Quantic’s Weekly Roundup – August 2020 (3)

Quantic’s Weekly Roundup is a satisfying mix of the latest breaking news, business, STEM and social science stories. Here are your headlines for this week:

To the moon and back: A Japanese startup company, ispace, is working to put a private lunar lander on the moon sometime in the next few years. The company raised more than $28 million in a Series B funding round. It will also launch a new data platform that will allow businesses to use the information it collects to help with commercial development. 

Lots of buzz around this experiment: Local officials in Florida have approved the release of 750 million mosquitoes that have been genetically modified to reduce local populations. The aim is to reduce the number of mosquitoes that carry diseases like dengue or the Zika virus. The British-based, US-operated company, Oxitec, produces the bugs and has already seen positive results from field trials in Brazil.

A tradition unlike any other: Medieval ‘wine windows’ in Italy have reopened to serve wine, Aperol Spritz, gelato and more. These windows, built around 1530 and once part of everyday life, are now becoming essential again for restaurant and cafe owners. Now, several wine windows have re-opened for the first time in generations, and are being used to serve food and drinks in a socially distanced way. 

Calories not included: A breakthrough with biomorphic batteries could allow robots to store up to 72-times more energy through a system similar to biological fat reserves. This type of biomorphic technology is based on living forms and is ideal for humanoid robots being developed to work and operate within environments designed for humans.

What if blankets had the power to advance healthcare technology, during the coronavirus pandemic? Executive MBA Students, Olivia Lin and Edward Shim, developed a Studio 1 Labs bed sheet that can be used in hospitals to monitor patients’ vitals and respiratory distress.