Stratolaunch air launch system for spacecraft comes closer to reality

Stratolaunch air launch system for spacecraft comes closer to reality: "Back in December of 2011, Stratolaunch Systems announced that it was designing a new air launch system for both manned and unmanned spacecraft. Among other things, that system would require the construction of what would be the world’s largest aircraft. While some people might understandably be skeptical of such grand plans ever seeing the light of day, the company recently announced that a couple of important milestones have been reached that bring the project closer to fruition."

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Big Brother is here, and his name is PRISM

Big Brother is here, and his name is PRISM: "If there was any doubt that George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four was a prophetic piece of fiction, you can pretty much put that to rest. The more skeptical among us have claimed for years that, in the age of the internet, nobody has real privacy. During the last 24 hours, those fears emerged from the shadows. Details leaked of the secret US National Security Agency (NSA) program called PRISM, which may as well have been called Big Brother."

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Porsche's iconic 911 celebrates 50 years with a limited edition facelift

Porsche's iconic 911 celebrates 50 years with a limited edition facelift: "With over 820,000 Porsche 911s being built and sold over the past fifty years, one could say the model has been a bit of a hit. Since 1963 Porsche’s very much iconic model (and we can use iconic here in proper context) has been the mainstay of the German automaker's performance hut. Now fifty years on it seems only fitting for the company to celebrate the car with the release of its 911 50th Anniversary Edition."

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Susan Fogwell: Yellowstone Travel Tips

Susan Fogwell: Yellowstone Travel Tips: "If you want to experience sheer, jaw-dropping American beauty, take a guided tour of the remarkably diverse Yellowstone National Park. With wildlife at almost every turn, Yellowston is one of the world's foremost wildlife sanctuaries. After visiting, you'll undoubtedly have a new appreciation of nature and wildlife. Have your camera ready to capture bison, moose, osprey, elk, coyotes and river otters, not to mention frequently seen black bears and grizzlies. Along with wildlife sightings, the most popular park visits include the geysers and hot springs, Yellowstone Lake, Upper and Lower Falls, and, of course, Old Faithful."

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Defined by Water: Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore | ActionHub

Defined by Water: Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore | ActionHub: "The miles add up quickly as we’re outlined by four of the five Great Lakes: Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron, and Lake Erie. Factor in island shoreline, and the number grows to 3,288 miles of Great Lakes waterfront. For comparison, that number’s close to the distance from Detroit to Juneau."

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Cheap, Sturdy, 1-Hour Quadcopter

Cheap, Sturdy, 1-Hour Quadcopter: "Here's a quadcopter build that we did in under an hour to win a bet.  We've got some experience building and took some shortcuts (such as using a flight controller from another unit, saving us the time of having to configure it), but I think it's reasonable to say that most makers could build this frame and get everything installed in a day, and still have some time left over to start flying it."

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The 800-hp Zonda Revolucion ends an era (for now)

The 800-hp Zonda Revolucion ends an era (for now): "After close to a decade and a half, including a run of super-limited editions and one-offs, Pagani has released its final Zonda. Or so it seems. A "car designed to amaze both on the track and in a car collection," the Zonda Revolucion brings the legendary line to a close with a bang."

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FYI: How Do Mosquitoes Survive Rainstorms? | Popular Science

FYI: How Do Mosquitoes Survive Rainstorms? | Popular Science: "Raindrops are to mosquitoes what falling VW Beetles would be to humans. Yet incredibly--maddeningly--mosquitoes survive rainstorms all the time. How?
By Meghan CeteraPosted 06.05.2013 at 10:00 am8 Comments"

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Researchers Unveil A Thought-Controlled Drone | Popular Science

Researchers Unveil A Thought-Controlled Drone | Popular Science: "Researchers at the University of Minnesota today revealed a drone that can be controlled merely by thought, and that's not even the coolest thing about it. Published in the Journal of Neuro Engineering, the project has implications in everything from unmanned vehicles to paraplegic mobility."

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Woman Attempts Second Solo Row Across the Pacific Ocean | ActionHub

Woman Attempts Second Solo Row Across the Pacific Ocean | ActionHub: "As of her last phonecast, 26-year-old Sarah Outen is somewhere in the North Pacific battling to keep her small ship above the waves. Currently she is only a quarter into her journey to reach Canada from Japan by a customized rowboat, a quest that will take her across 4,500 miles of open ocean. For this monumental feat she is completely alone."

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Hoverbike soon to become a reality | Ubergizmo

Hoverbike soon to become a reality | Ubergizmo: "If you’ve always wanted to glide around the air on a hoverbike, it looks like those day dreams could turn into reality soon. An Australian mechanical designer, Chris Malloy, has been hard at work over the past two and a half years in his garage creating the Hoverbike. Designed to fly above the ground with the use of two giant propellers, the Hoverbike is just like how we imagined – though not as sleek or futuristic-looking as the ones found in Star Wars."

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Touch Effects

Touch Effects:

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The Amazing Hyper Matrix Wall

The Amazing Hyper Matrix Wall:

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Solar Impulse deploys inflatable hangar for the first time

Solar Impulse deploys inflatable hangar for the first time: "Finding hangars to house an aircraft with a wingspan greater than a Boeing 787 Dreamliner is no easy task when planning a round-the-world journey. That’s why the Solar Impulse team designed an inflatable mobile hangar to be used on the Solar Impulse’s planned 2015 circumnavigation of the globe. After a storm damaged the hangar that was to host the solar-powered aircraft at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, the team was forced to deploy the structure for the first time to keep the 2013 Across America mission on schedule."

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Honda builds 130 mph fire-spitting lawn mower | Crave - CNET

Honda builds 130 mph fire-spitting lawn mower | Crave - CNET: "British TV series "Top Gear" is known for building some pretty outlandish automotive creations. The latest in that lineage is a Honda FH2620 mower. That doesn't sound very exciting until you learn just how heavily modified it is, from the tires to the engine."

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Online webcams to visit places you want to see

Online webcams to visit places you want to see: "One of the really amazing things about the internet, you can travel by webcam to places that you want to see, anytime you want. There are millions of webcams out there, "

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How To Be More Productive When Working From Home

How To Be More Productive When Working From Home: "No, Marissa Mayer hasn’t blown the whistle at me yet. I am still perfectly well ensconced in my own chair, in my own room, and drinking coffee in my own mug. The second reason is that I don’t work for Yahoo. I work for MakeUseOf.com and like our legion of readers, we authors are also spread around the world. But that’s not to say I don’t know what life is like on the other side of the “Iron Curtain”. 10 years of copious sweat has flowed in corporate cubicles."

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Bath University uses bacteria for self-healing concrete

Bath University uses bacteria for self-healing concrete: "ou’d think that concrete would last forever. After all, it’s pourable stone, so it should hang around as long as the Rock of Gibraltar. But, under the right (or wrong) conditions, concrete decays with alarming speed. To combat this, researchers at the University of Bath in the UK are working on a self-healing concrete that uses bacteria to seal the cracks that lead to decay. In this way, they hope to cut down on maintenance costs and increase the life of concrete structures."

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Even when stitched together, graphene remains the strongest known material

Even when stitched together, graphene remains the strongest known material: "A study conducted at Columbia University has revealed that even when stitched together from much smaller fragments, large sheets of graphene still retain much of their mechanical properties. The discovery may be a crucial step forward in the mass-production of carbon nanotubes that could be used to manufacture flexible electronics, ultra-light and strong materials, and perhaps even the first space elevator."

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Fluffy Stuff - two ingredient play-dough

Fluffy Stuff - two ingredient play-dough: "What do you get when you mix shaving cream with corn starch?

You get fluffy stuff (a mold-able play-with-me dough) that could be used to make summer snowballs.

I don't know if I found a cheaper way to entertain a group of children ranging from seven to two for an hour."

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Amelia Earhart’s Plane Believed to Have Been Found | ActionHub

Amelia Earhart’s Plane Believed to Have Been Found | ActionHub: "A recent announcement from The International Group of Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) revealed that the wreckage from Amelia Earhart’s 1937 flight might have finally been found."

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2014 Corvette stings a little harder with 460 horsepower

2014 Corvette stings a little harder with 460 horsepower: "When Chevy introduced the 2014 Corvette Stingray at the 2013 North American International Auto Show, it estimated that it would have 450 horsepower, making it the most powerful standard Corvette ever. As it turns out, it's even more powerful. Chevy released the official SAE-certified ratings this week, which show the new Corvette battling the highway with up to 460 ponies."

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Saker S-1: Military-inspired personal jet aims to reach Mach 0.99

Saker S-1: Military-inspired personal jet aims to reach Mach 0.99: "In the business world, time is money (and bragging rights). In April, the Citation X took said rights from the Gulfstream G650 with its maximum speed of Mach 0.935. Another contender could soon be on the tarmac in the form of the Saker S-1. With a design inspired by military fighter jets, US-based Saker Aircraft says its S-1 will cruise at Mach 0.95 and reach a top speed of Mach 0.99."

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WiFi-controlled multi-color light gives photos some Kick

WiFi-controlled multi-color light gives photos some Kick: "Not long ago we reviewed Photojojo’s Pocket Spotlight, a compact LED light source for use with smartphone cameras – or even with stand-alone cameras, for that matter. While the Spotlight just provides a single intensity of “white” light, the company’s new Kick is considerably fancier. It can be remotely-controlled via an iPhone app, and set to any color under the rainbow."

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Graphene-based image sensor to enhance low-light photography

Graphene-based image sensor to enhance low-light photography: "A team of scientists at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore has developed a new image sensor from graphene that promises to improve the quality of images captured in low light conditions. In tests, it has proved to be 1,000 times more sensitive to light than existing complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) or charge-coupled device (CCD) camera sensors in addition to operating at much lower voltages, consequently using 10 times less energy."

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Drayson Racing sets sights on EV land speed record

Drayson Racing sets sights on EV land speed record: "When Drayson Racing Technologies and Lola Cars introduced the B12 69/EV last year, the electric race car promised to be one of the fastest of its kind. Six months later, it set a record at the Goodwood Hillclimb, and it's now gunning for an even bigger record. Drayson announced this week that it plans to make an attempt at an FIA electric land speed record within a month. It will try to best the 175 mph (282 km/h) mark that was set back in 197"

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