Cycling to where you need to be with some electric motor assist is proving popular among commuters, but not everyone appreciates the bulked out look common to many ebikes. Estonia’s Ampler Bikes has just announced two lightweight city rides that have the stealthy look of non-electric bikes. Ampler says that it’s essentially gone back to the drawing board and started […]
Ampler Bikes
Infrared Embed “Invisible Info” Within 3D Printed Objects
Barcode stickers may provide valuable information on products, but they’re rather unsightly, and they peel off over time. An experimental new alternative, however, is 3D-printed right into the item, and is invisible to the naked eye. Known as InfraredTags, the technology is being developed by an MIT team led by PhD student Mustafa Doga Dogan. He got the idea when […]
Porous Battery Layer Could Make Once A Week EV Charging Become Reality
Lithium-sulfur batteries are a hugely promising energy storage solution with the type of density that could see smartphones run for five days, and scientists continue to make exciting advances that bring them closer to commercial reality. The latest comes from researchers at Australia’s Monash University, who have developed a novel layer component that shapes as a critical piece of the […]
Adaptalux Lights Up Macro Photography
UK-based Adaptalux hit Kickstarter in 2015 with a modular lighting system aimed at macro photographers that featured bendy LED arms for creative lighting opportunities. Fueled by success, the development team returned four years later with Xenon flash arms for the system, and now the newly redesigned flash arms are available to buy. Like many tech solutions, the Adaptalux system was born of frustration. A […]
China Plans For Mammoth Energy In the Deserts
China already dominates renewable energy production. Its installed capacity of around 895 GW in 2020 was more than the European Union, the USA and Australia combined. And while the world in general is accelerating its transition to renewable power, China is growing its capacity faster than anyone else as well. Now, according to Reuters, it’s got a series of mammoth solar and wind projects […]
Evolution UA-80 Life Vest
When most people think of life vests, they likely picture yokes that are worn around the user’s neck. Switlik Survival Products’ new UA-80 Evolution Vest takes what is claimed to be a better approach, however, by going under the arms. Reportedly the first FAA (Federal Aviation Administration)-approved device of its kind, the UA-80 is designed for constant-wear use by professional […]
LED Contact Lens May Prevent Diabetes
If diabetes progresses too far, it can result in a potentially blinding condition known as retinopathy. And while existing treatments are invasive and often painful, there may be new hope in the form of an LED-equipped contact lens. Diabetic retinopathy occurs when the disease damages tiny blood vessels in the eye, reducing blood flow to nerve cells in the retina, […]
Casual Link Between Blood Type & Genetics
Very early in the pandemic doctors began tracking the association between COVID-19 disease severity and a patient’s blood type. Now researchers have validated those early observations, finding several blood proteins are causally linked to an increased risk of hospitalization and death from COVID-19. Some of the earliest observational studies to come out of Wuhan in 2020 pointed to a correlation between a […]
Artificial Muscles
Researchers have developed a new type of artificial muscle that’s entirely made out of natural proteins. Responding to changes in its environment allows the muscle to flex on demand, which could make it useful for implants, prosthetics or robotics. As promising a technology as artificial muscles have been, most of the time they’re still a bit too artificial, often made […]
Hydroelectric Tech
While hydroelectric dams are capable of generating a lot of electricity, they drastically disrupt the environment. Scientists have now proposed a simpler but still effective alternative, in which electric trucks replace such dams. In a typical hydroelectric facility, a dam is built across a river, causing a reservoir to form directly upstream of that dam. When a gate in the dam is […]