by Michael Belfiore | Feb 6, 2011 | Blog
Prizes have enormous potential to foster radical solutions to tough problems. It’s because of a prize that Charles Lindbergh flew across the Atlantic in 1927. It was to win a prize that Scaled Composites launched the first commercial manned spaceship in 2004....
by Michael Belfiore | Feb 5, 2011 | Blog
Last April, President Obama set NASA on a course that will have it chartering commercial flights to the International Space Station after the Space Shuttle retires this year, freeing up R&D money for exploration beyond low Earth orbit. It’s a big change for...
by Michael Belfiore | Jan 26, 2011 | Blog
It’s called the State of the Union Address, but the speech President Obama delivered last night might as well have been called the “State of the Future” address. “The future is ours to win,” he said. “We are the nation that put cars...
by Michael Belfiore | Jan 21, 2011 | Blog
The full impact of the successful launch of the SpaceX Dragon space capsule last month in an unmanned orbital test flight has yet to be fully felt. But what is clear is that America’s next orbital spaceship will be a space capsule, rather than a winged design....
by Michael Belfiore | Jan 11, 2011 | Blog
A just launched Carnegie Mellon/Stanford University project called EteRNA lets ordinary people contribute to actual biochemical research. It’s an astonishing achievement, all the more so because it assumes no prior knowledge of the research subject, RNA. Besides...
by Michael Belfiore | Jan 4, 2011 | Blog
Today is publication day for Daniel H. Wilson’s new book, A Boy and His Bot. This is Wilson’s kids’ novel, and I’d say he’s off to a fantastic start. I was lucky enough to get an advance copy for review, and I devoured it. It’s fun,...
