Lifeboat Foundation

In San Francisco, where two major companies are testing driverless taxis, some local officials are reporting that the vehicles have caused a number of issues, including rolling into fire scenes and running over hoses. NBC News’ Jake Ward reports.

» Subscribe to NBC News: http://nbcnews.to/SubscribeToNBC
» Watch more NBC video: http://bit.ly/MoreNBCNews.

Continue reading “Driverless cars creating traffic jams in San Francisco” »

Scientists from Jilin University, the Center for High Pressure Science and Technology Advanced Research, and Skoltech have synthesized lanthanum-cerium polyhydride, a material that promises to facilitate studies of near-room-temperature superconductivity. It offers a compromise between the polyhydrides of lanthanum and cerium in terms of how much cooling and pressure it requires. This enables easier experiments, which might one day lead scientists to compounds that conduct electricity with zero resistance at ambient conditions—an engineering dream many years in the making. The study was published in Nature Communications.

One of the most intriguing unsolved questions in modern physics is: Can we make a material that conducts electricity with zero resistance (superconducts) at room temperature and atmospheric pressure? Such a superconductor would enable power grids with unprecedented efficiency, ultrafast microchips, and electromagnets so powerful they could levitate trains or control fusion reactors.

In their search, scientists are probing multiple classes of materials, slowly nudging up the temperature they superconduct at and decreasing the pressure they require to remain stable. One such group of materials is polyhydrides—compounds with extremely high hydrogen content. At −23°C, the current champion for high-temperature superconductivity is a lanthanum polyhydride with the formula LaH₁₀. The trade-off: It requires the pressure of 1.5 million atmospheres. At the opposite end of the spectrum, cuprates are a class of materials that superconduct under normal atmospheric pressure but require cooler temperatures —no more than −140°.

The reborn marque’s second model might not be an EV, either.

The team takes AI personalization to a whole new level.

Researchers at the School of Engineering at Princeton University have successfully deployed a large language model (LLM) to help a robotic manipulator make sense of instructions to tidy up a room.

Continue reading “Princeton researchers help a bot tidy up using large language model” »

David Risher also told CNN the company wants to make travel less stressful, and he doesn’t think Uber and Lyft need to destroy each other to succeed.

In the 1930s the Dust Bowl decimated the U.S. Midwest. Are current conditions pointing to a reoccurrence in the 21st century?

A dust storm between St. Louis and Chicago led to a 72-vehicle pileup and 7 deaths recently. Conditions are ripe for more of the same.

Elon Musk broke ground on a facility that’s unique among U.S. automakers.

Elon Musk has been pretty open about the idea of using social media platforms like Twitter to communicate directly with customers. Tesla highlighted this in its 2022 Impact Report, with the company noting that its social media accounts have helped it reach 1 billion views on Twitter last year.

With Twitter now being owned by Elon Musk, it is no surprise that his companies like Tesla are now more active on the platform. And in a recent post, the official Tesla account asked Twitter users what it could improve. The EV community, from fans to longtime owners, responded, to a great degree. As of writing, Tesla’s post has attracted over 22k comments.

A look at the comments on Tesla’s post would show that there are numerous calls for better service. Service has been Tesla’s Achilles heel for some time now, and with the company adopting a “best service is no service” stance, some owners have reported experiencing difficulties contacting Tesla for issues with their vehicles. Comments on Tesla’s post suggest that customer service is still a key point of improvement for the company.

AI is poised as a way to address many of the hazardous elements of manufacturing workplaces. The technology can help limit employees’ exposure to loud environments, unwieldy machinery and dangerous tasks by streamlining processes and helping workers focus on less physically risky activities.

In manufacturing, many of AI’s potential benefits are concentrated in replacing the cause of the most common workplace injuries. These include “musculoskeletal disorders, mainly from overexertion in lifting and lowering, and being struck by powered industrial trucks and other materials handling equipment,” according to an OSHA spokesperson.

There are several ways to reduce those points of risk, with the most dangerous manufacturing tasks standing to benefit the most.