Flooding is common in informal settlements in Bwaise, a neighbourhood in the Ugandan capital Kampala. Bwaise’s residents are largely excluded from planning and local decision-making processes, and have poor housing and limited access to sanitation and other essential services.
How to robotically build a human habitat in space…
Happening now.
Accelerate the accessibility and commercialization of cislunar space through cost-effective, habitable, scalable Infrastructure.
A talk with Sebastian Asprella CEO at ThinkOrbital: a commercial space-platform developer with a mission to accelerate the commercialization of cislunar space, focusing on On-orbit servicing, assembly and manufacturing technologies. Their flagship space-platform, the Orb2, is designed for a single-launch on-orbit assembly model, capable of delivering an internal spherical volume of up to 4000m3.
There’s a gap on the electromagnetic spectrum where engineers can not tread.
The spectrum covers everything from radio waves and microwaves, to the light that reaches our eyes, to X-rays and gamma rays. And humans have mastered the art of sending and receiving almost all of them.
There is an exception, however. Between the beams of visible light and the blips of radio static, there lies a dead zone where our technology isn’t effective. It’s called the terahertz gap. For decades now, no one’s succeeded in building a consumer device that can transmit terahertz waves.
In the far infrared band of the electromagnetic spectrum, engineers are exploring the terahertz gap, which could lead to a wave of faster, more sensitive technologies.
Devastating residential blazes and wildfires take a terrible toll in terms of deaths and injuries, as well as property loss. Today, researchers will report on a new type of coating that could limit the flammability of wood used in construction, potentially providing more time to escape fires and also curbing their spread. The environmentally friendly flame retardant could also be used for other flammable materials, such as textiles, polyurethane foam and 3D-printed parts.
The researchers will present their results today at the spring meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS).
Home fires account for the majority of fire deaths and lead to billions of dollars in property damage every year, according to the National Fire Protection Association. Adding fire sprinklers and smoke detectors can help, but another approach is to make construction materials less flammable. That’s the goal of Thomas Kolibaba, Ph.D., who is developing a new coating for these materials. “This type of treatment, which could be deposited via dipping, spraying or pressure treatment, could make homes much safer,” he says. “The coating could reduce flame spread and smoke production, which could limit damage and give people more time to evacuate.” Unlike most current fire retardant treatments, its ingredients are environmentally benign, and it might also cost less, notes Jaime Grunlan, Ph.D., the project’s principal investigator.
San Francisco firm Aidlin Darling Design has completed a low-slung home in California’s Palm Desert that is intended to contrast the boulders and trees found in its remote setting.
The three-bedroom family home is located on a rocky plateau in the arid landscape, with views of the Coachella Valley and San Jacinto Mountain Range.
This elevated vantage led to the name High Desert Retreat for the project, which earned a 2021 AIA Design Award in the interiors category.
The classic arcade game Cyclone has attracted many players, along with their coins, thanks to its simple yet addictive gameplay. In its most basic form it consists of a light racing around a circular track, which the player then has to stop at exactly the right place. Arduino enthusiast [mircemk] made a home version of this game, which allows addicts to keep playing forever without running out of quarters.
Instead of an arcade cabinet, this smaller version has an upright 3D-printed ring that holds 60 WS2812 LEDs. A further six in the center of the ring act as a score counter. An Arduino in the base drives the LEDs and runs the game, which is based on an earlier iteration built by [oKeeg]. An interesting addition is a large homemade “arcade button”, which is large and sturdy enough to withstand any abuse inflicted on it by a frustrated player.
Retro-style sound effects and flashing light sequences give the game a bit of an arcade vibe, even without a big cabinet and piles of coins. Simple LED games like this are always great eye-catchers in any home or office; if you like this one, be sure to check out other LED games like the handheld LEDBOY, the one-dimensional dungeon crawler TWANG, and this LED racing game.
The aluminium-clad studio is located on the grounds of studio founder Eric Reinholdt’s home on Mount Desert Island, off the coast of New England.
30X40 Design Workshop created the simple gabled structure as both a place to work and a practical demonstration of the office’s approach to architecture.
Archaeologists have found an ancient lead sarcophagus under Notre Dame cathedral along with fragments of a rood screen, offering a new insight into the history of the building which is currently under reconstruction after a devastating fire in 2019.
Spain houses just over a third or 35% of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage capacity in the EU and the UK, according to data from Gas Infrastructure Europe (GIP), the association of European gas infrastructure operators, comprising 67 companies from 26 countries. [INSAGO / Shutterstock].
