• The 2022 Summer STEM Challenge

    The famous Tesla electric car company takes its brand name from the wacky but hugely inventive Nikola Tesla. Beginning in Victorian times, Tesla discovered and invented a tonne of stuff like the AC electricity system we use today, radio, radio control and – what we are interested in here – the ability of rotating smooth discs to produce a jet of liquid.   Normally a paddle steamer is propelled by one or two huge wheels with their lower rim in the water. The wheels have blades on them which push the water backwards. But amazingly, you don’t have to put blades on the wheels to make them ‘grip’ the water. You can use a plain smooth disc and rely on the ‘grip’ of viscosity. Image credit: E&T As a wheel spins in water, it will pull along a thin layer of water next to…

  • Book review: ‘British Rail: A New History’ by Christian Wolmar

    In the overall history of the railways, the life of the unified state-owned entity that became known as British Rail (BR) was relatively short – less than 50 years in total. But the wheel turns full circle and the ensuing decades of privatisation, fragmentation, consolidation and economic crises have brought the core business back into the government’s hands, so the publication of Christian Wolmar’s latest book is timely, offering a chance to review the lessons of the past. Wolmar is an established and well-respected journalist and author on railway topics, so ‘British Rail – A New History’ (Michael Joseph, £30, ISBN 9780241456200) is based on sound knowledge with the added advantage of being easy to read. When the newly nationalised industry came into being at the start of 1948 it was…

  • Japan plans artificial gravity buildings for Mars and the Moon

    Researchers from Kyoto University and Kajima Corporation have proposed constructing artificial-gravity buildings to enable human settlements on Mars and the Moon.  The design of the facilities features huge rotating structures that would create the effect of Earth-like gravity through centripetal force. The proposals  follow a study published earlier this month which found astronauts suffered significant bone loss, while in low-gravity environments. A year after returning to Earth, the astronauts in the study had only recovered half of the bone loss, raising concerns about the health risks humans would face when travelling to other planets.  To solve this problem, the researchers have proposed building a living facility on the Moon called Lunar Glass. The cylindrical architecture is 100…

  • Is your business ready for the inevitable impact of quantum computing?

    Quantum computing continues to dominate the emerging technology news agenda. A series of big moves have been made in the field in the UK recently, including the Ministry of Defence’s purchase of the first government-owned quantum computer and the prediction by Kwasi Kwarteng, secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy, speaking at the 'Quantum Computing Summit' in London recently, that national investment in quantum technologies is set to surpass £1bn by 2024. Quantum computers (QCs) harness the peculiar behaviour of atomic and subatomic particles to execute certain types of algorithms faster and more efficiently than the most powerful conventional supercomputers available today. Although a fault-tolerant and commercially viable QC is yet to be built, it’s clear the momentum…

  • First James Webb Space Telescope image shows ‘deepest’ view of the universe

    US President Joe Biden has unveiled the first picture taken by Nasa's James Webb telescope (JWST), the most detailed glimpse of the universe ever seen.  Known as 'Webb’s First Deep Field', the picture showcases a galaxy cluster called SMACS 0723 as it appeared 4.6 billion years ago. It is the first of several pictures scheduled to be released over the next few days.  When unveiling the picture, Biden called the moment “historic” and said it provided “a new window into the history of our universe”. The image was taken by Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) and is a composite made from images at different wavelengths, some of them invisible to the human eye. The image is the farthest humanity has ever seen, in terms of both time and distance, with part of Webb's First Deep Field showing…

  • UK bins 100bn pieces of plastic annually amid calls to ban waste exports

    With the UK estimated to produce the second-largest amount of plastic waste per capita, Greenpeace and Everyday Plastic have launched 'The Big Plastic Count', an investigation to get to grips with the scale of plastic use in the UK. The survey took place for one week in May 2022, with participants recording how much plastic packaging, and of what type, they threw in the bin or put in the recycling. Some 248,957 people from 97,948 households across the UK took part in the count including 9,427 school students and 36 MPs. The results were then submitted for analysis.  On average, each household threw away 66 pieces of plastic packaging in one week, amounting to an estimated 3,432 pieces a year. If the totals for count week are assumed to be typical, this indicates that UK households are…

  • The new space economy is ready for lift-off

    Few things expedite innovation faster than competing billionaires with elastic budgets and a steely determination to make history. This has certainly proved true for the modern-age space race.  Billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX in 2020 was the first private company to send humans into orbit. Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin journeyed to zero gravity not long after. Their endeavours have pushed down costs and ushered in a new era of space activity. The cosmos is now more accessible than ever.   Since 1957 around 10,000 objects have been launched into space; 30 per cent of these were in the last six years alone. This coincided with a spike in annual investment from below a billion dollars a year to $7.6bn (£5.8bn) in 2020, according to BryceTech, a space-focused engineering…

  • Frequent gamers 'have enhanced brain activity and decision making skills'

    A project used functional magnetic resonance imaging (FMRI) to study the brains of 47 college-age participants, of whom 28 were categorised as regular video game players and 19 as non-players. “Video games are played by the overwhelming majority of our youth more than three hours every week, but the beneficial effects on decision-making abilities and the brain are not exactly known,” said lead researcher Mukesh Dhamala. “Our work provides some answers on that. Video game playing can effectively be used for training — for example, decision-making efficiency training and therapeutic interventions — once the relevant brain networks are identified.” The subjects lay inside an FMRI machine with a mirror that allowed them to see a cue immediately followed by a display of moving dots. Participants…

  • Is plant-based fuel the recipe for success for athletes?

    Of course, the energy athletes need depends on their body, performance goals and training regime, which means that energy intake differs between sports. However, more athletes are extolling the virtues of plant-based eating, and researchers want to know whether they perform better because of their vegan diets, but this is hard to prove. A number of studies suggest that plant-based diets can help people lose weight and become leaner while improving stamina, but most of their findings have been in average people – not professional athletes. Andrew Shepherd, performance nutrition lead at Loughborough University, says: “At this stage there isn’t a strong evidence base for a vegan diet being healthier than an omnivorous diet.” However, as more athletes successfully swap meat for plants, the…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • UK homes receive traceable renewable energy through P2P exchange

    Households across the UK have been the first to sign up as part of a new peer-to-peer (P2P) energy exchange programme to receive traceable renewable energy from local sources.  The programme - a collaboration between Rebel Energy and UrbanChain - aims to provide 100 per cent green energy to British homes and drive the country's energy transition amid a cost-of-living crisis.  More than 3,000 homes have already joined this new form of energy provision and will be able to trace the source of their energy to the UK site where it was produced, via a "unique" AI and blockchain platform, the company has revealed. Rebel Energy will supply energy while UrbanChain runs the P2P exchange.  “The only way to move the energy transition forward is to decentralise the generation of energy," said Dan…

  • Circular economy around offshore wind 'could create 20,000 Scottish jobs'

    The ‘ End of Life Materials Mapping for Offshore Wind in Scotland ’ report, produced by the Offshore Renewable Energy (ORE) Catapult, in partnership with Zero Waste Scotland, has identified the vast quantity of materials needed to develop the Scottish offshore wind market. The report also highlights how these materials could be refurbished, remanufactured and recycled from wind turbine decommissioning to reduce waste and generate economic opportunities. The report considers how the offshore wind sector could develop between now and 2050. It sets out the huge supply chain opportunity created by the volume of projected growth across Scotland as a result of the Scottish Government target to increase capacity to 11GW of offshore wind in Scotland by 2030, the ScotWind leasing round, and the…

  • View from Brussels: EU is making a lithium rod for its own back

    The current generation of battery technology requires lithium, so as electric vehicle sales constantly increase and more renewable energy comes online - requiring storage - demand is only set to increase. In 2020, the European Union added lithium to its list of critical raw materials, which is reserved for materials that are either essential to EU policy goals or which face supply shortages. In lithium’s case, it was the first criteria that secured its inclusion. Brussels has big plans to snag a chunk of the global battery-production market, by increasing both manufacturing of the final product and the mining and refining of raw materials. The likes of France and Germany have started to stump up billions of euros to build gigafactories as demand for vehicles in particular increases, while…

  • Retailer warns of emissions caused by ‘shipping air’ to UK homes

    Every year, 85 million m 3 of air – enough to fill 34,000 Olympic swimming pools – is being shipped to UK homes, according to a study commissioned by packaging giant DS Smith.  This "air-commerce", as the research dubs it, is caused by packaging companies using oversized boxes to package items bought by UK customers, resulting in the use of 9,291 extra tonnes of cardboard – at a cost of £39.4 million and 480 million m 2 of plastic tape – an area approximately the size of West Yorkshire. The use of oversized packaging is not only cost-inefficient but also produces high levels of carbon emissions.  According to DS Smith, UK 'air-commerce' is responsible for generating 86,071 tonnes of excess carbon dioxide emissions annually, equivalent to nearly 5 million online delivery journeys.  …

  • After All: Call it ‘ex-cru-dition’, or ‘exped-ruise’ – the journey was still great!

    “Dear expedition members! Good morning!” The loud velvety voice of David Berg, the expedition leader, coming from a carefully concealed and un-switch-off-able intercom (like a KGB bugging device) is filling my spacious cabin. It is 6am, and initially everything in me rebels against waking up. I want to stay in my super-comfortable king-size bed, to keep being rocked gently by the ocean waves, soothed even further by the ship’s cutting-edge stabilisers. But my travel-hungry mind is already half-awake and ready for another day of adventures and close encounters with the magnificent wild nature of the remote Scottish islands. The question that is bothering me now is whether the Zodiac landing on the island of St Kilda (or Foula, or Staffa) is going to be ‘wet’ or ‘dry’, and that should dictate…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Leaked ‘Uber Files’ reveal company lobbied politicians and dodged laws for years

    An unprecedented leak of over 124,000 documents obtained by The Guardian and dubbed the "Uber Files" have shed light on the ethically questionable practices that fuelled the ride-hailing company’s global growth. The leak spans a five-year period when Uber was run by its co-founder  Travis Kalanick. The documents reveal that the company lobbied political leaders, billionaires and oligarchs and breached local laws and taxi regulations in order to take its cab-hailing service into cities around the world.  The files include 83,000 emails and 1,000 other documents involving conversations between Kalanick and his top team of executives, as well as international lobbyists, spanning 2013 to 2017.  The files involve top political figures such as French President Emmanuel Macron and ex-EU digital…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Satellite-based 5G network to provide global coverage for smartphones

    The firms hope their network will allow smartphones to access a 5G connection almost anywhere on Earth and provide complete global coverage for wideband data services, including places normally only covered by legacy satellite phone systems with limited data-connectivity capabilities. The benefits of 5G connectivity via low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites are expected to include coverage in extreme geographies or remote areas across seas, oceans and other locations where terrestrial coverage is absent. It is envisaged that the widespread connectivity will boost 5G smartphone subscriber roaming service capabilities, as well as enabling global connectivity for transportation, energy and health sector 5G use cases. The space-based network could also be used as back-up support for terrestrial…

  • Sponsored: 3D printing carbon fibre for lightweighting and metal replacement

    Join Stratasys engineer, Matt Jones, as he deep-dives common applications, design considerations and real-world case studies of 3D printing carbon fibre parts in traditional industries and manufacturing environments. Expect to also hear how production grade 3D printers offer the high level of reliability, accuracy, and repeatability that today’s manufacturers need. Finally, we will walk a virtual manufacturing production line to identify tooling, jigs, fixtures, and production parts along the way and show the comparison between traditional and additive manufacturing. The webinar will feature real world examples of companies and applications from a wide variety of industries including automotive, aerospace and precision engineering firms. To find out how you might benefit, proven methods…

  • Hans Blix: The engineer of peace

    Sweden has long been an outpost of peace in Europe. The Nordic country has not experienced war in over 200 years. In the 20th century, Swedish statesmen have been great peace brokers and humanitarians. I am in Stockholm to interview perhaps the last of their breed, Hans Blix. Former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the former Iraq War weapons inspector, he was world-famous 20 years ago for stopping moves that would have given legal cover to the Anglo-American war on Iraq. Perhaps our long-planned interview is exquisitely badly timed, as the Iraq war has faded into history and now there is another conflict in Ukraine, with a clear villain that occupies all our attention. On the other hand, maybe it is useful to have a broader perspective and realise that other great powers…

  • Collapse of energy firms could cost households £164 each

    The charity Citizens Advice said the total bill for the broad collapse of energy firms in the wake of soaring oil and gas prices stands at about £4.6bn nationally. Some customers were also found to have missed out on credit refunds, as well as struggling to fix inaccurate bills in the process of switching to a new provider. While smaller energy firms that collapsed typically entered into administration and had their customers moved to a new provider, Bulb’s sizable customer base meant it was too big for the government to allow it to go through the normal process that suppliers entered. The taxpayer bailout was the biggest since Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group and Halifax Bank of Scotland in the 2008 financial crisis. The charity called on the government to “urgently review…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Elon Musk attempts to pull out of $44bn Twitter takeover deal

    Tesla and SpaceX owner Elon Musk is seeking to end his $44bn (£36bn) bid to buy Twitter. In a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing, the billionaire's team allege that the social media company had breached the agreement with Musk by providing “false and misleading” statements regarding the number of spam and bot accounts on the platform.  The announcement is the latest twist in a long-running saga after the world's richest person announced hit intention to buy Twitter in April 2022, only to place the deal "on hold" the following month.  However, the billionaire might still be forced to go through with the acquisition. Shortly after Musk's filing was made public, Twitter's chairman Bret Taylor publicly revealed the company's intention to pursue legal action to enforce the agreement…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Bizarre Tech: Building Brick Waffle Maker, Petvation Smart Door and Hunting Game Box

    Building Brick Electric Waffle Maker Let’s make a waffle kingdom!!! I am a massive waffle fan. I don’t, however, have a waffle maker, otherwise I would forever be eating them and staying inside. Because waffles are so much better than having a social life. Anyway, this product seems to encourage you to play with your food, which is pretty much not what I’ve been instructed to do my entire life, but hey. The Building Brick Electric Waffle Maker creates 14 interlocking building-brick-shaped wafflies. You can stack them up and make structures like towers, houses, or spaceships. You could even cut the little pieces up and make dragons or waffle monsters. I’m not sure how well the interlocking of the bits would work, unless you like your waffles solid as... well... bricks. The Waffle Maker…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • As industry goes all-in on automation, what happens next?

    While the world put itself on hold for much of the past two years, I found myself busier than ever – collaborating with various global companies to urgently accelerate their automation strategies. Now, with plenty of interested parties keen to play catch up, I’m often asked for my take on the state of the nation in automation. My answer? It’s exciting times, but there are plenty more challenges to face. Let me explain. In recent years when we talked about automation in industry, the conversations were predominantly focused on manufacturing, specifically in high-volume lines in the automotive industry. That world is history. Industry is all-in on automation as businesses scramble to realise new use cases from retail, logistics, wholesale and warehousing to pharma, medical devices and the broader…

  • View from India: Private space tourism could redefine recreation

    The Indian Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (In-Space) has begun to promote space activities in the private sector. With an intention of providing a level playing field, In-Space made news recently as it authorised two early birds to launch their payloads: Dhruva Space Pvt. Ltd. from Hyderabad and Digantara Research & Technologies Pvt. Ltd. from Bangalore are the first ones to mark this new beginning. Dhruva Space Satellite Orbital Deployer (DSOD 1U), a technology demonstration payload, was authorised. As a space technology start-up, Dhruva Space focuses on building space engineering solutions necessary for application-agnostic satellite platforms. For its part, Digantara Research & Technologies develops end-to-end solutions for safe and sustainable space operations through its…

  • Dear Evil Engineer: How many balloons do I need to make an elephant fly?

    Dear Evil Engineer, I own a flying circus – by which I mean not a barnstorming troop but, quite literally, a circus that flies. My clowns, acrobats and circus animals wear kerosene jetpacks throughout the performance, ensuring an excellent view for all members of the audience. However, I’ve found that the loud noise of their customised jetpacks tends to alarm my dancing bears, elephants and poodles, preventing them from performing to the standard I expect. I’ve come up with an idea for an alternative mode of flight: gigantic helium balloons, which I could additionally monetise as advertising space. So, how much helium will I need to lift a dancing elephant? And is this helium shortage I keep hearing of going to cause a problem – is there enough helium for my dozen elephants to continue…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

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