DTN 061: Welcome to the Laser Wars

Plus: World's first quantum navigation flight, brain's internal speech decoded, AI blamed for lack of alien contact, borehole battery for energy storage, and more.

“Perovskites offer a promising solution to meet the growing demand for clean energy as the world recognizes the urgent need to transition to net-zero emissions. If you look at the AI revolution, what do you think is going to power all those NVIDIA chips? They’re going to need a lot of energy. What we’re doing with perovskites is at the core of solving climate change.”

The Big Picture

Welcome to the Laser Wars

"The development and fielding of directed-energy weapons like lasers has taken on such new urgency among world governments in recent years due to the rapid proliferation of relatively cheap one-way attack drones among both professional militaries (see: the 2020 conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine) and irregular forces like Yemen's Houthis in the Red Sea, ISIS cells in Iraq and Syria, and Iran-backed militias across the Middle East. In 2021, then-Central Command chief Marine General Frank McKenzie Jr. warned US lawmakers that weaponized commercial off-the-shelf drones have become the greatest threat to US forces in the region since the advent of the improvised explosive device during the early years of the Global War on Terror." (Wired)

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Deep Tech News

• UK completes world’s first flights for quantum navigation that could replace GPS

• Startup sends Bluetooth into low Earth orbit

• Borehole battery: A promising solution for energy storage

• Intuitive Machines wants to help NASA return samples from Mars

• Astronomers are on the hunt for Dyson spheres

• First crewed flight of Boeing spacecraft delayed again

• The first nuclear microreactor company listed in the USA

• Geomagnetic storm scrambles tractor navigation systems

• No humans needed: AI robots discover new laser materials on their own

• Device decodes internal speech in the brain

• Vermont is on the cusp of mandating 100% clean electricity by 2035

• Engineered gene delivery vehicle crosses blood-brain barrier in mice

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JPEG of the Week

To prepare for exploring the moon during NASA’s Artemis campaign, NASA is conducting a week-long field test in the lunar-like landscape of San Francisco Volcanic Field near Flagstaff, Arizona to practice moonwalk scenarios.

NASA astronauts Kate Rubins and Andre Douglas are serving as the crewmembers and wearing mockup spacesuit systems as they traverse through the desert, completing a variety of technology demonstrations, hardware checkouts, and Artemis science-related operations. (via Phys.org)

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Peer Review

• Physicists create optical component for 6G

• Robotic 'superlimbs' could help moonwalkers recover from falls

• Researchers reveal new cellular mechanical transducer

• Nanoparticle plant virus treatment shows promise in fighting metastatic cancers in mice

• Manufacturing optimized designs for high explosives

• Chemists succeed in synthesizing a molecule first predicted 20 years ago

• A thousand times smaller than a grain of sand—glass sensors 3D-printed on optical fiber

• A novel multifunctional catalyst turns methane into valuable hydrocarbons

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Funding x M&A

• Cylib raises €55m Series A for lithium-ion battery recycling

• AI chip startup DEEPX secures $80M Series C at a $529M valuation 

• Paris-based VC firm Blisce launches climate tech fund with a target of $160M

• Food VC Peakbridge has new $187M fund to transform future of food, like lab-made cocoa

• Dendra Systems, a startup focusing on AI-powered ecological restoration, raised a $15.7M Series B

• Princeton NuEnergy, a clean-tech innovator recycling lithium-ion battery materials, raised a $10.3M Series A

• Ndustrial, an AI startup optimizing industrial energy consumption, raised an $18.5M Series B

• Battery recycling startup cylib raised a $60.6M Series A

• Infinite Orbits, a French startup building in-orbit services for satellites, raised a $13M round

• ULEMCo, a startup converting commercial vehicles to run on hydrogen fuel, raised a $6.5M round

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Miscellanea

Patient Dies Weeks After Kidney Transplant From Genetically Modified Pig / Does Quantum Physics Rule Out Free Will? / AI may be to blame for our failure to make contact with alien civilizations / Disney's Robots Use Rockets to Stick the Landing / U.S. Government Now Spends More on Debt Interest than National Defense / Huge jellyfish invasion could disrupt Arctic ecosystems as waters warm / Why a new literary prize for climate fiction will make a difference / Jim Simons, philanthropist who used math to conquer Wall Street, dies at 86 / Limits on access to DeepMind’s new protein program trigger backlash / Biden-Harris Administration Announces $71 Million Investment to Advance American Solar Manufacturing and Development as Part of Investing in America Agenda / Egypt’s famed pyramids overlooked a long lost branch of the Nile / How cuddly robots could change dementia care / Spiderweb thread inspires ultrasmall microphones / Does quantum physics rule out free will / Why are vitamins named after letters? / Orcas just sank another yacht

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