NASA is looking at bioengineered microbes that could recycle and print new electronics on Mars, researchers in China built solar panels that work in the rain, and an engineer in Belgium made a smart scalpel that can sniff out cancer during brain surgery. Oh, yes, and someone in France finally invented a flying hoverboard. We curated this week’s haul from the Twitter feed of Carlos Haertel, who runs the GE’s Global Research Center in Munich, Germany.
Bioengineered Bugs Could Eat Computer Chips On Mars, Assemble Into New Ones
Above: One day there might be bioengineered life on Mars. Image credit: Getty Images Top Image: Franky Zapata aboard his Flyboard Air. Image credit: Zapata Racing
NASA is thinking about using “synthetically enhanced” microbes as “bioink” for printing computer chips on Mars. The bioengineered bugs would first gobble up obsolete and used-up electronics and then flow into a plasma jet printer that would turn them into a new integrated circuit. “Here, we propose a solution that will not only enhance mission success by decreasing upmass and providing a fresh supply of electronics, but in addition has immediate applications to a serious environmental issue on the Earth,” NASA’s Ames Research Center wrote. NASA now plans to do “an analysis of the infrastructure required to execute this concept on Mars, and additional opportunities it could offer mission design from the biological and printing technologies.”
These Solar Panels Work In The Rain
Graphene sheet can be as thin as the width of one carbon atom. Image credit: Getty Images
Scientists in China are using a thin coating of graphene– the miracle carbon material – to build “all-weather” solar panels that can generate power from the sun as well as the rain. “The new solar cell can be excited by incident light on sunny days and raindrops on rainy days,” they wrote in a recent paper published in the Angewandte Chemie Journal. Water ions stick to the graphene and create an open-face power sandwich connecting positively charged water ions with electrons in the carbon. The energy difference between the layers then starts the flow of electricity.
This Man Just Invented A Flying Hoverboard
Franky Zapata, the man who invented the water jet Flyboard, is moving up. The 37-year-old Frenchman just introduced his latest invention: Flyboard Air. The device is basically a small platform the size of a night table propelled upward by an air jet. He says he can use the platform to go as high as 10,000 feet, reach top speed of 152 miles per hour and fly for 10 minutes. He appears to use a wireless joystick to control it. Take a look.
Smart Scalpel Sniffs Out Cancer In The Brain
David Oliva Uribe’s scalpel (featured above with a pig brain) can distinguish cancer from healthy tissue. Image credit: David Oliva Uribe
Scientists at the Free University of Brussels and the Hannover University developed an “intelligent scalpel” that can sniff out tumors in the brain and distinguish cancer from healthy tissue. “The technology of the device is based on self-sensing actuators using piezoelectric transducers,” David Oliva Uribe, the engineer who designed the device, told Gizmag. “The self-sensing actuator generates vibration on the tip of the instrument. When the device is touching brain tissue, the vibration is induced into the brain tissue and the device realizes the estimation of the mechanical properties, then this measurement is compared to a reference value previously taken on a well known healthy area to determine if there are changes in the consistency of the tissue.”
Firefly Tech Could Make Your TV Brighter
A green OLED covered with ridges and other nanostructures found on the firefly’s lantern shone “about 60 percent brighter” than a regular green OLED. Image credit: Getty Images
Thistle burrs and sharkskin inspired scientists to design Velcro and faster swimsuits. Researchers in Korea have studied nature – specifically fireflies – to design brighter LEDs. When they mimicked the ridges and other nanostructures on the insect’s lantern, they were able to build an organic LED that shines “about 60 percent brighter for the same amount of power compared to a conventional green OLED,” according to Chemical Engineering & News. These enhanced OLEDs could be used for everything from TV screens to lighting.