In a meeting of the cutting-edge and the mundane, the US Air Force has awarded a contract to purchase Reliable Robotics' autonomous flight technology and integrate it into an ordinary Cessna 208B Caravan utility aircraft for uncrewed cargo missions.
Category: Military, Technology
Tags: US Air Force, Autonomous flight
A new breath-based sensor from researchers at Penn State could soon offer an easy, pain-free, quick way to diagnose diabetes. The sensor was created through a technique that basically toasts a polymer until it turns into porous graphene.
Category: Diabetes, Illnesses and conditions, Body and Mind
Tags: Diabetic, Diagnostic devices, Breath, Pennsylvania State University
While machines have mastered both sight and sound, the sense of taste has proved harder to digitize. We've seen the creation of highly specialized artificial tongues targeting sweetness, chocolate, beer, wine or whisky, but now researchers in Beijing have developed a more generalist graphene oxide “tongue” that doesn’t just detect chemicals, it learns them. During laboratory tests, the system identified sour, salty, bitter, and sweet with nearly 99% accuracy, demonstrating that taste can be captured in digital form.
Earlier this month, Fujifilm announced that it would be raising its US prices on its products across the board, citing "volatile market conditions," but it didn't mention by how much. Now that retailers have started updating their listings, though, it's clear what the impact is. Here's what you need to know.
Several of its cameras have been affected. At retailers like B&H and Adorama, the X-T5 has gone from $1899 to $1999, while the GFX100RF has gone from $5399 to $5599. The GFX 100S II has seen a similar jump, going from $5499 to $5699.
This is Fujifilm's second price increase within the last month; at the beginning of August, the company raised the prices on some of its cameras and lenses by up to 15%.
Aug 30 priceAt time of writing, the X-M5, X-T50 and X100VI all appear to have stayed at the prices they rose to at the beginning of the month. However, two cameras have been unaffected by both of the price changes: the X half and X-E5.
Unlike the rest of Fujifilm's lineup, they were released after the tariffs were announced. It seems like Fujifilm built plenty of room into their prices to avoid having to raise them again before people had even received their pre-orders. The company did say, however, that its goal was to maintain its overall pricing structure.
The X half and X-E5 were released after the tariffs were announcedOf course, some of Fujifilm's lenses have also been affected by both waves of price adjustments. The venerable 16-55mm F2.8 II has gone from $1349 to $1399, and the company's more affordable standard zoom, the 16-50mm F2.8-4.8, is also now $50 more. Some of its premium primes, like the 23mm F1.4, 56mm F1.2 and 90mm F2 have gone up by $100, and while the 35mm F2 has gone up by $50, several of the company's more entry-level primes appear to be unaffected.
Obviously, having to do a second price increase in a row isn't ideal for anyone. It's now more expensive for Americans to get the company's cameras, which could lead to decreased demand, though Fujifilm is far from the only camera company having to raise its prices in the US.
Plant-based microbeads made from everyday ingredients like green tea and seaweed have helped mice shed weight by trapping fats in the gut, reports a new study published in Cell Biomaterials. Researchers see these microbeads as a potential “structured, drug-free therapy” to treat obesity, with fewer side effects than the current medications.
Category: Obesity, Illnesses and conditions, Body and Mind
Tags: Weight, Weight Loss, Obesity
Amid ongoing debate about red meat’s role in human health, a new risk has emerged. Researchers have shown that a gut-bacterial byproduct of eating red meat and other animal products is linked to the development and progression of abdominal aortic aneurysms – particularly in older men.
Category: Heart Disease, Illnesses and conditions, Body and Mind
Tags: Cleveland Clinic, Cardiovascular disease, Age-Related, Gut Bacteria, Gut health, Blood, Blood Pressure
This week, Hasselblad announced the X2D II, its latest medium format camera. While its "end-to-end" HDR capabilities are perhaps the most eye-catching feature, there are other upgrades that make it a more versitile camera than its predecessor.
In this week's roundtable discussion, editors Abby Ferguson, Dale Baskin and Mitchell Clark sat down to discuss the camera and what it means for the industry. Of course, there are some bits about the moon in there, too (we couldn't resist).
If you're looking for more info on the X2D II, check out our first look video, presented in HDR, or read our initial review.
Sweden's historic Kiruna Church needed to be relocated due to an expanding iron ore mine in the area. Rather than demolishing it or trying to carefully disassemble it for the move, the decision was made to simply jack it up and wheel it across town.
Category: Architecture, Technology
Tags: Building and Construction, Church, Engineering, Kiruna, Sweden
We humans have mastered fire, split the atom, and shot ourselves into space. We've built machines that can outthink us and tools that can cook us lunch or cut open our chests to perform life-saving surgeries. That's all well and good. The space part is certainly cool, sure ... but it doesn't look like us. It doesn't feel human.
Category: Robotics, Technology
Tags: Dance, Humanoid, Tesla Robot, Figure, Aldebaran Robotics, Evolutionary robotics
We started the week off by previewing the Ford Nugget High Roof camper van, and we're closing it out with all the details about the adorable small (but high) van that now sits atop Ford's camper lineup. Designed with winter road tripping in mind, the new Ford Nugget High Roof is a versatile year-round mini-adventure machine. While priced above an equivalent long-wheelbase Nugget pop-top, the Nugget High Roof still rolls to market at under €85,500 (US$100,000).
Category: Campervans, Adventure Vehicles, Outdoors
Tags: Ford, Campervan, RV, dusseldorf-caravan-salon-2025, Camping, Westfalia-Automotive, Outdoors and Camping
A decades-old scientific controversy and a small bench-top apparatus at the University of British Columbia (UBC) could be the key to more efficient fusion reactors by increasing the chances of a nuclear reaction occurring.
Category: Energy, Technology
Tags: University of British Columbia, Nuclear Fusion, Nuclear
Waterskiing, knee boarding, and wake surfing (aka wakeboarding) are popular water-sports. They can be done on any body of water that is large enough to accommodate a relatively fast-moving boat. MasterCraft boats can do all three, but specialize in wake surfing.
Category: Outdoors
Tags: Boat, Boating, Water Sports, Reviews
As lightweight, power-dense axial-flux electric motor topology shows its ability to be a dominant force in the auto market, and flashes early signs of inherent superiority for the skies, it's also quietly making some inroads in the boating segment. The new Falcon series from Denmark's EPTechnologies (EPT) has debuted as one of the most powerful electric outboards on water, and it's well lighter than the competition thanks to its slim, axial-flux orientation. The Falcon is smart, too, using a free-rotating propeller to provide improved maneuverability and handling.
Astronomers have discovered a new celestial object, a compact radio beacon located in the galaxy NGS 4945, about 12 million light-years away. Its light is polarized at an almost impossible level that hints at a perfectly aligned magnetic field. The object has been nicknamed "Punctum"; it’s a signal so clean and precise that it stands out like a lighthouse beam cutting through fog.
The Cabana tiny house squeezes a lot of house into a length of just 20 ft (6 m). Despite its compact dimensions, it includes two bedrooms, plus a flexible room that can be used as an office or a third bedroom.
Category: Tiny Houses, Outdoors
Tags: Building and Construction, Tiny Footprint, Micro-House, House, Home
Now more than ever, it's important to get your news from sources you trust – not just from whatever the first hits are that come up in a Google search. That's why Google has launched a Preferred Sources function within its new News on Search feature … and you can use it with our site!
Category: Telecommunications, Technology
Tags: News, Internet, Google Home
At first, choosing an SD card to go in your camera may seem like an easy task. After all, they all look more or less the same, so picking one should be as simple as going to the store, finding the highest-capacity one that fits in your budget, and putting it in your camera, right?
Unfortunately, that's not quite the case. While that strategy will probably work for most modern cameras, there are some considerations you'll want to take into account if you're using older cameras or if you're shooting video or bursts of photos.
The need for speed SD card labels have a lot of information, but not all of it is relevant.Looking at the label of a typical SD card can be an assault on the senses. They're often covered with numbers and letters, and while the meaning of some (such as the size) may be obvious, others are less so.
Many cards advertise a write and/or read speed, usually denoted in MBps. You can pretty much ignore this; often the card only shows the read speed, which isn't particularly important for cameras, as you'll mainly be writing to it, and even when it does include a write speed, it's almost always showing the best-case scenario rating, which won't be particularly applicable to real-world shooting.
You can ignore the listed read/write speedsIf that number isn't useful, what should you look at instead? It depends on your use case. If you just plan on taking single photos and maybe a few short video clips, most modern SD cards will work just fine; you don't need to pay extra for a super-fast model, which will often come with labels like V60 or V90.
If you have a high-resolution camera, plan on doing a lot of burst shooting with both Raws and JPEGs, or shooting long 4K60p clips or even 8K video, you'll want to spend the extra money to get one of the high-end cards. If you get a card with a low speed rating like V30 or even no V-rating at all, it could hinder your camera's performance.
What about the other ratings? UHS-I cards (top) have fewer pins than UHS-II ones (bottom).The SD standard has had several speed ratings over the years, enough that it could be its own separate article. If you're using an older camera, it may be worth checking if it recommends a certian C or U-rating, but nowadays the most important spec will be the card's UHS rating. Most cards you're likely to run into are UHS-I or UHS-II. It's easy to tell the difference between the two, as UHS-II cards have a second row of pins on the back.
If you have an older or lower-end camera, it'll likely have a UHS-I slot, and you won't get any benefit from a UHS-II card. It'll likely still work with your camera, but it'll only be able to run at the slower UHS-I speeds. Likewise, UHS-I cards will work in cameras with UHS-II slots, but as we noted in the speed section, they may bottleneck your camera's performance if your usage is particularly demanding.
Can an SD card have too much storage? Some cameras won't be able to accept larger cards.While high-capacity SD cards are always getting less expensive, there are situations where you may need to avoid getting the one with the most storage. For example, if you're using an older camera, it may not work with larger cards.
If you look closely at your card, you may notice that it has a few letters after "SD," such as "SDHC" or "SDXC." These actually denote different generations of cards, and while most newer cameras will be able to use any of them, older cameras may not be compatible with newer generations of cards.
Some cameras have a printed or engraved indicator that shows which version of SD they support; if not, that information should be available in the manual, or online. If your camera says "SDHC," for example, you'll probably only be able to use it with cards that are 32GB or smaller. Cameras that just support "SD," meanwhile, are limited to cards that are just 2GB or less, which can be difficult to find new.
SD eXtended Capacity, or SDXC, was introduced in 2009 and supports cards up to 2TB, so this will mainly be a concern for cameras released around that year or before, though some lower-end cameras from the 2010s may also lack SDXC support.
microSD vs SDWhile it's not particularly common, a few cameras use microSD cards instead of full-size ones. The name makes the difference obvious: microSD cards are SD cards, but much smaller. The speed ratings and classes will all be the same, so the advice for buying a microSD card is much the same as it is for full-size ones; figure out how big and fast a card you need, and go from there.
If your computer only has a full-size SD card reader or you want to be able to use your card in a variety of cameras, fear not: microSD to SD adapters are widely available, and may even be included when you buy a microSD card. This only goes one way, though; you can't gracefully fit a full-size SD card into a microSD slot.
What is SD Express?It's not particularly likely, but you may come across cards labeled as "SD Express." If you do, we don't recommend buying it, as there are currently no cameras on the market that support the standard. While SD Express cards are backwards compatible with standard SD slots, they'll only run at UHS-I speeds, so you'll be paying for a high-speed card without any benefit at all.
Wait, this isn't SD at all! Higher-end cameras may have a CFexpress slot alongside an SD one... or even two CFexpress slots!While SD cards have been the industry standard for years, if you buy a vintage point-and-shoot, you may wind up with something that doesn't take them. Unfortunately, there may not be much you can do about that, as finding obsolete cards such as xD or the original Memory Stick is increasingly difficult. In some cases, you may be able to find an adapter that will let you use SD or microSD cards in other slots, and some older formats like Compact Flash are still around, but generally it's best to stick to cameras with SD card slots.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are high-end modern cameras, which may use standards like CFexpress Type B. While most people won't have ended up with one of these cameras by accident, if you see a port that's far too big for an standard SD card, that may be what it's meant for.
When in doubt...If you bought a new camera and are unsure what card to use with it, check the manual. Most come with recommendations for specific SD cards that the manufacturer knows will let you get the most out of your camera. Cards not on the list will almost certainly work with it, but if you want to be sure you're not getting something that will slow your camera down, it's a good place to start.
Boston Dynamics probably has the most show-offy robots on the planet right now, and the company's latest video shows that its robodog, Spot, is no exception. Spoiler alert: he nails a septuple back flip that is wildly impressive.
Category: Robotics, Technology
Tags: Boston Dynamics, Robots
Rollei Analog may have something new coming for analog shooters, according to its first Instagram post in four years. The company shared "We are back" on its account this week, with hints that something is coming.
The Instagram account rollei_analog hadn't posted since October 14, 2021. This week, though, it shared a post with a Zebra and text saying "We are back" and "be prepared and stay tuned!" The caption of the post said it has "big plans, new projects and analog inspiration." It isn't clear if it's simply an announcement that the Instagram account will be active again, or if there will be new products coming.
View this post on InstagramA post shared by Rollei Analog Official (@rollei_analog)
Hans O. Mahn GmbH & Co. KG manages the Rollei Analog brand, which specializes in film, photo chemicals and photographic papers. It last shared news on its website in 2020, so even that platform has been quiet for a while. You can still buy Rollei-branded film; however, it's not produced in-house by Rollei and is repackaged from other major manufacturers.
Over the past year, we've also seen the Rollei name pop up on other products, including a mirrorless lens and the Rollei 35AF film camera. However, those products are the result of licensing deals, with other companies obtaining the rights to use the Rollei branding on their products. The lens looked as though it was likely a re-branded 7Artisans offering. The revival of the iconic Rollei 35 in an autofocus format was a project by Mint Camera, which licensed the Rollei name from Rollei GmbH & Co. KG.
Rollei Analog's cryptic post leaves a lot to the imagination, and the comments are peppered with requests. We'll just have to wait and see what it means by "big plans," though.
It's still a niche, but with projects like Wimberly Springs and Wolf Ranch, 3D-printed housing continues to grow in popularity in the USA. The latest example of this consists of two 3D-printed homes in Colorado that showcase the impressive speed and resilience of the burgeoning construction technology.
Category: Architecture, Technology
Tags: Building and Construction, 3D Printing, House, Home
