Growing Bone Tissue With Sound Waves (Cool Weird Awesome 724)

Researchers at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology took stem cells and treated them with high-frequency sound waves, which was enough to convert them into bone cells.

By |2024-03-03T11:45:29-05:00March 3, 2022|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , , , |

Jets Can Burn Less Fuel Thanks To Electric Towing (Cool Weird Awesome 719)

Taxiing accounts for about 5 percent of a jet's fuel consumption, so one way to make flying greener is making taxiing greener, like through an all-electric towing system.

By |2022-02-17T06:49:25-05:00February 17, 2022|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , , |

High Tech Clothes Could Start Your Car Or Pay For Your Groceries (Cool Weird Awesome 662)

Our wireless, hands-free, automatic, smart device era may be about to get even smarter, thanks to high-tech smart fabric that can send out signals to devices or turn itself into a health monitor. Plus: a trash barrel from the US goes on holiday, traveling all the way across the ocean to end up in Ireland. 

By |2023-11-23T16:47:53-05:00November 23, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , |

When Countries Stayed Out Of The Olympics, They Held Their Own Olympic-Style Games (Cool Weird Awesome 589)

The Olympic Games are supposed to bring the countries of the world together, but that isn't always what happens. Several times the Games have been canceled, and at other times, boycotts have led some countries to hold their own alternative competitions. Plus: we mark the birthday of the great Black scientist and inventor Dr. Shirley Ann Jackson.

“Soft Electronics” Means Even Devices With Holes In Them Could Still Work (Cool Weird Awesome 563)

Our high-tech devices are amazing but also kind of fragile. But a team at Virginia Tech has a solution: “soft electronics” that can not only keep working when they’re damaged, they can heal themselves. Plus: NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Caltech have been using high-altitude balloons to measure seismic activity, and they're hoping to send those balloons someday to monitor Venusquakes! 

By |2021-06-30T09:04:11-04:00June 30, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , |

Waterways Could Get Extra Clean After They’re Cleaned By These Drones (Cool Weird Awesome 512)

A device in Denmark, WasteShark, has been roaming through water to scoop up floating debris. Now it's going to have a flying companion drone to help spot waste and maybe even clean up oil spills. Plus: photographer Nancy Floyd has been taking self-portraits and other images, structured the same way, day after day since 1982, to show the passage of time. Talk about playing the long game. 

By |2024-01-12T09:49:30-05:00April 5, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , , , , |

A High-Tech Bed That Can Help Rock A Preemie (Cool Weird Awesome 508)

Babies born ahead of schedule can benefit from close contact with parents and caregivers - and for the times they're not available, there's a new hospital bed called Calmer that can simulate the rocking motion they feel when they're being held up close. Plus: anybody need a fancy door that can fold down into a ping pong table? Cause that exists now.

By |2021-03-30T07:30:04-04:00March 30, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , |

Smart Tech Can Help Beekeepers Protect Their Hives (Cool Weird Awesome 504)

An engineer and beekeeper in New England has developed a system using radar and vibrational sensors to detect when a hive is being robbed by a rival colony, or when some of the bees are about to leave and start their own colony. That should create a buzz among beekepers!

By |2024-03-24T09:40:50-04:00March 24, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , , |

The Butler In A Box Was A Smart Speaker Before There Were Smart Speakers (Cool Weird Awesome 487)

You know about the Echo and the Google Home, but do you know about the Butler In A Box? It was a voice-controlled smart home device in the 1980s, and could do many of the same things our smart speakers do today. Plus: it's the birthday of Dr. Mark Dean, a computing pioneer who helped create some of the most important technology we have, and also saw the future of technology quite a few times.

By |2024-03-02T10:30:43-05:00March 2, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , , , |

The People Of 1921 Had A Good Feeling About 2021 (Cool Weird Awesome 457)

I certainly did not expect 2021 to be what it is, but what did people back in the day predict our world would be like now? Entrepreneur Magazine looked back at predictions from a hundred years ago, and some of them were surprisingly close to the mark.

By |2024-01-12T10:10:48-05:00January 12, 2021|Categories: Cool Weird Awesome, Podcasts|Tags: , , , |
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