• US Senate unanimously backs tighter Huawei restrictions

    The Secure Equipment Act would prohibit the FCC from considering or authorising use of products from companies deemed a threat and included on its 'covered list' (which it is required to maintain under the 2019 Secure and Trusted Communications Network Act). Companies on the list include Chinese telecoms giants Huawei and ZTE, which were formally designated national security threats by US authorities last year. In March, three further Chinese companies were added to the list: Hytera, Hangzhou Hikvision, and Zhejiang Dahua. The bill was sponsored in the Senate by Republican Mario Rubio, who is vice-chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Democrat Ed Markey. Both issued statements welcoming the approval of the act by their peers. “China’s state-directed companies like Huawei and…

  • Crossrail faces £150m funding shortfall amid pandemic uncertainty

    By the time passengers can finally travel the full length of the Elizabeth Line, Crossrail is expected to have cost a total of around £19bn, including nearly £2.9bn in loans from the taxpayer to TfL and the Greater London Authority. Originally projected to cost £14.8bn and open in 2018, Crossrail’s budget has spiralled upwards. In May 2019, the National Audit Office estimated that the funding package for Crossrail stood at £17.6bn and it wouldn’t open by March 2021. Since that estimate, milestones were missed in 2019 and into 2020 due to Crossrail continually uncovering problems or identifying requirements for new work alongside the Covid-19 pandemic, which added further cost and delay to the programme. In a report, the PAC found that Crossrail Ltd is still unable to give passengers or…

  • Low-gravity simulator design could enable advanced astronaut training on Earth

    Developed by researchers at Florida State University, the new design for a magnetic levitation-based low-gravity simulator can create an area of low gravity with a volume about 1,000 times larger than existing simulators of the same type. “Low gravity has a profound effect on the behaviours of biological systems and also affects many physical processes from the dynamics and heat transfer of fluids to the growth and self-organisation of materials,” said Wei Guo, associate professor and lead scientist on the study. “However, spaceflight experiments are often limited by the high cost and the small payload size and mass. Therefore, developing ground-based low-gravity simulators is important.” Existing simulators, such as drop towers and parabolic aircraft, use free fall to generate near-zero…

  • Apple hit by chip and supply chain woes; warns that impact will get worse

    Speaking to Reuters, Cook said that the last quarter, ended September 25, had "larger than expected supply constraints" as well as pandemic-related manufacturing disruptions in South-East Asia. While Apple had seen "significant improvement" by late October in those South-East Asian facilities, the chip shortage has persisted and is now affecting "most of our products," Cook added. "We're doing everything we can do to get more [chips] and also everything we can do operationally to make sure we're moving just as fast as possible," he said. Cook said that chips made with older technology remain the key supply constraint. He said that Apple remains unsure whether the shortages will ease after the holiday shopping season. "Most of what we design are leading-edge (chip manufacturing) nodes…

  • Shell’s 2030 climate target falls short of Dutch court ruling; protests grow

    Shell said it would cut the greenhouse gas emissions produced at its oil and gas sites in half, as well as halve the off-site emissions from the energy it uses, by 2030. However, this new pledge - which would represent a 50 per cent reduction compared to 2016 emissions - will not touch around 90 per cent of Shell’s emissions, i.e.: those produced when customers burn its fuel. In May this year, a Dutch court ordered Shell to slash the so-called Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions by 45 per cent by 2030. Unsurprisingly, Shell is appealing the Scope 3 aspect of the ruling, namely the emissions that come from its customers. A Shell spokesperson said: “It is an important step as we rise to meet the challenge of the Dutch court’s ruling for our Scope 1 and 2 emissions, which Shell expects to meet by…

  • Juno spacecraft unlocks mysteries of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot

    Jupiter's famed 16,000km-wide tempest has been churning in the planet’s atmosphere for several centuries and is big enough that it could swallow the Earth whole. Juno was launched in 2011 with the explicit mission of closely studying Jupiter and its moons. It finally reached the planet in 2016 after a gruelling five-year, 1.4 billion-mile trip. Its findings reveal new insights into Jovian (Jupiter) meteorology and its links to the planet’s deeper interior. While it has long been known that large storms and bands of rotating winds are common in Jupiter’s atmosphere, it’s unclear whether these storms are confined to the uppermost parts of the planet’s atmosphere or extend deeper into the planet. In a pair of studies, researchers used microwave and gravity measurements, respectively, from…

  • UK’s flagship climate bill not ready before COP26

    Leader of the House of Commons Jacob Rees-Mogg confirmed that amendments made by the House of Lords to the legislation will be brought before MPs on 8 November. By this point, the COP26 conference will already have completed its first week. The passage of the Environment Bill has not been perfectly smooth, due to a wider public backlash; bilateral parliamentary criticism, and a government U-turn regarding regulations against dumping raw sewage into waterways. The House of Lords has backed by 213 to 60 (majority 153) an amendment to place a statutory duty on water companies to “take all reasonable steps” to prevent raw sewage leakage into the environment. The upper chamber has also taken on the government over steps to ensure the independence of the new environmental watchdog, the Office…

  • Close 3,000 coal units by 2030 to keep Paris Agreement goals

    The report was published just days ahead of world leaders gathering in Glasgow for COP26. More than other fossil fuels, coal may prove to be the most contentious issue as the most polluting of fossil fuels whilst still being a major driver of economic growth in much of the world. There is currently more than 2,000GW of unabated coal-fired power in operation, according to Global Energy Monitor. This must be almost halved by the end of the decade, requiring the closure of almost one coal unit every day from now until 2030. Operating coal units are currently on average 314MW in size, according to Global Energy Monitor data. There was a record number of coal station retirements in 2020. However, there must be a more than threefold increase in the amount of coal capacity closed in the past decade…

  • AI analyses gene variants for disease potential

    DNA mutation is a cardinal feature of biology. Small genetic variations – and the resulting proteins that build our cells – can lead to profound disruptions in physiological function, sometimes causing disease. A handful of well-known genetic mutations and their associated conditions are well understood. However, dramatic leaps ahead in genome sequencing technology has not been followed with similarly rapid advances in the ability to interpret the meaning of the millions of genetic variations identified through human genome sequencing. Harvard and Oxford researchers sought to make sense of these data by developing an AI tool called Eve (Evolutional model of Variant Effect). Eve uses machine learning to detect patterns of genetic variation across hundreds of thousands of non-human species…

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    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Most UK councils failed to install EV chargepoints in 2021 despite booming sales

    A combination of improving technology, cheaper prices, fuel shortages and the upcoming ban on petrol and diesel vehicles has seen electric vehicle sales reach record highs in the UK this year. But the FOI requests sent to 374 local councils in the UK from chargepoint firm DevicePilot shows they are not expanding infrastructure to meet the increased demand. Furthermore, investment has been uneven across the country, with some parts making sizable contributions towards EV infrastructure while others have spent nothing or received no government funding to do so. For example, the FOI requests showed that London councils spent more than double the national average on EV charging in 2021 (£204k) and they are planning to install 39 new chargers per 100,000 people in 2022, compared to a national…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • Intel unveils speedy gaming processors as it finally cracks 10nm chipmaking

    Processors typically become more power efficient and are able to compute more calculations per second the smaller the architecture that they use. Intel has been struggling to improve upon its 14nm chip technology and has been releasing successive chips based on that architecture while some of its competitors have leapfrogged it. Intel says its most powerful new chip, the Core i9-12900K, offers boosts of up to 30 per cent performance compared to the previous generation depending on the workload, with an average of about 20 per cent for gaming. It said that improved framerates could be achieved on games such as 'Troy: A Total War Saga' (25 per cent improvement), 'Hitman 3' (28 per cent) and 'Far Cry 6' (23 per cent). The full twelfth-generation Intel Core family will include 60 processors…

  • China’s hypersonic test ‘very concerning’, says US general

    General Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was the first Pentagon official to confirm on the record the nature of a test this year by the Chinese military that the Financial Times had reported was a hypersonic weapon. The article stated the nuclear-capable weapon was launched into space and orbited the Earth before re-entering the atmosphere and gliding toward its target in China. Military experts say this is a Cold War concept known as a 'fractional orbital bombardment system' (FOBS). Milley said he could not discuss details because aspects involved classified intelligence. But he said the US is also working on hypersonic weapons. Its key features include flight trajectory, speed and manoeuvrability that make them capable of evading early warning systems that are part of…

  • Plants from plastics: circular recycling of polymer waste

    Plastics have taken the world by storm over the last century, finding applications in virtually every aspect of our lives. However, the rise of these synthetic polymers, which form the basis of plastics, has contributed to many serious environmental issues. The worst of these is the excessive use of petrochemical compounds and the disposal of non-biodegradable materials without recycling; only 14 per cent of all plastic waste is recycled, which hardly puts a dent in the problem. To solve the plastic conundrum, 'circular' systems need to be developed in which the source materials used to produce the plastics come full circle after disposal and recycling. At Tokyo Institute of Technology, a team of scientists led by assistant Professor Daisuke Aoki and Professor Hideyuki Otsuka is pioneering…

  • ‘Science superpower’ ambition takes backseat in budget

    The Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly emphasised his desire to make post-Brexit Britain a “science superpower” with strength in areas such as AI, quantum computing and biotechnology. At the heart of this ambition was the pledge to raise annual R&D funding to £22bn; a pillar of Sunak’s first budget . This would make the UK’s R&D spending higher as a percentage of GDP than the US, China, Japan and France. However, that pledge has been put on hold by two years, as other - likely more political - matters take priority in the budget. The research spending pledge has now been pushed back two years to 2026-27. The government says it remains committed to the overall target. “We need to do what the people of this country have always done: invent, discover and create the ideas and technologies…

    E+T Magazine
    E+T Magazine

  • CD-sized discs that hold 500TB of data made possible with laser writing method

    Developed by University of Southampton researchers, the lasers etch tiny structures in the discs that can be used for long-term “five-dimensional (5D)” optical data storage that is more than 10,000 times denser than Blu-Ray optical disc storage technology. The new method for writing data encompasses two optical dimensions plus three spatial dimensions.  “Individuals and organisations are generating ever-larger data sets, creating the desperate need for more efficient forms of data storage with a high capacity, low energy consumption and long lifetime,” said doctoral researcher Yuhao Lei.  “While cloud-based systems are designed more for temporary data, we believe that 5D data storage in glass could be useful for longer-term data storage for national archives, museums, libraries or private…

  • Economic losses from weather extremes shown to amplify around the world

    As human-induced climate change progresses, the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events is likely to increase, leading to a high probability of increasing direct production losses and consequently to higher consumption losses. Disruption caused by extreme weather events typically impacts a country's health sector, as well as the economy through disturbances to income, employment, economic growth, energy supply and food security. In the aftermath of an extreme weather event, regions tend to react in a variety of ways. Some might not manage to recover in between subsequent events, while others might even profit from disasters when the economy is built back to be more resilient or efficient after a shock. On an inter-regional level, local production shocks induced by extreme events…

  • Australian engineers patent energy-storage blocks

    Professor Erich Kisi, one of the inventors of the block and now CEO of MGA Thermal, said his term were working on thermionic converters, which produce an electric power input from heat when they hit upon the idea to shift their work to energy storage. “The [most important] ingredients for the bricks are the aluminium particles which provide the latent heat, that melting energy that we’re talking about,” Kisi told Reuters. “They will melt and solidify many thousands of times during the life of the block, but remain in position. They are held in position by graphite, in this case. We have other systems, but graphite is the main body.” The inventors compared the process to heating a chocolate chip muffin in a microwave. The matrix is the cake component (holding the shape when heated and rapidly…

  • Affordable decarbonisation ‘possible with carbon takeback scheme’

    The CTBO is a supply-side mitigation policy that would require fossil fuel extractors and importers to dispose safely and permanently of the CO 2 the fuel generates, starting with a low fraction and rising to 100 per cent by the year of net-zero CO 2 . This could provide a path to net-zero emissions by targeting a single industry, if enforced consistently and to include emissions generated by products sold. “Despite the perceived high cost of carbon dioxide capture and storage, we show that the cost to the world economy of a CBTO, even if entirely passed on to fossil fuel consumers, is no higher than the cost of mitigation in conventional scenarios meeting similar goals driven by a global carbon price,” said Stuart Jenkins, Oxford graduate student and lead author of the Joule study . The…

  • Climate commitments could force airlines out of business in just ‘three to five years’

    The Centre for Aviation (CAPA) report indicates steep cost increases for airlines as emission reduction measures are introduced or strengthened, including higher carbon pricing and mandated blending of sustainable aviation fuels. The report found that multiple airlines could fail in just the next three to five years if they do not have the financial strength to invest in decarbonisation or misjudge the need to accelerate their climate mitigation plans. This is because carbon offsets for airlines will likely become increasingly uneconomic or unavailable, with offset prices rising with broader demand for decarbonisation and tighter criteria for legitimate offsets. It also predicts that corporate customers and investors will increasingly demand more reliable data on decarbonisation and proof…

  • Spaceship electronics could be protected from radiation by carbon nanotubes

    Space missions, such as Nasa’s Orion that will take astronauts to Mars, are pushing the limits of human exploration and will require electronic circuitry to maintain operation for years at a time. But the continuous stream of damaging cosmic radiation can harm or even destroy onboard electronics. MIT researchers believe the risk to future missions could be reduced with carbon nanotubes that are configured to maintain their electrical properties and memory after being bombarded by high amounts of radiation. The lifetime and distance of deep space missions are currently limited by the energy efficiency and robustness of the technology driving them. As well as radiation protection, carbon nanotubes, which are just one atom thick, are expected to make transistors more energy efficient compared…

  • Autonomous vehicles need ethics so they can break road rules, report finds

    In a report, 'Ethics of Automated Vehicles: Breaking Traffic Rules for Road Safety', the group warns that strictly forbidding AVs from breaking existing traffic rules may hamper road safety. “While they promise to minimise road safety risk, AVs like hybrid AI systems can still create collision risk due to technological and human-system interaction issues, the complexity of traffic, interaction with other road users and vulnerable road users,” said UK transport consultant professor Nick Reed, from Reed Mobility. “Ethical goal functions for AVs would enable developers to optimise driving behaviours for safety under conditions of uncertainty while allowing for differentiation of products according to brand values.” The European Commission recently suggested that AVs may have to break strict…

  • UN warns of ‘climate catastrophe’ under latest plans

    The UNEP said that even with new and updated plans and pledges from countries for cutting greenhouse gas emissions in the next decade, the world faces global warming of at least 2.7°C by the end of the century. The latest climate plans and pledges brought forward by countries to tackle emissions in the medium term are likely to reduce emissions by just 7.5 per cent by 2030 compared to their previous commitments, it said. This falls far short of the 55 per cent required to meet the ambition of the Paris Agreement, keeping warming with within 1.5°C of pre-industrial levels. Beyond these levels, warming will pose an existential threat to island nations. The national plans (nationally determined contributions, or NDCs) previously put forward fell far short of the 1.5°C goal, prompting the submission…

  • Covid test based on carbon nanotubes gives results in minutes

    The new sensor is based on technology that could be quickly adapted to generate rapid and accurate diagnostics for future pandemics as well, the researchers said. “A rapid test means that you can open up travel much earlier in a future pandemic. You can screen people getting off of an airplane and determine whether they should quarantine or not. You could similarly screen people entering their workplace and so forth,” said Michael Strano, senior author of the study. “We do not yet have technology that can develop and deploy such sensors fast enough to prevent economic loss.” The diagnostic is based on carbon nanotube sensor technology that Strano’s lab has previously developed. Once the researchers began working on a Covid-19 sensor, it took them just 10 days to identify a modified…

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