In 1933, the Soviet Union began construction work on what would become some of the world’s most beautiful subway stations. The Moscow Metro opened in 1935. Built mainly by hand, the train stations resemble a palace more than a place of transit. And they were palaces of a sort: they articulated, through architecture, the Soviet creed that the worker, not a king, queen or Tsar, reigned supreme. The irony—and tragedy—is that these palaces required the punishment of the very people they venerated: working conditions on these palatial subway sites were notoriously cruel.
A jet pack, rocket belt or rocket pack is a device, usually worn on the back, which uses jets of gas (or in some cases liquid) to propel the wearer through the air. The concept has been present in science fiction for almost a century and became widespread in the 1960s. Real jet packs, using a variety of mechanisms have been developed, though the challenges of Earth's atmosphere, Earth's gravity, low energy density of available fuels, and the human body not being naturally adapted to fly mean that their uses are much more limited than their fictional counterparts, being principally used for stunts. A practical use for the jet pack has been in extra-vehicular activities for astronauts.
Fly over “Datong County”, a region in northern China, and you’ll see two giant pandas. One is waving at you. They are made of thousands of solar panels. Together, and with the other adjacent panels included, they form a 100-megawatt farm covering 248 acres. It’s actually a relatively small solar park by China’s standards – but it is certainly patriotic. “It is designed and built as the image of the Chinese national treasure – the giant panda,” explains a document from Panda Green Energy, the company that constructed the farm.
The name may point a long way into the future - ‘Terzo Millennio’ means third millennium - but Lamborghini CEO Stefano Domenicali started the Terzo project on his arrival at Sant’Agata. The idea was to explore how to make an EV hypercar dramatic and engaging enough to deliver both the kerb appeal and performance that makes it worthy of the brand, as well as engage Lambo’s future audience. The Terzo is basically a rolling technical test bed designed to challenge current EV thinking and jump-start a more radical approach.
With any technology, there are certain inflection points when it goes from being something perpetually in the near future to being a part of everyday life. For years, drones have been hovering on the cusp—used by militaries and relatively small numbers of hobbyists but not part of the larger culture. The U.S. military ushered in the drone age in 2001, when it began using the unmanned, remotely piloted technology to target al-Qaeda leaders in the wilds of Afghanistan. Drones have since become a key part of the military’s arsenal, and their use in conflict zones around the world has expanded under both the Obama and Trump Administrations. Civilian uses, however, have long been more promise than reality.