• Wildlife Trust urges UK to ban peat farming and seabed trawling to cut carbon

    The charity, which represents 46 local trusts that look after more than 2,300 nature reserves between them, said the Government should be placing greater focus on climate action ahead of the international COP26 talks in Glasgow later this month. It wants the UK to “significantly increase” peatland restoration and ban the sale and use of peat in gardening and compost products. Peat is typically used in compost because of its ability to retain water and nutrients, but to harvest it, bogs need to be drained and the top surface of the peat gradually stripped away. Not only does this destroy rare and endangered habitats and the flora and fauna that rely on them, but also allows the peat to react with the air, releasing vast quantities of carbon dioxide. It also wants to ban bottom-trawling…

  • Recycled concrete and captured CO2 make new building material

    Concrete is the most-used artificial material. The concrete industry is vast and it is estimated that around seven per cent of CO2 emissions come from the manufacture and use of cement (the main component of concrete) alone. A large proportion of this is due to the use of calcium, which is normally obtained by burning limestone and which is essential for the reaction between cement and water to form concrete. Considerable research efforts are already underway to find alternative ways of making concrete or similar construction materials more sustainable. Now, the University of Tokyo researchers have demonstrated a method for combining waste concrete and captured CO2 to create a usable form of concrete called calcium carbonate concrete. Inspired by the way some aquatic organisms harden…

  • Clingy mussels could inspire new glues and plastics

    Blue mussels spend their days being buffeted by crashing waves and currents, remaining tethered to the rocks - or their fellow mussels - thanks to the highly effective underwater glue which they produce. Given that achieving adhesion in the presence of water is so challenging, scientists who are interested in producing effective adhesives for use in wet environments – such as within the body, for surgical or dental purposes – have turned to nature for inspiration. In a new Science paper , a McGill-led team reports that, after a decade of work in the area, it has uncovered the cellular mechanisms by which mussels fabricate underwater adhesives. “The specific mechanism by which mussels produce their adhesive has been shrouded in mystery until now because everything occurs hidden from view…

  • News from the global AI hothouse

    The need to train machines more quickly, more efficiently and less expensively is a pressing imperative. AI-powered technology, dependent on machine learning, has limitless potential to propel business and benefit society. Progressive improvements in training will bring incalculable rewards, if only we could imbue machines with a childlike curiosity that encourages them to learn more naturally, more intuitively and more effectively. Perhaps we can. Like many businesses and academic institutions, our team at Cambridge Consultants invests in extracurricular research to advance machine learning, using algorithms and neural-network models to progressively improve the performance of computer systems. Many see meta learning – essentially learning to learn – as the ultimate objective. With that…

  • Nasa’s Perseverance rover sends back images of Martian river delta

    The pictures also provide insight into where the rover could best hunt for samples, including those that may contain signs of past life, known as biosignatures. Billions of years ago, when Mars had an atmosphere thick enough to support water flowing across its surface, river flows carried sand and gravel from the surrounding highlands towards Jezero’s fan-shaped river delta. The lake in the crater – Lake Jezero – could have been up to 40km wide and tens of metres deep, researchers believe. They hope the findings could help Perseverance achieve its scientific missions of finding signs of former life and collecting samples for future return to Earth. Soon after landing in February this year, the rover’s Mastcam-Z cameras and Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) zoomed in for a closer look at one of…

  • Intel no longer considering UK semiconductor factory

    The company, one of the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturers, is currently pushing to boost its own chipmaking output amid a global shortage. Intel plans to expand its US chip-manufacturing operations with a $20bn investment towards two new factories in Arizona and a colossal $95bn investment in new and upgraded semiconductor factories in Europe over the next 10 years. Gelsinger told the BBC that before the UK left the single market, it “would have been a site that we would have considered” and that Intel “absolutely would have been seeking sites for consideration” in the country. However, post-Brexit, “we are looking at EU countries and getting support from the EU”. He said that Intel has approximately 70 proposals for sites across Europe, covering around 10 countries, and hopes…

  • UK electricity supplies will be tight this winter although demand should be met

    The annual winter report of The National Grid's Electricity System Operator (ESO) arm has predicted that while there would be a sufficient margin between peak demand and supply all winter round, it anticipates that it may have to issue Electricity Margin Notices and Capacity Market Notices. Electricity Margin Notices are used to send a signal to the market of looming tightness in supply in a bid to ensure there is a greater safety cushion between power demand and available supply. Six such notices were issued in winter 2020 - a record for the UK’s electricity grid. Only two notices were issued in the winters between 2011-2019. The coming winter brings even tighter conditions than last year, with gas prices rising to historic highs and a fire at a French interconnector sending the cost…

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  • Red squirrels get conservation boost with AI acoustic monitoring

    In partnership with the University of Bristol, Huawei Technologies and international NGO Rainforest Connection (RFCx), the Mammal Society project will deploy innovative technologies for the first time in the UK to help protect red squirrels by generating unprecedented insights into the lives and activities of their declining populations across the UK. The project will see advanced bio-acoustic, cloud and artificial-intelligence (AI) technologies deployed to help experts assess and monitor squirrel populations. It will use custom-built 'Guardian' and 'Audiomoth' monitoring devices and Huawei software to analyse the natural noise of the environment – the first time Huawei’s world-leading technology has been applied in this way in the UK. One of the UK’s most-loved native species, the endangered…

  • Tech innovation insufficient for UK to reach net-zero target

    Professor Dame Theresa Marteau, who is director of the behaviour and health research unit at the University of Cambridge, is heading calls for systemic behavioural change to mitigate climate change. Dame Theresa and her colleagues state that technological innovation will not be sufficient for the UK to reach its goal of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, in line with the Paris Agreement. Reaching net-zero CO2 by 2050 at the latest is critical to keeping global warming within 1.5°C, but experts warn that the world is not nearly on track to reach this target. The UK, for example, though among the first to set a legally binding target of net zero by 2050, has so far fully implemented just 11 of 92 policy recommendations from the independent climate change committee and is not on track…

  • Aerial lidar mapping uncovers prehistoric archaeological sites

    Lidar (light and radar) uses laser precision to sense the surrounding environment. Laser beams are emitted and the amount of time taken for them to be reflected from objects and return to the sensor is measured. This provides the distances from various objects and allows a three-dimensional map of the environment to be built up quickly. The technology was applied to the National Trust’s Wallington 13-hectare estate in Northumberland as it prepares to decide where to plant 75,000 British native trees as part of ambitions to plant 20 million trees by 2030 in order to help tackle the climate crisis. The lidar-created map found evidence of archaeological sites dating from 2,000BC to 1,900AD, including traces of historic, healthy woodlands dating from the mid-eighteenth century which were cleared…

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  • ‘Very high levels of offshore wind possible’ for UK, report says

    The analysis by Energy Systems Catapult underlines the important role for offshore wind - currently about 10GW capacity - as the workhorse of the power system in the coming decades. Following the 'Offshore Wind Sector Deal' between the UK Government and industry and the subsequent adoption of the 40GW deployment target for offshore wind by 2030, the Offshore Wind Industry Council (OWIC) established a task force to ‘Solve the Integration Challenge’. Energy Systems Catapult was commissioned by OWIC to consider the impact of very high levels of offshore wind on the energy system, and how these impacts could be mitigated, and also to identify opportunities to strengthen offshore wind’s role in delivering innovative solutions to system integration. The report - ' Solving the offshore wind…

  • View from India: Connect the unconnected in healthcare

    Looking back, astronomy gave scope for the growth of computational science. And computational science has opened out the applications of deep learning. That’s one side of the story. On the other side, biology has benefitted from computational science. “Complex biology operations are possible using computational science as the base. Pursuing this, biological computing is expected to emerge from this,” said Professor Vijay Chandru, Centre for Bio-Systems Science and Engineering, the Indian Institute of Science, speaking at the Digital Technologies and Precision Health Webinar organised by Carnegie India in partnership with Plaksha University (Mohali). The next stage can happen when scientists-researchers work out strategies to engineer biology. Data encoding in biology can become a reality…

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    E+T Magazine

  • Book review: ‘The Man from the Future’ by Ananyo Bhattacharya

    “Call me Johnny” would be the extrovert words that greeted guests at his lavish parties, social events that seemed to be completely at odds with our expectations of how a genius mathematician should behave. In fact, one of the reasons Neumann János Lajos – John von Neumann – is such an endlessly fascinating subject for the modern biographer (as well as the reader of so-called works of popular science), is that contrast. Apart from being one of the finest minds of the 20th century, von Neumann was also idiosyncratic and entertaining. For any commentator, the challenge is always one of painting the dual portrait of visionary thinker and eccentric professor stereotype with credible balance. In ‘The Man from the Future: The Visionary Life of John von Neumann’ (Allen Lane, £20 ISBN 9780241398852…

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  • Fuel crisis boosts appeal of EVs for consumers

    According to the SMMT's car registration figures for September, while the overall new car market in the UK recorded its weakest September since 1998 (ahead of the bi-annual two-plate system being introduced in 1999) battery electric vehicles continue to surge ahead, with 32,721 new vehicles hitting the road – the best monthly performance ever for the EV segment. Meanwhile, data compiled by Leasing.com revelaed that electric car models such as the Volkswagen ID.3, Hyundai Kona and Tesla Model 3 all featured in the top 10 vehicles most enquired about during September. With EVs performing better than many conventional ICE (internal combustion engine) models, this suggests a significant uptick in the speed at which EV adoption is growing. On the ICE side of things, the SMMT figures show a total…

  • Ofcom powers up to police video-sharing platforms

    Under the new measures, VSPs including TikTok, Snapchat, Vimeo and Twitch, are required by law to take measures to protect under-18s from potentially harmful video content. All users must be protected from videos likely to incite violence or hatred, and certain types of criminal content. Past research from the regulator had found that a third of users said they had been exposed to hateful content, while a quarter said they had seen unwanted violent or disturbing content on the platforms. One in five said they had seen videos or content that encouraged racism. Ofcom said it had already begun discussing with the VSPs what their responsibilities are and how they should comply with them. While the body will not be monitoring content itself like it does with TV broadcasts, the laws lay out measures…

  • Low-cost ventilator could address shortage in developing countries

    Ventilators are medical devices used by patients in intensive care units (ICUs) with serious respiratory diseases, such as tuberculosis and Covid-19. They mechanically support the breathing of patients. The coronavirus pandemic led to a scramble to obtain many more invasive ventilators, as clinicians warned that there was a severe shortage of these devices to meet the needs of patients with severe cases of Covid-19. In the UK, engineering companies with no prior experience with these complex devices were encouraged by the government to turn their attentions to designing and adapting ventilators such that they could be manufactured at a greater pace. Now, researchers from Imperial College have presented their design for the low-cost, simple 'Relavent' ventilator, which achieves all the performance…

  • Thales partners with Google for secure French cloud service

    The alliance between Thales, Europe's largest defence electronics supplier, and Alphabet's search unit Google fulfils a May government plan under which France acknowledged US technological superiority in the field. The French government said then that cloud-computing services developed by Google and Microsoft could be used to store France's most sensitive state and corporate data, provided the services were licensed to French companies. In their joint statement, Thales and Google Cloud said they will create a new France-based company – as yet unnamed (Thoogle, perhaps?) – in which Thales will be the majority shareholder. That company will provide the whole range of Google Cloud's services, but its network and servers would be separate from those used for regular Google clients. "The…

  • Climate Change Committee head urges public engagement with net-zero transition

    Stark said that switching to EVs, heat pumps, and transitioning to work in greener sectors can have huge benefits for people as well as for the environment, such as the health benefits of reducing air pollution. However, he emphasised that this transition must be just, with support for the public to adapt. The Government is expected to produce the details of its net-zero strategy, detailing how it will cut emissions to zero overall by 2050, before the Cop26 climate talks hosted by the UK in Glasgow. Stark said it was right to set emissions-cutting targets in line with the Paris Agreement – which aims to limit warming to 1.5°C – including net-zero by 2050 and 68 per cent cuts by 2030. “It is exactly what we need to have the credibility to host those talks and to demand the same of others…

  • Glitch in Heathrow Airport’s ePassport gates cause major delays

    Travellers have been facing long queues with wait times of up to four hours in order to board their flights or are simply being forced to remain on aircraft. The gates use facial recognition technology to verify the traveller’s identity against the data stored in the chip in their biometric passport, as well as run the data against numerous databases to determine if the traveller is a security risk. The Home Office did not give details about why the gates had failed other than chalking it down to a “technical issue”. On 24 September, Heathrow’s ePassport gates also faced glitches that prevented them working for a period of several hours. In 2017, it was estimated that around 100 million passengers had used ePassport gates since they first went live in Manchester Airport in 2008. Initially…

  • Drones carry post to remote island in Royal Mail trial

    Royal Mail, in conjunction with drone specialists Windracers Ltd, has started a two-week trial of scheduled, autonomous flights between Kirkwall and North Ronaldsay in the Orkney Islands to help better connect remote island communities. The mail is being carried by a large twin-engine, UK-built unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), named Ultra (pictured below, photos as supplied by Royal Mail Group), capable of transporting 100kg of post of all shapes and sizes – equivalent to a typical delivery round. Letters and parcels will ultimately be hand-delivered by the local postal service representative in the usual way when they reach North Ronaldsay. The island is situated geographically further north than the southern tip of Norway and is home to around 70 people. The drone trial is part of the…

  • Google Maps introduces low-carbon routing options for cars and bikes

    New eco-friendly routes will be available on Google Maps, including updates to biking directions and bike and scooter share information. A new routing model has also been implemented for cars which is designed to help lower fuel consumption to save on carbon and petrol money. While the new routes are only rolling out in the US at the moment, Google said it plans to expand this to “Europe and beyond” next year. It said the routing options could help to save over one million tons of carbon emissions per year, equivalent to removing about 200,000 cars from the road. The search firm has also implemented new carbon features into its flight comparison tools that let users see the emissions per flight. The information will be displayed next to the price and flight times in order to help users…

  • Data standards and digital skills will unlock innovation in transportation

    Intelligent transport systems, autonomous vehicles, the mass rollout of 5G and the growth of the Internet of Things IoT are collectively set to have a profound effect on the way we navigate our world in the coming years. Increasingly, geospatial data and the expertise to harness this information will be essential to enable new and compelling use-cases. According to a study commissioned by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders Ltd (SMMT), connected and autonomous vehicles are set to add £51bn a year to the UK economy by 2030, so there’s plenty to be excited about when it comes to innovation. Connected autonomous vehicles (CAVs) need to know where they are at all times, as do the organisations in charge of them. For this reason, and many others, consistent, reliable geospatial data…

  • Nobel Prize in Physics recognises climate modelling breakthroughs

    The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences recognised Syukuro Manabe, 90, and Klaus Hasselmann, 89, for their work in “the physical modelling of Earth’s climate, quantifying variability, and reliably predicting global warming.” They will each receive a quarter of the 10 million kronor prize money (£840,000). The other half of the prize goes to Giorgio Parisi, 73, for “the discovery of the interplay of disorder and fluctuations in physical systems, from atomic to planetary scales.” The work of the three physicists can be described broadly as describing and predicting 'complex systems', such as Earth’s climate. These systems have many interdependent factors that cause what appear to be random and disordered behaviour. BREAKING NEWS: The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award…

  • Facebook blames ‘faulty configuration change’ for six-hour outage

    Tens of thousands of people reported outrages yesterday evening, prompting Facebook to confirm using its Twitter account that it was aware of the issues and working to resolve them. It apologised for the outage, particularly for its effect on businesses that depend on Facebook platforms for sales and thanked its users for “bearing with us”. According to reports, other tools which depend on Facebook services also suffered, including employees’ work passes and email, Oculus VR, and Pokémon Go, which requires a Facebook login. According to around 50,000 reports on Facebook submitted to DownDetector before 5pm, most problems (72 per cent) were with the website while some were with the server connection and app. More than 75,000 complaints were submitted regarding WhatsApp and 30,000 regarding…

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