New type of electrolyte
A new type of electrolyte could enhance supercapacitor performance. Supercapacitors, electrical devices that store and release energy, need a layer of electrolyte — an electrically conductive material that can be solid, liquid, or somewhere in between. Now, researchers at MIT and several other institutions have developed a novel class of liquids that may open up…
Master plan of the universe revealed in new galaxy maps
Pretty cool stuff…and hard to get your head around. after more than three decades of work, he and his collaborators released the latest fruits of this labor: the most complete view ever created of our place in space…In the renderings, our Milky Way galaxy is a tiny speck in the midst of other galaxies and…
Enforcement of Endangered Species Act to be weakened
Clean Water Act, Endangered Species Act…smh The Trump administration is finalizing major changes Monday to the way it enforces the landmark Endangered Species Act, in a move that it says will reduce regulatory burdens but critics charge will drive more creatures to extinction. For more, check out this USA Today story. UPDATE: I see where…
Intel Debuts Visual Identifier for Project Athena
Now there is a new identifier for mobile performance. Intel announced that laptops verified through its innovation program, code-named “Project Athena,” will feature the visual identifier “Engineered for Mobile Performance.” PC manufacturers and retailers can use the identifier across promotional activities and in-store and online retail environments to draw consumers to the laptops that meet…
Clean Water case ferments trouble for craft breweries
Sigh…craft brewers are worried that an EPA rule change could dismantle the Clean Water Act, undermining water systems across the United States — as well as their beer. Sixty craft breweries from across the country filed a brief in July in support of environmental advocates who are fighting the deregulation attempt in a case before…
Milky Way is ‘shaped like a Pringle’
New research shows our home galaxy is warped and twisted. A new study of the Milky Way shows that our home galaxy is significantly warped. Instead of forming a relatively flat disk, the hundreds of billions of stars that make up the Milky Way form a disk that’s noticeably twisted at the edges, a bit…
NASA just received a major data dump from Sun mission
The success of the Parker Solar Probe will ultimately depend on the data it sends back. The good news is that the probe’s communication system is performing well, and actually exceeding the expectations set during pre-launch testing. Because of that, the probe has managed to transfer a whopping 22 GB worth of data from its…
How to delete Siri, Alexa and Google recordings
It should come as no surprise, but Voice assistants are listening to you. USA Today tells you how to delete those recordings. Amazon and Google came under fire earlier this year for similar reasons when it was discovered workers were listening to the recordings the Echo and Google Assistant collected. Although smart speakers are only supposed to…
Mysterious release of radioactive material uncovered
Radiation leaks are never a good thing, no matter how small they may be. It was the most serious release of radioactive material since Fukushima 2011, but the public took little notice of it: In September 2017, a slightly radioactive cloud moved across Europe. Now, a study has been published, analyzing more than 1300 measurements…
A ‘super-Earth’ discovered just 31 light-years away
A potentially habitable ‘super-Earth’ has been discovered just 31 light-years away from our solar system, astronomers announced Wednesday. The planet, named GJ 357 d, is about six times larger than Earth and orbits a dwarf sun GJ 357, much smaller than our own, every 55.7 days. The international team of astronomers that discovered the planet…