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It just so happens that hovering in mid-air is a pretty energy-intensive process. It's this fact that helps explain why helicopters — notorious for being energy-hogging little buggers — have yet to make an appearance in the recent wave of electric vehicles. More »
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Where you and I might walk our dogs around the block, retired engineer Jack Clemens walks his own working airship, a perfect model of a naval airship that was destroyed in 1935. More »
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Ideally, at least, that's what they do. In practice, they have to deal with low gravity, uneven surfaces, and lots of grit. The iRing provides a new way to do it. More »
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A construction material that's stronger than steel but perfectly transparent is a classic sci-fi invention, and a research team at the University of Missouri is bringing it a little closer to reality with their blast-resistant glass. More »
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The Valkyrie was a plane decades ahead of its time, pushing the aeronautical engineering of the early 1960s well beyond what had been thought possible. It was even slated to become the world's first nuclear powered bomber. More »
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Wind is a clean, renewable energy source, but there isn't nearly enough of it down here on the ground. But high in the sky, there are furious jet streams of powerful wind just waiting to be harvested by floating turbines. More »
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Even the most efficient solar cell loses a lot of energy in the form of wasted heat. But the electron-like particles that photons emit as they enter the cells could be turned into electrical energy, solving the heat loss problem. More »
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A major challenge holding back the accurate prediction of volcanic eruptions is we don't really have the ability to put sophisticated monitoring equipment right in the heart of the hot magma. Now there's technology that thrives in such extreme heat. More »
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A new remote-controlled helicopter is the first to use a robotic hand to pick objects off the ground and safely fly away with them. Check out a video of the Yale Aerial Manipulator in action. More »
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An experimental "ferroelectric" data-recording device crams 4 trillion bits onto every square inch. This all-electrical method leaves magnetic and flash memory devices scrambling to catch up. More »
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Mirrors are usually surfaces that reflect light, which means photons bounce off of them. But a new kind of magnetic mirror can reflect magnetized atoms - one at a time. More »
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We've long known that encoding data using electron spin could revolutionize computer performance - and now it's been successfully demonstrated for the first time ever. More »
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Augmented reality, in which computer-generated virtual imagery is used to alter a person's perception, has been used to help people overcome phobias and help people drive better. And now, for some (awesome) reason, there's this... an augmented reality cookie. More »
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Membranes that alternately block the passage of gases and then allow them to flow through are a crucial part of many engineering processes, but we've never found a perfect switch to let the gases through - until we used light. More »
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War-zones such as Afghanistan never have enough interpreters, often forcing soldiers to rely on nonverbal communication that's easily misunderstood. Three new devices solve that by automatically translating one language to another - and you can see it in action! More »
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In the future, play-doh will be used to make electronics devices. That's the message of "Squishy Circuits," a project where students ran a motor and LEDs connected to a battery-powered roll of dough. More »
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In desperate need of a more efficient structure for their tiny solar cells, engineers turned to the world's foremost expert on nanotechnology: Mother Nature. The corneas of flies are the perfect nanostructures for the next generation of solar cells. More »
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An unmanned aerial drone flew continuously for fourteen days and twenty-one minutes, shattering the previous world record by 250 hours. Climbing to heights of 70,000 feet, the plane uses powerful solar panels to keep flying day and night. More »
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The Modular Prosthetic Limb allows 22 degrees of motion, independent movement of the fingers, weighs as much as a human arm, and responds to the user's thoughts. So how is it different from a real arm? It really isn't. More »
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Modern computers rely on electrons moving through wires to transmit information, which is far, far slower than the fast-as-light optics we theoretically could be using. And now we've found the exotic material that might allow us to leave electrons behind. More »
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This "smart sheet" can instantly fold into a boat or a plane without any human assistance. It's the first step toward being able to carry any imaginable tool around with you in the form of a single paper-like sheet. More »
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The blimp, everyone's favorite steampunk mode of transportation, has gotten an eco-friendly upgrade. Solar-powered airship Nephilios represents the culmination of a years-long French project to build a completely carbon-neutral flying machine.

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Japanese researchers have built an artificial butterfly that mimics the unusual flight patterns of the swallowtail butterfly. Their tiny model is called an "ornithopter" - and we've got the video of the little guy in flight. More »
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Scientists have raided the photosynthetic structures of leaves to figure out the most efficient way to use solar energy to turn water into hydrogen fuel. The Artificial Inorganic Leaf, or AIL, potentially represents a major step towards a hydrogen-powered world. More »
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The wonder material of tomorrow might just have been unveiled yesterday, as researchers at Imperial College London announced a prototype battery material that is strong and light enough to be used as the bodies of cars and casings of computers. More »
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Futurama showed us a world with space travel, robot sidekicks, and Al Gore riding the Mighty Moon Worm, but what really made hearts beat faster were the downloadable Lucy Liu robots. How close are we to robot lovin'? More »
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The soldier of the future might be able to see in all directions at the same time. Researchers at MIT have developed a fabric made of fibers that can "take pictures" of its surroundings. More »
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A new medical device that works much like a primitive version of Star Trek's tricorder could allow medics to check patients' vital signs from up to forty feet away, greatly shortening triage time at disaster sites and potentially saving countless lives. More »
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If you're sick of your laptop and mobile running out of power, fret no more. Researchers have invented a system of "wireless electricity" that powers up your devices without having to plug them in. Yesterday the CTO of Intel, Justin Rattner, wowed a crowd of journalists with the prototype for this wireless electricity system. Using an emitter device, Rattner beamed power to a lamp on stage, powering up the bulb from a distance. Sounds convenient, but many questions remain. Is it safe to wander through an environment bathed in electricity that's powering up your devices? More »
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Flying around with your own personal jet engine, strapped to your back, has been one of the hallmarks of futurism for decades. Which sucks, because futuristic stuff is supposed to eventually happen. So why the hell aren't we all flying to work via rocket power? Because you're about as aerodynamic as a potato, my friend. Here are five reasons the jet pack just hasn't happened yet, despite announcements that "a practical jetpack" will be on the market soon. More »
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Click to viewThose strange lights in the sky seem to move with unnatural precision, making turns and accelerations no human-made aircraft could possibly match. What ultra-advanced anti-gravity system allows UFOs to fly in such a bizarre way? Apparently it's ionized air. An engineering professor at the University of Florida has it all figured out, and he's going to build his own flying saucer. More »
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Using nothing more than a battery-powered device that emits a beam of ultraviolet light, future robotic explorers will be able to identify the building blocks of life on other planets and moons. A group of scientists in the U.S. and the U.K. have developed a small device which uses a low-power laser beam to sweep over rocks or soil, identifying identify organic substances that are the signposts of life as we know it. Specifically, the little machine "sees" life by causing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), often called the earliest form of organic matter in the universe, to light up. The discovery is so promising that it's likely to be launched out with the next generation of Mars rovers. More »
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The salvage crew is ready to board a wreck drifting off Reticulum when the engineer calls over the comm: radiation detected. They pop the airlock and pull out a translucent green ball that fits in the palm of a hand. Fitting it into a spherical metal sheath that's perforated like a colander, they toss it onto the derelict ship, then pull back and wait. Eventually they retreive the little ball, analyze it with a computer, and get a 3D map of all nearby radiation sources. This strange device is called RadBall, and it's already been invented. More »
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You know you've always wanted to see what would happen if you could control a first-person shooter with your penis — or, if you don't have one of your own, the penis of a friend. Maybe you want to literalize the term "cock block," or maybe you want to leave the mousing to your special down-there places while your hands roam freely across the keyboard. Either way, Kyle "Slashdong" Machulis has the ultimate futuristic, posthuman USB device for you. More »
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All viruses have an organic outer shell, but it turns out that with a little genetic tinkering they can be trained to produce an inorganic outer shell made of gold or cobalt oxide. Angela Belcher's lab at MIT has created an entire factory of trained viruses whose genes have been reprogrammed to grow battery ingredients. They're also growing ingredients for solar cells, as well as computer monitors and water-purification systems. More »
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