Month: April 2019

Scientists in Israel have revealed what they say is the world's first 3D-printed heart using human tissue. It's hoped the small heart will pave the way for transplants without donors, when every hospital might have access to 3D organ printers. Faith Lapidus reports. ...

Tech toys used to be their own category at the toy store, but just as technology has become unavoidable in day-to-day life, so too has it become more integrated into toys for children. Tina Trinh reports. ...

Microsoft recently rejected a California law enforcement agency’s request to install facial recognition technology in officers’ cars and body cameras because of human rights concerns, company President Brad Smith said Tuesday. Microsoft concluded it would lead to innocent women and minorities being disproportionately held for questioning because the artificial intelligence has been trained on mostly white, male pictures. AI has more cases of mistaken identity with women and minorities, multiple research projects have found. “Anytime they pulled anyone over, they wanted to run a face scan” against a database of suspects, Smith said without naming the agency. After thinking through the uneven impact, “we said this technology is not your answer.” Prison contract accepted Speaking at a Stanford University conference on “human-centered artificial intelligence,” Smith said Microsoft had also declined…

Automakers are showcasing electric SUVs and sedans with more driving range and luxury features at the Shanghai auto show, trying to appeal to Chinese buyers in their biggest market as Beijing slashes subsidies that have propelled demand.  Communist leaders wanting China to lead in electric vehicles have imposed sales targets. That requires brands to pour money into creating models to compete with gasoline-powered vehicles on price, looks and performance at a time when they are struggling with a Chinese sales slump.  General Motors, Volkswagen, China's Geely and other brands on Tuesday displayed dozens of models, from luxury SUVs to compacts priced under $10,000, at Auto Shanghai 2019. The show, the global industry's biggest marketing event of the year, opens to the public Saturday following a preview for reporters. On Monday,…

Most wireless communications use RF or radio frequency communications to send data back and forth. But all that information can slow things down. One National Science Foundation supported researcher is using light to send information, and, as we hear from VOA's Kevin Enochs, it’s quicker and more secure than RF. ...

The vibrant colors and hues that make up Georgia O'Keeffe's paintings soon will be on full display for color blind visitors The vibrant colors and hues in Georgia O'Keeffe's paintings soon will be on full display for color blind visitors. The Santa Fe museum announced Monday it's teaming up with California-based EnChroma to expand the gallery experience through special glasses. Starting May 3, visitors with red-green color blindness can borrow glasses to see O'Keeffe's work in the way that she intended.  One of the museum's curators, Katrina Stacy, says O'Keeffe in her later years developed visual impairment from macular degeneration and turned her attention to sculpture.  Stacy says the project with EnChroma has ties to that part of the artist's story. EnChroma co-founder Andrew Schmeder says O'Keeffe juxtaposed colors from…

The Israeli start-up behind last week's failed lunar landing has vowed to create a second mission to steer a privately funded spacecraft onto the moon. Morris Kahn, Israeli billionaire and chairman of SpaceIL, the nonprofit that undertook the botched lunar mission, says he's already formed a task force of engineers and donors that will build another spacecraft. He called the new mission a lesson in persistence for "the younger generation."   SpaceIL confirmed Monday that the crew will convene in the coming weeks to figure out how to fix the technical glitches that caused the first mission to crash, while still keeping the venture relatively fast and cheap.   The crash ended an ambitious eight-year effort to make Israel the fourth nation to land on the moon.     ...

Women are woefully underrepresented in technology, science, engineering and mathematics jobs in South Africa. But for the last decade, a homegrown, UNICEF-supported program has worked to bring 11,000 lower-income high school girls into these industries. Among those students was Raquel Sorota. Sorota has come a long way from her humble upbringing in Johannesburg’s Tembisa township. She now works as a risk engineer at a top South African insurance company. She was those one of those South African high school girls who went through the UNICEF-supported TechnoGirls program, which started in 2005. She was selected for the program in 2009. Now 24, she says it changed her life. “My life has literally never been the same again,” she said. “So, before the program, I wanted to be a doctor and today…

Women are woefully underrepresented in technology, science, engineering and mathematics jobs in South Africa. But for the last decade, a homegrown, UNICEF-supported program has worked to bring 11,000 lower-income high school girls into these industries. VOA's Anita Powell catches up with a few such "TechnoGirls" in Johannesburg and brings us their stories. ...

The world’s largest aircraft took off over the Mojave Desert in California Saturday, the first flight for the carbon-composite plane built by Stratolaunch Systems Corp., started by late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, as the company enters the lucrative private space market. The white airplane called Roc, which has a wingspan the length of an American football field and is powered by six engines on a twin fuselage, took to the air shortly before 7 a.m. Pacific time (1400 GMT) and stayed aloft for more than two hours before landing safely back at the Mojave Air and Space Port as a crowd of hundreds of people cheered. First flight 'fantastic' “What a fantastic first flight,” Stratolaunch Chief Executive Officer Jean Floyd said in a statement posted to the company’s website. “Today’s…

Even though the U.S. first landed on the moon 50 years ago this year, it's never been — nor will it ever be — an easy thing to accomplish. The Israelis learned just how difficult it is. VOA's Kevin Enochs reports. ...

In the race to beat China in the fifth generation of wireless technology, known as 5G, U.S. President Donald Trump is announcing the largest-ever auction of radio frequencies and a $20 billion fund to build a rural fiber-optics backbone. "We cannot allow any other country to outcompete the United States in this powerful industry of the future," Trump said in the White House Roosevelt Room, flanked by a group of telecommunications tower climbers and farmers. "The race to 5G is a race that we must win." Starting Dec. 10, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will begin auctioning three chunks of millimeter-wave frequencies (upper 37 GHz, 39 GHz and 47 GHz) for cellphone companies to use. Some Trump allies had tried to persuade him to effectively nationalize this technology as a…

Facebook Inc. more than doubled the money it spent on Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg’s security in 2018 to $22.6 million, a regulatory filing showed Friday. Zuckerberg has drawn a base salary of $1 for the past three years, and his “other” compensation was listed at $22.6 million, most of which was for his personal security. Nearly $20 million went toward security for Zuckerberg and his family, up from about $9 million the year prior. Zuckerberg also received $2.6 million for personal use of private jets, which the company said was part of his overall security program. Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg took home $23.7 million in 2018 compared to $25.2 million last year. Facebook has in the past few years faced public outcry over its role in Russia’s alleged…

SpaceX launched its second supersized rocket and for the first time landed all three boosters Thursday, a year after sending up a sports car on the initial test flight. The new and improved Falcon Heavy thundered into the early evening sky with a communication satellite called Arabsat, the rocket’s first paying customer. The Falcon Heavy is the most powerful rocket in use today, with 27 engines firing at liftoff — nine per booster. Eight minutes after liftoff, SpaceX landed two of the first-stage boosters back at Cape Canaveral, side by side, just like it did for the rocket’s debut last year. The core booster landed two minutes later on an ocean platform hundreds of miles offshore. That’s the only part of the first mission that missed. “What an amazing day,”…