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How voting rights groups are helping inmates vote from jail
If casting a ballot can already be a tricky process for regular citizens, you can imagine how difficult it is for inmates to vote—especially during the pandemic. Most states don’t allow felons to vote while serving their sentence. With that said, people with misdemeanor sentences do have the Read More...
IKEA and LEGO team up to save playtime and your living room floor
Parenting always comes with unique challenges, but one experience that is well-known to all parents of LEGO-loving children is the pain of stepping on one of those surprisingly sharp colorful blocks. Fortunately, treacherous LEGOs, and scattered playroom mess in general, could soon be a thing of Read More...
Flying taxis could be the future of air rescue emergency services
The promise of electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft (eVTOLs) was that they would unlock the skies to bring high-speed, traffic-free transportation to the public. But now it seems flying taxis could be a valuable asset for emergency air rescue services. In a recent feasibility study Read More...
Playing underwater ‘music’ attracts young fish to degraded coral reefs
Whether it’s the “crackle of snapping shrimp” or the swishing sounds of fish passing by, a healthy coral reef tends to be quite a noisy place. These are sounds that young fish are attracted to once they have hatched and spent their larval stage in the open ocean. The problem is that once a Read More...
Low-cost COVID-19 test produces accurate results in less than five minutes
Because of limited lab capacity, people getting tested for COVID-19 these days sometimes have to wait days or even weeks to get their results back, rendering the tests nearly useless. This often makes it incredibly difficult for contact tracers to find other infected patients in time to stop the Read More...
Conservationists release 26 scarlet macaws into Guatemala’s tropical forest
As a result of habitat loss and poaching, the scarlet macaw population has been suffering a decreasing trend over the last couple of decades, with fewer than 50,000 of the red bright birds remaining in the wild. But a recent conservation effort brings good news for these handsome tropical Read More...
How a single Japanese tourist got to enter Machu Picchu alone
Like many of us have experienced in the past months, Japanese tourist Jesse Katayama had his vacation plans ruined due to the coronavirus pandemic. Back in March, Katayama, a native of Osaka, arrived in Peru with the dream of visiting the ruins of Machu Picchu—the ancient Inca citadel. But when Read More...
Iconic rock band performs live concert in socially distant bubbles
Social distancing at a live rock concert may sound like a pipe dream, but the iconic rock band The Flaming Lips recently proved otherwise. On Monday, the band performed its first concert since the coronavirus pandemic started for a live audience in Oklahoma City, where everyone was entirely Read More...
Lifelike robotic creatures could be the future of theme parks and aquariums
Going to the aquarium may be a great way to learn about sea creatures, but keeping animals in captivity for such purposes usually comes hand in hand with a number of ethical problems. US engineering firm Edge Innovations wants to change that by creating animatronic dolphins that look almost Read More...
America’s first firefighting robot helped put out a blaze in downtown LA
Firefighting took a step into the future this week when the Los Angeles Fire Department became the first in the US to deploy a “robotic firefighting vehicle”. Weighing in at 3,500 pounds, LAFD’s Thermite RS3 is about the size of a Smart car but has the power to blast its way through a wall. Read More...