10-inch (26-centimeter) tall robot can jump higher than a bullfrog and almost as high as a galago, or bush baby, a small primate found in Africa. The robot can jump one yard (one meter) […]
Tourist numbers in Iceland on the up
An island of ice and lava battered by the Arctic winds, Iceland’s dramatic and pristine landscape is attracting a growing number of tourists, not all of whom are respectful of the fragile ecosystem. https://youtu.be/JK3a3_UQGsk
How artificial hearts work
Artificial hearts operate like a natural human heart. They are made of soft “biomaterials” intended to lessen the risk of blood clots or rejection by the immune system and are powered by a belt of lithium batteries.
Canada caribou and monarch butterfly “endangered”: experts
OTTAWO, Canada (AFP) — Canada’s caribou population has reached “all-time low” levels, particularly in the eastern Arctic, where the animal was classified as endangered Monday along with the monarch butterfly, according to a committee of scientific experts. “Caribou are, sadly, very sensitive to human disturbances, and we are disturbing caribou more and more,” Justina Ray said in a report by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (Cosewic). “These stressors seem to be […]
Paradise lost: How toxic water destroyed Pakistan’s largest lake
by Caroline Nelly PERROT MANCHAR LAKE, Pakistan (AFP) — For generations the Mohanna tribe have lived, loved, worked, and played on Pakistan’s Manchar Lake; their floating settlement serving their needs from birth to death. But an unrelenting flow of toxic wastewater is pouring into the lake — a byproduct of industrialisation and aggressive agricultural practices upstream — and has slowly rendered it inhospitable, poisoning the water and almost everything in it. For fishermen such as Mohammed […]
Carbon neutral city (videographics)
Welcome to Carbon Neutral City! This urban development — with its own smart grid — runs entirely on locally-produced, clean energy. Here, wind parks, solar panels and biogas plants powered by cattle manure and vegetable waste, are the norm. https://youtu.be/xTMjZ3KvpZU MARIAN HENBEST FRED. GARET / AFP VIDEOGRAPHICS / AFP
Buzz Aldrin recovering after polar evacuation, can’t go home
Retired US astronaut and the second man to walk on the moon, Buzz Aldrin, was recovering after his medical evacuation from Antarctica but is not yet able to return home, his manager Christina Korp said Sunday. “He still has some congestion in his lungs so has been advised not to take the long flight home to the States and to rest in New Zealand while it clears up,” Korp said in a statement. Aldrin, 86, […]