In a cavernous arena outside of Peoria, Illinois, two industrial robots worked against the clock last weekend to finish their tasks. Each had been converted into a towering 3-D printer and programmed to build one-third-scale models of extraterrestrial habitats. For 30 hours over three days, generators chugged and hydraulics hissed as robotic arms moved in […]
At 4:18 a.m. Eastern time on 25 April, according to preliminary observations, a gravitational wave that had been traveling through deep space for many millions of years passed through the Earth. Like a patient spider sensitive to every jiggle in its web, a laser gravitational wave detector in the United States detected this subtle passing […]
Photo: LinkSpace Countdown to Launch: Four space launch companies in China aim to demonstrate their systems in the next two years. In the early years of rocketry at Caltech, there was no figure more influential than the Chinese cyberneticist Qian Xuesen. Then, in 1955, the United States repatriated him to China, suspecting him of being […]
Illustration: NASA Over the past six decades, 12 people have walked on the moon, spacecraft have visited every planet from Mercury to Neptune, and four rovers have racked up more than 60 kilometers traveling on the surface of Mars. And yet, despite the billions of dollars spent on the world’s civilian space programs, never has […]
.article-detail aside.inlay.xlrg { margin-top: 26px; font-size: 18px; line-height: 24px; padding: 20px; } The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not represent positions of IEEE Spectrum or the IEEE. Photo: Jemal Countess/Getty Images This is part of the wreckage of Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET302, a Boeing 737 Max airliner that crashed […]
Several companies are developing helicopters that could replace the U.S. Army’s aging Black Hawk fleet in the coming decades. One of those futuristic aircrafts, Sikorsky-Boeing’s Defiant, took its first test flight two weeks ago. The Defiant is based on Sikorsky’s experimental X2 technology, which holds the record for being the fastest helicopter technology in the world. […]
You might think that being handed a whopping US $900,000 fine by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for surreptitiously launching four illegal satellites would scare off potential partners. Not in Silicon Valley, where wrestling with regulators is more of a badge of honor than a mark of shame. Automotive giant Ford, wireless multinational company Vodafone, Stanford University, […]
Video: D.J. Preston, P. Rothemund, H.J. Jiang, M.P. Nemitz, J. Rawson, Z. Suo, and G.M. Whiteside A human-operated, completely soft gripper reacts to the push of a soft button. This robot can pick up a variety of oddly-shaped or fragile objects, even after being struck by a mallet. A team of scientists at Harvard University […]
Laser pointer pens, easily bought for US $10, can be a hazard in the wrong hands. Aiming a laser pointer at airplanes, a federal crime in the United States, is a growing problem worldwide. The focused beam from a 5-milliwatt laser might produce a tiny green dot to highlight your presentation or entertain your cat, but it expands […]
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