Mix-and-match kit could enable astronauts to build a menagerie of lunar exploration bots

The Walking Oligomeric Robotic Mobility System, or WORMS, is a reconfigurable, modular, multiagent robotics architecture for extreme lunar terrain mobility. The system could be used to assemble autonomous worm-like parts into larger biomimetic robots that could explore lava tubes, steep slopes, and the moon’s permanently shadowed regions

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Sierra Space and Notre Dame to Push the Boundaries of Scientific Discovery in Space

Sierra Space and Notre Dame to Push the Boundaries of Scientific Discovery in Space. Sierra Space and Notre Dame announce plans to develop new in-space R&D platforms – expanding the academic institution’s footprint in low-Earth orbit and beyond.

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The Switch Made From a Single Molecule

Researchers have demonstrated a switch, analogous to a transistor, made from a single molecule called fullerene. By using a carefully tuned laser pulse, the researchers are able to use fullerene to switch the path of an incoming electron in a predictable way. This switching process can be three to six orders of magnitude faster than switches in microchips, depending on the laser pulses used. Fullerene switches in a network could produce a computer beyond what is possible with electronic transistors, and they could also lead to unprecedented levels of resolution in microscopic imaging devices.

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Cummins announces new 540 horsepower L9 for defense applications

Cummins Inc. announces its ISL9 diesel engine is now available up to 540 horsepower for military ground vehicles. The ISL9 is already proven in a wide variety of equipment; commercial on and off-highway and military vehicles like armoured personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles and logistical trucks.

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Qcells invests over $2.5 billion to build first fully-integrated solar supply chain in the U.S.

Photovoltaic manufacturer Qcells, an affiliate of the Hanwha Group, announced it will invest over $2.5 billion to build the first fully-integrated, silicon-based solar supply chain, from raw material to finished panel, in the United States, which represents the largest ever clean energy investment to date in the country.

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