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Stargate Origins will focus on Catherine Langford, the scientist whose lifelong obsession with alien hieroglyphs unearthed on her father’s archaeological expedition led to the events that kick off the 1994 film Stargate. Langford then recurred as a character throughout the long-running TV series Stargate SG-1, which aired on the Sci-Fi network (before it was renamed Syfy) from 1997 through 2007. Now she gets her own 10-episode prequel web series exploring her life, her adventures, and maybe even her grand romance. A new digital streaming service, Stargate Command, that will host the new show.

Star Trek: Discovery premieres September 24th on CBS All Access.

Thor Ragnarok will be the third Thor movie. The release dates for upcoming Marvel movies are. Thor: Ragnarok release date: Nov 3, 2017 Black Panther release date: Feb 16, 2018 The Avengers: Infinity War release date: May 4, 2018 Ant-Man & The Wasp release date: Jul 6, 2018 Captain Marvel release date: Mar 8, 2019 The Avengers 4 / Untitled Avengers Movie release date: May 3, 2019 Untitled Spider-Man: Homecoming Sequel release date: Jul 5, 2019

Harvard and MIT are making a wide variety of robots. Swarming bots Soft bots Insect bots Folding bots Here are some videos of them

Due to the continuous improvement of scanning probe microscopy techniques, the long thought inaccessible goal of inducing and visualizing chemical reactions at the atomic scale is now routinely achievable by many groups around the world. In the framework of so-called mechanochemistry, mechanical force induced reactions have been studied using NCAFM. Recent works reported force induced atomic-scale switching, quantitative force measurements to induce the diffusion of single atoms and molecules, as well as studying molecular conformers and tautomerization. A few earlier studies also showed examples of mechanically induced vertical manipulation of single atoms.

Harvard’s George Whitesides and Alex Nemiroski, a former postdoctoral fellow in Whitesides’ Harvard lab, have created a type of semi-soft robot capable of standing and walking. The team also created a robotic water strider capable of pushing itself along the liquid surface. The robots are described in a recently published paper in the journal Soft Robotics. Unlike earlier generations of soft robots, which could stand and awkwardly walk by inflating air chambers in their bodies, the new robots are designed to be far nimbler. Though real-world applications are still far off, the researchers hope the robots eventually could be used

In July 2017, China’s statistics bureau has revised the way it calculates the country’s gross domestic product by including contributions from healthcare, tourism and “new economy”. This move increased the total of 2015 GDP by 1.3 percent to 68.55 trillion yuan ($10.3 trillion), but that year’s growth rate was only marginally amended and basically remained 6.9 percent. The calculation of China’s GDP for the first half of 2017 has not been affected, and stood at about 38.2 trillion yuan ($5.6 trillion), up 6.9 percent year-on-year. Global Credit rating agency Fitch said in its most recent Global Economic Outlook (GEO) that

The Government Accountability Office reviewed six ships valued at $6.3 billion that had completed the post delivery period, and found they were provided to the fleet with varying degrees of incomplete work and quality problems. GAO used three quality assurance metrics, identified by Navy program offices, to evaluate the completeness of the six ships—LPD 25, LHA 6, DDG 112, Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) 3 and 4, and SSN 782—at delivery and also at the time each ship was provided to the fleet. Although the Navy resolved many of the defects by the end of the post-delivery period, as the table

An international team of physicists, materials scientists and string theoreticians have observed a phenomenon on Earth that was previously thought to only occur hundreds of light years away or at the time when the universe was born. This result could lead to a more evidence-based model for the understanding the universe and for improving the energy-conversion process in electronic devices. Previously it was thought to only occur in the early stages of the universe and within neutron stars and black holes. IBM scientists predict this discovery will open up a rush of new developments around sensors, switches and thermoelectric coolers

The US Navy work will focus over the next year on increasing railgun power with which projectiles are fired to the target of 32 megajoules and increasing the firing rate to 10 shots per minute, or one every six seconds. said Dr. Tom Beutner, head of Naval Air Warfare and Weapons for ONR. At 32 megajoules, the railgun will have a range of about 110 nautical miles. Engineers will bring a new composite launcher designed to support the increased power and rep rate to where railgun prototypes are already being fired using a demonstration barrel. SOURCE – Defense Tech

Third way has a report on 48 north american companies and research institutions working on advanced small nuclear reactors. Only five of those north american projects are considered to be in more advanced development by the World Nuclear association. The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) is conducting Phase 1 of a pre-licensing vendor design review on the Terrestrial Energy molten salt IMSR, which it expects to be completed in September 2017 as it moves into the engineering phase. It plans to submit either an application seeking design certification or a construction permit application for the IMSR-400 no later than October

India added only 827 megawatt of solar power generation capacity in the first three months of the current financial year. This is about one third of the pace needed to achieve a 10,000 megawatt addition in solar power target for this year. India also has a target of having 100 gigawatt (100,000 megawatt) of solar power installed by 2022. It will primarily be large solar farms supplemented by grid-connected rooftop installations. This forms part of a large renewable energy program that scientists built a total of 175 GW of alternate power capacity, including 60 GW from wind and 10 GW

India’s plans to build ten indigenously designed pressurised heavy water reactors (PHWRs). The Indian cabinet approved the plan in May, 2017. The reactors are to be built at four plant locations – including two new sites – by 2031. They approved the construction of ten 700 MWe units to fast-track India’s domestic nuclear power program. Atomic Energy Minister Jitendra Singh said * two of the reactors would be constructed as units 5 and 6 of the Kaiga nuclear power plant in Karnataka state; * two as units 3 and 4 of the Gorakhpur plant in Haryana state; * two as

China’s solar industry is expected to produce 25 percent more panels in 2017 than last year, supported by domestic sales and demand from the United States and emerging markets, the head of a Chinese industry association said. China was expected to produce solar panels with a combined capacity of 60 gigawatts (GW) this year, said Wang Bohua, secretary general of China’s photovoltaic industry association. China produced panels with capacity of 48 GW in 2016. The United States has told the World Trade Organization it was considering putting emergency “safeguard” tariffs on imported solar cells, a move aimed at shielding its

The Boring Company released a statement following Musk’s tweets saying its talks with officials should lead to breaking ground on a tunnel “later this year.” If Musk truly is considering starting a new company to build a hyperloop, his track record with Tesla and SpaceX signals a major shake-up among the small group of start-ups that are getting closer to building these futuristic transportation platforms. Brogan BamBrogan (x-Spacex engineer and former Hyperloop One CTO) recently started a competing Hyperloop company here called Arrivo. All three main hyperloop companies — Hyperloop One, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies (HTT), and newly minted Arrivo are

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) now features a cutting-edge new congestion control algorithm, TCP BBR, which achieves higher bandwidths and lower latencies for internet traffic. This is the same BBR that powers TCP traffic from google.com and that improved YouTube network throughput by 4 percent on average globally — and by more than 14 percent in some countries. “BBR allows the 500,000 WordPress sites on our digital experience platform to load at lightning speed. According to Google’s tests, BBR’s throughput can reach as much as 2,700x higher than today’s best loss-based congestion control; queueing delays can be 25x lower. Network innovations

Today ASML is selling billions in Extreme Ultraviolet lithography machines. These machines will help deliver chips at the 5 nanometer to 2 nanometer nodes. ASML (Veldhoven, the Netherlands) sold eight more EUV (next-generation extreme ultraviolet lithography) systems in the second quarter. This brings its EUV backlog to 27 tools valued at about 2.8 billion euro (about $3.26 billion). The firm also announced that it demonstrated the key productivity metric of 125 wafers per hour (125) on an EUV tool at its headquarters. Second quarter sales increased to 2.1 billion euro (about $244) million, up 8 percent compared to the year

China authorizing the maximum speed of the Shanghai-Beijing high-speed rail line to increase to 350 kilometers per hour. China is upgrading its high speed rail trains to new trains with a 400 kph top speed. Hundreds of trains will be upgraded to the higher top speed and more lines will be permitted to run at the higher 350 kph speed and perhaps in two years or so the trains will be permitted to run at 400 kph. Travelers will be able to zip between the two cities in just 4 hours aboard the G1. Currently, those bullet trains crawl across

If Elon Musk’s Boring company makes a New York City to Washington DC hyperloop tunnel, then it would be 226 miles long. This would be nearly three times longer than the current longest tunnel. Elon Musk tweeted out that he has been given verbal approval by someone in the US government to build a New York to DC hyperloop tunnel. Here is the wikipedia list of longest tunnels. The Gotthard Base Tunnel (GBT) is a railway tunnel in the heart of the Swiss Alps expected to open in 2016. With a route length of 57 km (35.4 mi) and the

DARPA created the Safe Genes program to gain a fundamental understanding of how gene editing technologies function; devise means to safely,A responsibly, and predictably harness them for beneficial ends; and address potential health and security concerns related to their accidental or intentional misuse. DARPA announced awards to seven teams that will pursue that mission, led by: The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard; Harvard Medical School; Massachusetts General Hospital; Massachusetts Institute of Technology; North Carolina State University; University of California, Berkeley; and University of California, Riverside. DARPA plans to invest $65 million in Safe Genes over the next four years

A 2011 NASA analysis showed that developing the Spacex Falcon rocket would have cost $4 billion in a cost plus contract versus the $443 million that Spacex actually spent. Musk said NASA could avoid unnecessary delays and costs by transitioning to a system of competitive awards for fixed-price contracts, in which companies are only paid when they meet “milestones” such as completing a flight test or satisfying NASA about the safety performance of a vehicle. Additionally, he said, at least two entities should compete during the development process. Musk talked about

Elon Musk said “To really get the public real fired up, I think we’ve got to have a base on the moon.” “Having some permanent presence on another heavenly body, which would be the kind of moon base, and then getting people to Mars and beyond — that’s the continuance of the dream of Apollo that I think people are really looking for,” Musk told NASA ISS program manager Kirk Shireman, who interviewed him onstage at the conference. Musk also said today that his tunneling company (The Boring Company) could aid in Mars colonization as well. Advanced tunneling technology will

Elon Musk has just received verbal government approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins. This would be 29 minutes from New York city center to Washington DC city center. Boring Comapny would put up to a dozen or more entry/exit elevators in each city. Just received verbal govt approval for The Boring Company to build an underground NY-Phil-Balt-DC Hyperloop. NY-DC in 29 mins. — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 20, 2017 For sure. First set of tunnels are to alleviate greater LA urban congestion. Will start NY-DC in parallel. Then prob LA-SF and

A 2016 study that claims feeding cows small amounts of seaweed along with their normal diet of grass can reduce methane emissions by up to 99 per cent. The study, by a team of researchers at James Cook University in Queensland, Australia, found in live trials with sheep that recorded methane levels fell between 50 – 70 per cent when they ate a diet including 2 per cent seaweed. The Australian study was originally based on the experience of a Canadian farmer who realised that his cattle that ate washed up seaweed were healthier and produced “rip roaring heats” with

Disneyland is planning two main Star Wars attractions, including one that will let guests pilot the famed Millennium Falcon, Disney Imagineers described the area as one that will essentially be large-scale immersive theater. The Millennium Falcon attraction will feature a lifesize re-creation of the ship. It appears to be nestled in a corner closer to the First Order-themed area of the land, will be tailored to individual guest experiences. Everyone will be in character. “If you’re flying the Millennium Falcon on a mission and you bring that ship in all banged up, the boss man might not be too happy,”

DARPA has awarded BAE Systems a $4.6 million contract for its Mobile Offboard Clandestine Communications and Approach (MOCCA) program. The MOCCA program’s goal is to enable submarines to detect other submerged vessels at greater distances, while minimizing the risk of counter-detection. Active sonar, which sends out a pulse of sound — that loud “PING” you hear in war movies — has a much longer range than passive sonar, which merely listens. But submarines generally rely on passive sensors, because the enemy can home in on active pulses. If the sub can launch an unmanned underwater vehicle with active sonar, though,

The first stage of test flights for the Russian PAK FA Stealth fighter(Perspective Airborne Complex of Front-line Aviation), or T-50, is planned to be over in December 2017, commander-in-chief of the Russian aerospace forces, Viktor Bondarev, said. On Tuesday. The prototypes currently under evaluation are fitted with a modified engine from the Su-27 and Su-30 fighter jets. It is a derivative of the Saturn AL-41F1S engine, called AL-41F1, which has also been installed on the upgraded Sukhoi Su-35S Flanker-E. The first T-50 (PAK FA) prototype fitted with the new engine was expected to perform its debut flight in the last

In 2018, Spacex will have nearly two thirds of the global commercial space launch market. Other orgs shd also develop reusable orbital rockets. If an airplane co had reusable airplanes, buying single use airplanes wd seem crazy. pic.twitter.com/OJotlGmPHt — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 13, 2017 Worth noting that Boeing/Lockheed ("Other US" on chart) get a billion dollar annual subsidy even if they launch nothing. SpaceX does not. https://t.co/Mi27ZnYLRJ — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 13, 2017

Elon Musk confirmed that SpaceX is developing a revised version of the overall 2016 Mars exploration architecture. The previous plan involved the development of giant reusable launch vehicles, called the Interplanetary Transport System. The new Mars plan figures out how to make the whole Mars system affordable. He will decrease the size of the vehicles somewhat. “You make it capable of doing Earth orbit activity as well as Mars activity,” he said. “Maybe we can pay for it by using it for Earth orbit activity. That’s one of the key elements of the new architecture.” Falcon Heavy and commercial crewed

A new 3D printer creates metal parts at commercial production speeds. Their SPEE3D printer has the potential to turn 3D metal printing, which currently is just making prototypes of parts, into a tool for manufacturing actual parts for use. It is up to 1000 times quicker than conventional 3D metal printers. The entrepreneurs behind an exciting new 3D metal printer are all about speed. Speed is what gives their product a unique edge, and it’s essential if they are to get their new technology to markets before competitors. CEO Byron Kennedy and chief technology officer, Steve Camilleri, established their SPEE3D

Space Startup Moon Express plans several robotic lunar missions over the next three years. The missions are initial lander and tiny rover missions, a polar mission to confirm water and then a sample return mission. They plan to scale up the sample return to mine for lunar ice to provide low cost rocket fuel and water to earth orbiting satellites. Expedition One: Lunar Scout the 1st Commercial Voyage to the Moon The Lunar Scout expedition will be the first commercial voyage to the Moon. This historic expedition will demonstrate the cost effectiveness of entrepreneurial approaches to space exploration, carrying a

What if you could improve your average running pace from 9:14 minutes/mile to 8:49 minutes/mile without weeks of training? Researchers at Harvard’s Wyss Institute and the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) at Harvard University have demonstrated that a tethered soft exosuit can reduce the metabolic cost of running on a treadmill by 5.4 percent, bringing those dreams of high performance closer to reality. “Homo sapiens has evolved to become very good at distance running, but our results show that further improvements to this already extremely efficient system are possible,” says corresponding author Philippe Malcolm,

Researchers use expensive machinery to develop ways to harness DNA as a synthetic raw material to store large amounts of digital information outside of living cells. In 2016, a team at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering and Harvard Medical School (HMS) led by Wyss core faculty member George Church built the first molecular recorder based on the CRISPR system. The recorder allows cells to acquire bits of chronologically provided, DNA-encoded information that generate a memory in a bacterium’s genome. The information is stored as an array of sequences in the CRISPR locus and can be recalled and used

There were problems with the calibration of a sensor on the first of several satellites launched to measure the height of the sea surface using radar. Adjusting the data to remove that error suggests that sea levels are indeed rising at faster rates each year. Nerem’s team calculated that the rate of sea-level rise increased from around 1.8 millimeters per year in 1993 to roughly 3.9 millimeters per year today as a result of global warming. In addition to the satellite calibration error, his analysis also takes into account other factors that have influenced sea-level rise in the last several

Moon Express has revealed their family of three lunar robot explorers. * MX-1 Scout * MX-2 dual stage Scout * MX-5 Discovery class The moon express MX-1scout is the lowest cost planetary spacecraft ever. It is designed for Scout Class exploration capabilities starting from low Earth orbit, MX-1 delivers flexibility and performance to revolutionize access to the Moon and cis-lunar space. MX-1 is environmentally green, using eco-friendly fuels, advanced carbon composites and silicates, powered by the Moon Express PECO rocket engine, for an unparalleled capability in space robotics. Available in orbiter, lander and deep space probe configurations. MC-1 SPECS ~5.8km/s

The Carnival of Space 518 is up at Everyday Spacer Blasting News – Moon Express reveals its plans for private lunar exploration The first probe Moon Express intends to launch is the Lunar Scout, which the company hopes to launch before the end of 2017 as part of its quest to win the Google Lunar XPrize. The probe will carry a number of payloads, including, “the International Lunar Observatory, “MoonLight” by the INFN National Laboratories of Frascati and the University of Maryland, a Celestis memorial flight.” Lunar Scout will also attempt to fulfill the terms of the Google Lunar XPrize

Researchers have created a brain implant that stimulates persistent aggression. Winners in social dominance experiments are mice that are not stronger but are just more persistently aggressive. The brain circuits of a winner Social dominance in mice depends on their history of winning in social contests. Zhou et al. found that this effect is mediated by neuronal projections from the thalamus to a brain region called the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex. Selective manipulation of synapses driven by this input revealed a causal relationship between circuit activity and mental effort–based dominance behavior. Thus, synapses in this pathway store the memory of previous

The Planetary Habitability Lab at the University of Puerto Rico is conducting a scientific campaign from the Arecibo Observatory to observe red dwarf star with planets. These observations might provide information about the radiation and magnetic environment around these stars or even hint the presence of new sub-stellar objects including planets. So far, they observed Gliese 436, Ross 128, Wolf 359, HD 95735, BD +202465, V* RY Sex, and K2-18. Only Gliese 436 and K2-18 are known to have planets. Observations were done between April and May 2017 in the C-band (4 to 5 GHz). Two weeks after these observations,

Glen Robertson has over 30 years of advanced propulsion research experience and development for the NASA – Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL as an Aerospace Technologist. He helped establish the Advanced Propulsion Research Center and conducted/supported many advanced propulsion projects over his NASA career. He holds 10 patents and has published over 20 papers on propulsion and power generation and currently supports the SLS program and plans to retire by end of 2018. Acceleration Mechanics for New Propellant-less Space Drives It has been shown that the mechanism of acceleration is hidden within known physics, much like a Chameleon

1. Damien Turchi is a graduate of Drexel University in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, founder and former president of the Icarus Interstellar Drexel University Student Chapter and lead coordinator of the first Interstellar Hackathon at Starship Congress 2015 at Drexel University, PA. He is currently a director of Icarus Interstellar. On the Development of a Permanent Lunar Settlement: A Micro-Literature Review and Suggested Action Since the 1960s, humanity seriously discusses the idea of a permanent lunar settlement. In both academic and professional literature, many designs for an initial settlement are proposed to varying fidelity. NASA published a comprehensive review of

An analysis by John Bucknell (x-Spacex senior engineer) describes an 11 meter diameter robotic vehicle with a 6,000-megawatt nuclear thermal rocket in a NTTR arrangement. The rocket would be single stage to orbit and would be immediately be able to refly after landing and refueling much like todays airliners. Even fully reusable Spacex rockets where all stages are resused would need to be re-assembled. He describes SSTOH missions to place a 21 meter minor and 214 meter major diameter toroidal habitat in space, capable of full terrestrial gravity simulation by spinning at 3 rpm. The habitat begins as two thin

London and New York are replacing outdated phone booths with Wi-Fi kiosks that have embedded computing tablets, USB charging ports, keypads for making phone calls, and large screens that display relevant information to passersby. New York started installing its “LinkNYC” kiosks in 2016, currently has more than 900 activated across all five boroughs and plans to increase that number to 7,500. The U.K. just started erecting its “InLinkUK” kiosks in London and intends to deploy up to 1,000 across the country. Today, people use the Links primarily to charge their smartphones, take advantage of the fast Wi-Fi, make Internet (VoIP)

The researchers, led by University of Washington assistant professor of materials science and engineering Peter Pauzauskie, published a paper on July 17 in the journal Nature Microsystems and Nanoengineering describing their supercapacitor electrode and the fast, inexpensive way they made it. Their novel method starts with carbon-rich materials that have been dried into a low-density matrix called an aerogel. This aerogel on its own can act as a crude electrode, but Pauzauskie’s team more than doubled its capacitance, which is its ability to store electric charge. These inexpensive starting materials, coupled with a streamlined synthesis process, minimize two common barriers

Mathematicians at the Universities of York, Munich and Cardiff have identified a unique property of quantum mechanical particles – they can move in the opposite way to the direction in which they are being pushed. In everyday life, objects travel in the same direction as their momentum – a car in forward motion is going forwards, and certainly not backwards. However, this is no longer true on microscopic scales – quantum particles can partially go into reverse and travel in the direction opposite to their momentum. This unique property is known as ‘backflow’. Physical Review A – Quantum backflow and

A truck-fired 50 kW laser weapon — an upgrade of the lumbering HEL-MTT — will be test fired in 2018. A 100 kW weapon on a more mobile vehicle — perhaps an 8×8 Stryker or tracked Bradley — will be test-fired in 2022. Currently the army is testing 5 to 10 kilowatt weapons on trucks and the Stryker. Moving up in power will mean being able to take out helicopters, low flying planes and possibly cruise missiles. Current weapons are targeting quadcopters and mortars. The new dates are slippage by one year from the schedules announced in 2016. The US

US defense leaders should consider developing limited-production prototypes deployed to operational environments as “one off” weapon systems tailored to specific missions. For prototyping to become a relevant component of military doctrine, promising weapon systems will need to be delivered quickly to the operational forces in limited quantities, with the option of building or modifying the base design for future use. These prototypes may be produced at a lower cost and may only need to be operational for a short time period. The technology exists today to manufacture and deploy a system while in an operational environment. A 2015 prototype produced

Google Glass has been optimized for industrial, healthcare and other workplaces where workers need help with complex tasks. Complex assembly, done faster AGCO manufactures complex agricultural machines at low volume with the goal of helping make today’s farms more productive and more profitable. All AGCO solutions are custom, which can require over 1,000 precise steps to build correctly. Quality is key. Glass really gives their operators the ability to do their jobs faster, smarter, and safer. Rewiring productivity GE partnered with Upskill to implement the Skylight platform with Glass in warehouses and manufacturing facilities globally. At Renewable Energy in Pensacola,

Russians have added porosity to aluminum so that it can be lower density than water. Ships with porous aluminum foam would be unsinkable even with holes in the hull so long as the water that leaks in does not go beyond the buoyancy of the aluminum foam. Aluminum foam is produced by adding foaming gas into liquid metal during re-melting of the aluminum material. The porous materials can be used for increase of structures stiffness and sound and heat insulating proprieties, said the SPbPU’s Media-center. “High porosity level can be used to decrease the density of structural elements, e.g. sheets.

MIT 3-Sigma Sports aims to solve the biggest engineering problems across sports. The program connecting students and faculty with alumni and industry partners who work together to improve athletic performance by using engineering to enhance endurance, speed, accuracy, and agility in sports. Graduate students and former varsity athletes Sarah Fay and Jacob Rothman have both found ways to bridge their personal passions with their academic pursuits. Fay, who played squash and field hockey as an undergraduate at MIT, is working to identify the optimal weight for squash rackets by modeling the swing of a racket based on a person’s height

A US Congressional report shows that From FY2007 to FY2016, obligations for all DOD-funded contracts performed with in the Iraq and Afghanistan areas of operation totaled approximately $249 billion in FY2017 dollars. For the fourth quarter of Fiscal Year (FY) 2016, CENTCOM reported 42,592 contractor personnel working for DOD within its area of responsibility, which included 28,189 individuals located in Afghanistan and Iraq. At the end of the Obama administration contractors outnumbered US soldiers in Afghanistan by 3 to 1. For the fourth quarter of FY2016, DOD reported 3,053 private security contractors in Afghanistan, with 813 categorized as armed private