Devin Coldewey
Writer & Photographer
The Latest from Devin Coldewey
Moon bricks could keep the lights on and the heat up in Lunar colonies
There may be no "dark side" of the Moon, but when and where it is dark, it's dark — and stays that way for two weeks. If we're going to have colonists up there, they'll need to stay warm and keep th
Google’s SMILY is reverse image search for cancer diagnosis
Spotting and diagnosing cancer is a complex and difficult process even for the dedicated medical professionals who do it for a living. A new tool from Google researchers could improve the process by p
Chinese space station Tiangong-2 is about to burn up over the Pacific
The final hours for China's Tiangong-2 space station are at hand, as the 8-ton piece of hardware will fall to earth, or rather sea, some time in the next 20 hours or so in a controlled deorbit manueve
FaceApp gets federal attention as Sen. Schumer raises alarm on data use
It's been hard to get away from FaceApp over the last few days, whether it's your friends posting weird selfies using the app's aging and other filters, or the brief furore over its apparent (but not
SpaceX’s ‘Starhopper’ bursts into flames during static fire test
SpaceX's test vehicle, a small-scale demonstration craft for some Starship components, caught fire after what appears to be a fuel leak or dump following an otherwise successful static fire test last
Nexar’s Live Map is like Street View with pictures from 5 minutes ago
We all rely on maps to get where we're going or investigate a neighborhood for potential brunch places, but the data we're looking at is often old, vague, or both. Nexar, maker of dashcam apps and cam
Voyant Photonics raises $4.3M to fit lidar on the head of a pin
Lidar is a critical method by which robots and autonomous vehicles sense the world around them, but the lasers and sensors generally take up a considerable amount of space. Not so with Voyant Photonic
Computing pioneer and LGBT icon Alan Turing will grace the £50 note in 2021
Alan Turing, one of the pioneering figures in modern computing, and also a tragic one in LGBT history, will soon appear on the U.K.'s £50 note. He was selected from a shortlist of scientists and brig
Archinaut snags $73 million in NASA funding to 3D-print giant spacecraft parts in orbit
A project to 3-D print bulky components in space rather than bring them up there has collected a $73.7 million contract from NASA to demonstrate the technique in space. Archinaut, a mission now severa
These robo-ants can work together in swarms to navigate tricky terrain
While the agility of a Spot or Atlas robot is something to behold, there's a special merit reserved for tiny, simple robots that work not as a versatile individual but as an adaptable group. These "tr
AI smokes 5 poker champs at a time in no-limit Hold’em with ‘relentless consistency’
The machines have proven their superiority in one-on-one games like chess and go, and even poker — but in complex multiplayer versions of the card game humans have retained their edge... until now.
Hayabusa2 lands on an asteroid and sends back amazing pictures to prove it
Japan's Hayabusa2 mission to the asteroid Ryugu is an ambitious one to begin with, and the team recently made the decision to up the stakes with a second touchdown on the space rock's surface. Not onl
Luminar eyes production vehicles with $100M round and new Iris lidar platform
Luminar is one of the major players in the new crop of lidar companies that have sprung up all over the world, and it's moving fast to outpace its peers. Today the company announced a new $100M fundin
Planted joins the meatless meat melee with its pea-protein ‘chicken’
Imitation meat is poised to expand its presence in our diets exponentially, if the success of dueling faux burger companies Impossible and Beyond are any indication — but where's the chicken? Plante
Spoiler warning! This neural network spots dangerous reviews before you read them
It's hard to avoid spoilers on the internet these days — even if you're careful, a random tweet or recommended news item could lay to waste your plan to watch that season finale a day late or catch
Space moss, stem cells and more are on their way to the ISS
The International Space Station is such a unique and important test bed that practically every spacecraft that docks with it carries new experiments for the crew to run. This month's mission is no dif
FCC proposal would let it punish international robocallers
While the FCC and Congress hammer out new rules to (hopefully) banish robocalls forever, there are some short-term solutions that can help in the meantime — and one may arrive in just a few weeks. A
Mario creator Miyamoto counters cloud gaming hype (but don’t count Nintendo out)
Cloud gaming — however a company chooses to define that — is shaping up to be a big part of the next generation of consoles and other platforms. But Mario creator and Nintendo veteran Shigeru Miya
This drone swarm spray painted a jumbo-size graffiti mural
It's Friday, so why not watch some good old-fashioned drone-powered graffiti? A design firm in Italy has put together a lovely little show that collected sketches from the art community and put them a
Watch a plane land itself truly autonomously for the first time
A team of German researchers have created an automatic landing system for small aircraft that lets them touch down not only without a pilot, but without any of the tech on the ground that lets other p