IEEE Spectrum: ELECTRIC VERTICAL TAKE-OFF and landing (eVTOL) aircraft for urban commuting are currently under development by more than a dozen different companies. These concepts and prototypes, representing well over a billion dollars of venture capital investment in 2020 alone, promise…
Wired: Beyond Mars and the asteroid belt, half a billion miles from the sun, the solar system might seem frigid, bleak, and lifeless. But scientists believe there’s a chance tiny alien creatures could reside on a distant moon, and you…
IEEE Spectrum: Back in February of 2019, we wrote about a sort of humanoid robot thing (?) under development at Caltech, called Leonardo. LEO combines lightweight bipedal legs with torso-mounted thrusters powerful enough to lift the entire robot off the ground,…
IEEE Spectrum: On 3 January 2019, the Chinese spacecraft Chang’e-4 descended toward the moon. Countless craters came into view as the lander approached the surface, the fractal nature of the footage providing no sense of altitude. Su Yan, responsible for data…
IEEE Spectrum: Jetpacks might sound fun, but learning how to control a pair of jet engines strapped to your back is no easy feat. Now a British startup wants to simplify things by developing a jetpack with an autopilot system that makes operating it more like controlling a high-end drone…
