Seven From Seven: Solar powered planes and England’s nature recovery

27th May 2022

Each week, we scour the worlds of innovation, tech for good and social impact to bring you seven of our top stories…

  1. London’s Science Museum’s newest exhibition shows examples of new technologies that can help to detect cancer and remove tumours in the body. Technologies include a cytosponge – a pill that expands in the oesophagus and grabs cells to test for cancer.
  2. A section of road in Wellington, New Zealand, will be made with Strength-Tex, a product made of used textiles. The product will save approximately 11,725kg of CO2e and 568,500 litres of water compared to traditional surfaces.
  3. The Telegraph reports that the UK’s first fully solar-powered plane has made its first flight. The plane is powered by off-the-grid solar panels and can currently fly for one hour.
  4. Fabrix, a property developer in London, is re-using pieces from old buildings in new designs in a new process named ‘urban mining.’ The pieces used would originally be melted down, becoming unusable.
  5. The Guardian reports that up to 99,000 hectares of land in England will be part of a nature recovery programme to tackle wildlife loss, the climate crisis, and improve public access to nature.
  6. Microchips meant to mimic the human brain could make AI more energy efficient. The new chips run AI algorithms by using a fraction of the energy used by ordinary chips.
  7. Scientists have developed a new method of predicting seasonal wildfires in the US. The new method analyses precipitation, temperatures, and drought in the winter and spring of that year.

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