🤖 Humanoid robot could join Chang’e 8 mission, Interstellar generation ship design with 250-year life, 35,000-year-old saber-toothed kitten discovered

IE Quizzes are back!

You asked, we delivered – the IE Quiz is back, exclusively for Blueprint Weekly subscribers!

Subscribe Now

China’s Chang’e 8 mission will introduce new technologies and scientific experiments for lunar exploration. According to a post shared on Chinese social media, Wang Qiong, chief designer of the mission, recently presented an update on the project in Beijing.

The presentation highlighted a four-wheeled spacecraft with a humanoid-shaped upper section. Although the purpose and significance of its design remain unclear.

Scheduled for 2028, the mission aims to land near the moon’s south pole to test resource utilization technologies, such as 3D-printing lunar regolith into bricks, and conduct ecosystem experiments. Dive deeper into this Must-Read.

🔥Today’s job of the day as featured on jobs.interestingengineering.com:

> System Engineer - Identity (IAM) and Sailpoint
> ETS Principal Engineer - Cloud Engineer (Systematics/Mainframe)

Reading Time: 4 mins

Did a friend forward this e-mail to you? Subscribe here.

MUST-READ

🤖 Humanoid robot could join China’s Chang’e 8 mission to the moon in 2028

Slides from the post, uploaded onto the Chinese social media platform Weibo, reveal details of the Chang’e 8 spacecraft. The four-legged lander, based on previous successful Chang’e missions, will carry scientific instruments like cameras, telescopes, and a seismometer. It will also include a crane to deploy payloads and spacecraft on the lunar surface.

The lander will carry a six-wheeled rover, similar to the Yutu rovers from earlier Chang’e missions. The rover will be equipped with a panoramic camera, lunar penetrating radar, an infrared spectrometer, and a payload for sample analysis and storage.

The Chang’e 8, along with the 2026 Chang’e 7 mission, serves as a precursor to China’s planned International Lunar Research Station, set for construction in the 2030s with support from Russia and other partners.

🚀 A living world in space: Interstellar generation ship design with 250-year life invited

Project Hyperion is part of a study aimed at assessing the feasibility of crewed interstellar flight using current and near-future technologies, and hoping to guide future research and technology development while educating the public on the logistics and potential of interstellar travel.

Now, recently, Project Hyperion has launched a design competition, inviting teams to submit their innovative plans for a generation ship.

“The competition will run from the 1st of November 2024 to 2nd of June 2025 and is open to all,” announced the company through its official website.

🔥 35,000-year-old well-preserved saber-toothed kitten discovered, fur, head intact

In a stunning discovery, researchers have unearthed a remarkably preserved saber-toothed kitten, frozen in time for 35,000 years. Despite its tender age – a mere three weeks old when it died – this tiny feline offers an unprecedented glimpse into the appearance and evolution of these legendary creatures.

A recent study highlights the ongoing debate surrounding the appearance of saber-toothed cats. The exceptional preservation of this newly discovered kitten, with its intact fur and overall condition, offers a rare opportunity to study an extinct mammal with no modern equivalent.

Preserved in permafrost for millennia, the kitten confirms the species’ presence in the Late Pleistocene epoch and “radically expands the understanding of the distribution of the genus.”

Love what you're reading, but too many emails? Sign up to IE+ to get Blueprint Weekly, our exclusive weekly premium newsletter that gives all the insights you love in a more digestible weekly format– plus, enjoy an Ad-Free experience on our website. Try IE+ today for just $1 in the first month. Subscribe here

HOT TOPICS OF THE DAY

SCIENCE

> The ATLAS collaboration, a group of researchers working with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), has detected top quarks in a collision between lead ions. (More)

> Researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich have developed the first-ever fully functional mechanical qubit. This incredible quantum innovation is a two-in-one system combining the abilities of a mechanical oscillator and a superconducting qubit. (More)

> A multi-institutional team of physicists is proposing an experiment to test whether gravity behaves as a quantum entity when measured. (More)

ENERGY

> Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) is exploring the use of advanced 3D printing to mass-produce fuel capsules for fusion energy power plants. It could be a significant advance in the field of fusion energy. (More)

> Researchers from the Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) and the University of Tokyo have engineered a new type of hydrogel. This hydrogel mimics the natural process of photosynthesis. It uses sunlight to split water, producing hydrogen and oxygen. (More)

> Finnish startup Polar Night Energy is building an industrial-scale thermal energy storage system in southern Finland. The 100-hour, sand-based storage system will use crushed soapstone, a by-product from a fireplace manufacturer, as its storage medium. (More)

INNOVATION

> Researchers have developed robotic trousers that enable people to walk more easily while expending measurably less energy. Users will not only be able to walk slowly with the shorts, but they can jog as well, claimed researchers. (More)

> The absence of self-destruct option on nuclear weapons is by design, but experts argue the time is right to revoke this. (More)

> Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a way to use sound to detect when lithium-ion batteries are about to catch fire. The NIST team included Wai Cheong "Andy" Tam and Anthony Putorti. (More)

VIDEO

> Through the Waste2Race project, a team of college students managed to build a hydrogen-powered race car fueled entirely by sewage. (More)

> Using the giant, groundbreaking Automated Fiber Placement machine, Rocket Lab can cut down over 150,000 of manual labor to build its next Neutron rocket. (More)

FROM THE WEB

> Ancient Egyptians drank hallucinogenic cocktails in rituals, reveals 2,000-year-old mug

> World-first robotic hand to help cultivate baby corals for reef restoration

> Twin spacecraft will launch to create an artificial solar eclipse

> "Chart Your Fart" is asking one nation to track its gas – in the name of science

> Chinese scientists modify tomatoes to make them ‘significantly sweeter’