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Americans Move to More Solar and Wind Power in 2021
In 2021, Americans used 5 percent more energy than in 2020. Solar and wind energy production increased drastically this past year, with jumps of 20 percent and 11 percent, respectively; biomass-derived energy also increased by 7 percent. These increases contrasted with hydro, geothermal and nuclear power, which decreased by 12 percent, 4 percent and 1 percent, respectively.
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Artificial Intelligence and Chemical and Biological Weapons
A recent article in Nature offers a disturbing look at the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the creation of chemical and biological weapons. “Anyone unfamiliar with recent innovations in the use of AI to model new drugs will be unpleasantly surprised,” Paul Rosenzweig writes. “The benefits of these innovations are clear. Unfortunately, the possibilities for malicious uses are also becoming clear.”
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New Tool in the Fight Against Hackers
A new form of security identification could soon see the light of day and help us protect our data from hackers and cybercriminals. Quantum mathematicians have solved a mathematical riddle that allows for a person’s geographical location to be used as a personal ID that is secure against even the most advanced cyberattacks.
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Risk Models Overlook an Important Element
Earthquakes themselves affect the movement of Earth’s tectonic plates, which in turn could impact on future earthquakes, according to new research. This new knowledge should be incorporated in computer models used to gauge earthquake risk, according to the researchers behind the study.
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Risk Models Overlook an Important Element
Earthquakes themselves affect the movement of Earth’s tectonic plates, which in turn could impact on future earthquakes, according to new research. This new knowledge should be incorporated in computer models used to gauge earthquake risk, according to the researchers behind the study.
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The Social Impact of Disasters
A human geographer and a physicist conduct research into weather and climate risks. Their methods may be different, but they agree that the scale of a disaster is often determined more by societal decisions than by the natural hazard itself.
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To Reduce Growing Climate Dangers, the World Needs to Consider Sunlight Reflection
Nothing about the present climate crisis or its implications is natural. Perhaps how the world deals with a warming planet shouldn’t be either.
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National Action Plan: The U.S. Domestic Counter-Unmanned Aircraft
Over the last decade, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS or “drones”) have become a regular feature of American life. We use them for recreation, for research, and for commerce. But the proliferation of this new technology has also introduced new risks to public safety, privacy, and homeland security. On Monday, the administration released whole-of-government plan to address UAS threats in the homeland.
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A Peak at the Nation’s Future Cybersecurity Workforce
Hack the Port 22, hosted jointly by USCYBERCOM and the Maryland Innovation and Security Institute, brought together subject matter experts from government, industry, and academia to highlight the nation’s critical infrastructure and cyber defense priorities.
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Real-Time Flood Sensors, Dancing Drones and More
Over 40 innovations, including new influenza diagnosis tests and human-driven robots, will be on display at the Research Excellence Exhibit this Friday at NYU.
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Harnessing Wave Energy
Most wave energy devices only capture energy in one direction, such as an up-down motion, but waves have some movement in multiple directions.
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Bringing Big Science to Address the Climate Challenge
Tackling the climate crisis and achieving an equitable clean energy future are among the biggest challenges of our time. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the largest Department of Energy science and energy laboratory in the country, says it is deeply invested in the big science capabilities and expertise needed to address the climate challenge on multiple fronts.
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Risks of an Unfamiliar New Nuclear Age
High-tech advances in weapons technologies and a return of ‘great power nuclear politics’, risk the world ‘sleepwalking’ into a nuclear age vastly different from the established order of the Cold War, experts warn. Stockpiles are much reduced from the peak of up to 70,000 nuclear weapons seen in the 1980s, but progress in a number of new or ‘disruptive’ technologies threatens to fundamentally change the central pillars on which nuclear order, stability and risk reduction are based.
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AI, Machine Learning to Help Defend Against Cyberattacks
Two new tools are helping cybersecurity professionals fight the vast volume of threats and attacks— artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. AI and machine learning can detect novel malicious code, catch fraudulent charges on a credit card or fraudulent network login attempts, block phishing messages on an email service and assist companies with cloud management in spotting anomalies that traditional cyber defense technologies may not pick up.
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Predictive Models of Wildfire Behavior
New partnership will work to Advance fire research capabilities to help support the work of fire-, land-, and emergency managers.
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More headlines
The long view
Leveraging U.S. Capital Markets to Support the Future Industrial Network
$56 trillion is nearly three times the size of the U.S. economy. This vast pool of capital in U.S. capital markets — $46 trillion in public capitalization and another $10 trillion in private money – dwarfs that of China. Tapping U.S. equity and debt markets would enable the Department of Defense to remedy current capability shortfalls, fund technological advances from leading private-sector innovators, invest in generational transformation efforts across the military services, and upgrade antiquated global infrastructure to sustain U.S. forces.
Using Blockchain to Increase Electric Grid Resiliency
Blockchain is best known for securing digital currency payments, but researchers are using it to track a different kind of exchange: It’s the first time blockchain has ever been used to validate communication among devices on the electric grid.
Hydrogen Changing Power Dynamics in Energy Sector
As the EU tries to finalize its hydrogen rules, Asian countries are moving fast to secure deliveries and the US is committing money to set up local supply chains. Can the Middle East collaborate with both continents?