Best Tech Stories around the web #332

Tesla Optimus bot

INNOVATION

Tesla’s Optimus Robot Is a Bit of a Flop, but That Doesn’t Mean It Isn’t Important by gizmodo.com

In August 2021, Tesla CEO Elon Musk annouced the electric car manufacturer was planning to get into the robot business. Musk has now unveiled a prototype of the robot, called Optimus, which he hopes to mass-produce and sell for less than US$20,000. Read more

SCIENCE

Nobel Prize Awarded to Scientist Who Sequenced Neanderthal Genome by nytimes.com

Svante Pääbo, a Swedish geneticist, was honored for work that created a new field of ancient DNA studies and identified populations at higher risk of disease. Read more

Svante Pääbo medecine nobel prize

MOBILITY

 

An all-electric passenger plane completed its first test flight by theverge.com

The small aircraft carries big hopes for more sustainable aviation, but there are roadblocks ahead. Read more

Electric plane Alice

PODCAST

The Langley Files on spotify.com

On this debut episode of The Langley Files, CIA Director Bill Burns joins the hosts, Dee and Walter, to dispel some common misconceptions about the CIA, provide insights into the character and skills of the Agency’s workforce, and share some personal anecdotes about what it means to him to lead the world’s premiere foreign intelligence organization. Listen

The Langley Files podcast

UNUSUAL

Living plant controls a machete through an industrial robot arm by designboom.com

David Bowen’s installation, ‘Plant Machete,’ enables a living plant to move a machete through an industrial robot‘s bionic-like arm. Read more

Plant holding a machete