China May Have Tested a new Sub Launched Nuclear Missile

China conducted the first test flight of its next-generation JL-3 submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) in late November, according to report published on the Washington Free Beacon website on 18 December.

Citing unnamed defence officials, the test firing was detected by US missile-launch warning satellites and monitored by US intelligence agencies.

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Robopocalypse Report #111

Drones:

The first global standards for drones have been unveiled.

A 737 seems to have been damaged by a midair impact with a drone.

Amazon promised drone delivery in five years...five years ago.  Where are they?

In Britain, the Gatwick airport was seriously impacted by one or more drones flying through restricted air space.  The Army was deployed.  People were arrested and then released.  A British Minister stated new detection equipment is needed.

Drones are being used in Britain to spot European nightjar nests.

The Dauntless cargo UAV can lift 200 lbs.

Regular drones are being used to monitor and track sharks.

Drones can be used to replace several cameras in film making and even used in animation.

Foldable drones could be used in rescues because they can fly through smaller holes.

Google/Alphabet's Project Wing drones will start delivery trials in Finland next year.

Google/Alphabet is working to make those drones quieter.

Indonesian rescuers are using drones after the recent tsunami.

The NYPD will start using drones.

The number of drone flights in Russia are projected to increase 16 fold from 2015 to 2020.

Russia has demonstrated a new cargo drone with claims it is capable of carrying 400 kg (880 lbs) 350 km (~220 miles).

The Self Repairing Cities Project continues to develop 3d printing drones that repair potholes.

Self Driving Cars:

Congress did not pass its self driving car laws before the end of 2018.

How self driving cars handle tricky highway merges.

Self driving cars are here.  Here just depends on where you live.

Audi is using Luminar's lidar for its self driving cars.

Baidu is testing its self driving cars with the Unity game.

Bosch is developing self driving tech.  Even betting on it.

GM Cruise's has a new boss, Dan Ammann.

Honda is testing off road self driving work vehicles.

Kroger has launched a self driving vehicle based service for grocery delivery in Arizona with Nuro's help.

Levandowski, the troublesome ex Google, ex Uber self driving car engineer who founded a church that believes AI is the savior, claims to have ridden a self driving car from the Atlantic to the Pacific, over 3000 miles.

A Lyft patent shows how their self driving cars might communicate.

May Mobility is another self driving car startup.

Rinspeed has shrunk its self driving pod.

Tesla celebrates over 1 billion miles using Autopilot.

Musk is stating Tesla's Autopilot will recognize emergency vehicles shortly.

Musk misused Tesla's Autopilot on the tv show 60 minutes.

Tesla is testing its Autopilot system for successful navigation of traffic lights and roundabouts.

TuSimple's cameras can see farther than lidars can for self driving cars.

Uber apparently ignored warnings about its safety before the death of the woman in Arizona.

Uber got permission to return its self driving cars to the road in Pennsylvania in a scaled down test.

Volvo's self driving trucks will be hauling limestone from a mine.

As reported before, Waymo has returned safety drivers to its self driving cars.

Waymo has already launched its self driving car service in Phoenix.  They still have safety drivers as noted above.

People are harassing Waymo's self driving cars.

Zoox has won approval to carry passengers in its self driving vehicles in California.

3d Printing:

3d printed houses vary from mud huts to luxury mansions.

A software bots are able to recreate famous paintings in 3d printing.

An Australian woman has received a 3d printed jaw after a tumor removal.

Bugatti is testing 3d printed titanium parts for its cars.

A Bulgarian patient has received a 3d printed rib, a first for that country.

A custom 3d printer makes better microfluidic devices.

Harvard Innovation Labs has set up the MakerFleet 3d printer farm.

3d printed scaffolds could help bones heal.

3d printed homes may be the future of architecture.

An Italian bioengineer figured out how to 3d print a steak from vegetable proteins.

A new paper states there needs to be a better way to allow more people to design 3d printed components.

Norwegian researchers compared the results of 3d printing in both a factory setting and in a military cargo container. 

Robotics:

A new type of robotic hand can play the piano with more human like motion.

Where are the SciFi promised home robots?

Amazon is launching a cloud-based robotics testing platform.

Amazon is trying to get developers to make the control software for small robotic car.

24 Amazon workers were sent to the hospital when a warehouse robot broke open a can of bear spray.

Arm is building chips with a sense of smell.

BART is a type of bar tending robot.

DHL will spend $300 million to quadruple the robots in their warehouses.

European scientists have made an artificial neuron from nanowire.

Studying fish will help robotics.

Harvard developed a robot that can climb on ceilings.

A new huggable robot about to go on sale looks eerily like Cheburashka.

Intel has developed a wheelchair controlled by facial expressions.

Kiwi, a delivery bot, caught fire in Berkeley, California.

Larvalbot has been seeding the Great Barrier Reef with coral.

Postmates unveiled its robotic delivery bot.

A Robotic rice planter is being sent to the fields.

Toyota has invested in the autonomous ship company, Sea Machine Robotics.

The Velox robot skates over ice, but does so in way that creeps some people out.

Waitrose and Partner's parent company is testing in robotic farming equipment.

Walmart is rolling out 360 mopping robots as janitors for its stores by the end of January.  The same robots are in use at airports in Boston, Miami, San Diego, and Seattle,

Walmart is also supposed to be testing a burger flipping robot.

Youbionic has added 3d printed arms to a Boston Dynamics Mini Spot robot.

The Z6 robot is an unfolding hexapod.

Cyborgism:

Meet Elowan, the first(?) mobile cyborg houseplant.

Researchers have developed a new hydrogel electrode for brain implants.

A new artificial joint allows lower arm amputees to have wrist movements.

Software Bots:

US law makers are seeking to introduce bills to make certain actions illegal for bots during the holiday season.

100 AI researchers could not get visas to Canada for a conference.

Canada and France want to study the global impacts of AI.

Alibaba's Voice Assistant is way better than Google's.

An Amazon Alexa had a software error that allowed another user in another house to spy on one house hold.

Alexa is gaining self teaching algorithms to be able to learn from the people its communicating with to better understand them.

The BBC asked two software bots to come up with christmas dishes that were inspired by cultures around the world.

In China, a facial recognition software bot took an ad on the bus for a jaywalker.

Digital assistants are getting better, but have a long, long ways to go.

Europe actually publishes the most papers on AI, not China or the US.

Can software bots actually clean up Facebook?

Google's head of AI research wants bots to think more like a brain does.

Google's not being as open as it ought over the Duplex calls.

Google's Deep Mind can predict the 3d shape of proteins.

Google Deep Mind now has a generalized game playing system for any sort of game.

IBM is looking at Watson for human resources.

The Japanese have developed an automated technique for coloring anime.

Memristers are making circuits that mimic synapses better.

Microsoft wants to stop facial recognition AI's 'race to the bottom.'

MIT and Facebook are teaming up to use bots to give everyone who does NOT have a address in the world one.

Musicians are using software bots to master songs.

NBCUniversal is attempting to use software bots to make their ads more relevant.

Communication between two neural networks is being worked on.

Nvidia has developed a software bot to generate cityscapes in real time.

Nvidia has also released its new machine learning chip.

Oregon State University is looking at using machine learning to work on energy storage.

Texas A&M is using software bots for material science.

The UK is looking at AI to predict and prevent violent crime:  pre crime, here we come.

Software bots can be used to detect water leaks in city water systems.

Software bots can accelerate cancer discoveries.

Software bots can be trained without negative data.

Software bots can reduce the gadolinium dose needed for MRIs.

A new software bot can track biological age on multiple levels.

Bots are also being used to tell how healthy you will be in old age.

Software bots have mapped every last solar panel in the US.

Software bots are being used for hiring now and its producing some unorthodox results.

A new form of machine vision uses software bots to recognize objects like people do.

Software bots are being used to determine if you could have a potentially life threatening skin infection.

Software bots are being used to notice details in low exposure images.

Software bots are being used to design peptides.

Software bots can sort cancer cells now.

Codeveloping hardware and software makes neural nets less power hungry.

Technology companies and employees are pushing back against software bots, or at least putting limits on them.  Some.

Tumblr is banning porn on its site and has developed a software bot to find and delete it.  It's really bad at its job.

Automation:

2018 was the year bots began taking over service jobs.

Automation is changing work.

Amazon is testing its cashierless system on larger stores than their Amazon Go.

Amazon wants to open its Go stores in company lobbies.

Space Tango plans a orbital robotic factory.

META:

Can an AI conference shed its sexist behavior?

Germany will attempt a universal basic income experiment in 2019.

New models can sense when and if people trust robots. Think of them as your robotic rat friends.

While the robopocalypse may be upon us, the singularity has a long, long ways to go.

Do not fear the robotic overlords!  Embrace them as coworkers!

The year in the robopocalypse.

NASA Approves Sierra Nevada's DreamChaser Manufacture of First Prototype Space Plane

Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) has won NASA approval to begin full-scale production of its Dream Chaser cargo spacecraft scheduled to make its first flight in about two years.

The company announced Dec. 18 that it completed a milestone in its Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) 2 contract called Integrated Review 4. With that milestone, the company is cleared to move ahead into assembly of the Dream Chaser vehicle that will deliver cargo to the station.

“NASA’s acknowledgement that SNC has completed this critical milestone and its approval of full production of the first Dream Chaser spacecraft is a major indication we are on the right path toward increasing vital science return for the industry,” John Curry, CRS-2 program director at the company, said in a statement announcing the milestone.

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Russian Military Can't Seem to Grow Past 384,000 Contract/Professional Soldiers

Last week Russian General Staff Chief Valeriy Gerasimov addressed a variety of topics in his annual briefing for the Moscow foreign military attaché community. According to KZ’s coverage, he said Russia continues to work at manning Russia’s military forces at 95-100 percent of their authorized level.

...

Anyone studiously following the process of Russian military professionalization would notice that 384,000 is the very same number given by Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu almost exactly two years ago.

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Paleolithic Papers #25

Genus Homo:

Stone tools found in China from the Pleistocene of the Levallois tradition hint at a potential local development of the technology.

A cave painting in Borneo in Indonesia dates from 40,000 years ago.

Inbreeding was common in hominins.

Crossing out of Africa was not difficult because the Arabian peninsula was green.

Hominins were not the cause the megafaunal extinctions in Africa, rather climate and the expansion of the grasslands were.  Unless, of course, the evidence for H. erectus purposefully expanding the grasslands with fire are accurate.

How did human language arise?  We don't really know.

How did members of the genus Homo survive in east Africa from paleolithic to mesolithic?

Analyzing Aurignacian tools using morphometrics.

A Russian site and its dating from the Upper Paleolithic is discussed and explored more.

H. sapiens:

The Lago Santa people had African-like features and were possibly Clovis culture descendants.  The peopling of South and Central America turned out to be fairly complicated.

The peopling of the Americas is getting a lot of interest once more with genetic studies.

Multiple types of projectiles found in Texas hint at potentially multiple migrations into the Americas.  Note: this could also be an example of a transition from one projectile point technology to another.

It seems the dispersals into the AMericas were more complex and hint at an Australasian component.

How did people cross the Wallace Line?

How the environment of northwestern Argentina changed across the Pleistocene/Holocene boundary.

People appear to have inhabited Tibet at least as early as 30,000 years ago.  This is much earlier than previously thought.

Star watching to understand the seasons may have very early origins.  Cave paintings from 40,000 years ago definitely suggest this.

Why do modern humans have round heads?

H. neanderthalensis:

Neandertals were just as violent as modern humans.

Neandertal children suffered from extreme stress during the winter.  Lead exposure was noted.

Neanderthals in the Caucasus transported obsidian over 250 km to make tools with.

Neandertal genes associated with neurogenesis in modern humans have been found.

H. erectus:

Are stone tools of the Acheulean style from 190k to 240k years ago a sign Homo erectus survived in Saudi Arabia until a late date?

H. erectus social behavior is discussed wrt an animal carcass. 

H. habilis:

Oldowon stone tools, the style associated with Homo habilis, have been found in Algeria dating from 2.4 million years ago.

Genus Australopithecus:

Little Foot, a likely A. africanus, is emerging from the stone matrix it was preserved in.

Little Foot's brain endocast suggests a more basal, chimpanzee like brain.

The original studies of A. africanus when it was known as A. prometheus are discussed.

Genus Paranthropus:

The scapular anatomy of P. bosei gets studied.

KNM-ER 47000 appears to be from P. bosei.

META:

U-Pb dating of flowstones from South Africa constrains the dates hominins were evolving there and shows they were living in dry climate conditions.

Trabecular Bone Fraction gets compared between modern humans, hominins and other primates.

The stone tool gripping abilities of modern humans, hominins and apes are compared.

3d analysis of bone tools sheds some light on how they were made and used.

Three plus different hominins coexisted in the early Pleistocene ~2 million years ago in the Omo-Turkana Basin (P. bosei, H.habilis and H. erectus. possibly H. rudolfensis as well).

What was the dietary diversity of early Pleistocene hominins?

The trabecular structure of the distal femur is compared between humans, apes and baboons is compared.

India Convinced to Work With Russia on Space Exploration

The union cabinet on Thursday approved a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between India and Russia on joint activities under human spaceflight programme

India and Russia will strengthen cooperation in space programmes, including manned space missions, under a memorandum of understanding signed between the two countries in October.

The MoU will provide an impetus for development of technologies and advanced systems required for the human space flight programmes, such as radiation shielding, life support systems, crew module, rendezvous and docking systems, space suit, training for astronauts etc.

The MoU will lead to a joint activity in the field of application of space technologies for the benefit of humanity. It will also help in the setting up of a joint working group, which will further work out the plan of action, including the time-frame and the means of implementing the provisions of the agreement.

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Russia to Build at Least two More Borey-A SSBNs by 2027

According to an industry source, quoted in the Russian media, the 2018-2027 State Armament Program includes construction of two additional Project 955A/Borey-A submarines. This will bring the number of submarines of the Project 955 class to ten by 2028. The source said that five submarines will be based in the Northern Fleet and five - in the Pacific. He also suggested that the construction of the Borey submarines will continue after 2027, since it is unlikely that the Project 667BDRM subs will be able to remain in service that long. (Back in May 2018, it was suggested that Russia may build six additional Project 955A submarines, bringing the total to 14.)

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Pondering the Precambrian #25

Proterozoic:

NeoProterozoic:

Cobalt deposits may be 150 million years younger than previously thought and due to an orogenic event.

There's evidence suggesting scavenging was the origin of predation during the Ediacaran.

There's evidence of shifting from continental collision to a subduction in Africa during the Ediacaran.

There were very diverse microfossils from the Ediacaran Doushantuo Formation.

The fossilization method of the Ediacaran gets examined for the earliest metazoans.

Fossils from the Ediacaran site at Nilpena, Australia are biological snapshots of benthic communities.

Ediacaran discoid fossils from the Anti-Atlas Mountains in Africa have been found.

In the early Ediacaran ocean, there seems to have been a global zinc signature.

Did the complex forms of the Ediacaran arise in the benthic depths of the ocean because there were stable temperatures?

In China, the carbonate caps suggest a oxygen recovery after the Marinoan Glaciation ended.

The oxygen isotopes from the Cryogenian meteoric water are similar to today's.

A group attempts to model the global temperatures from the Tonian to the present.

MesoProterozoic:

Fossils from Brazil suggest two different microbial habitats from the Stenian at the site.

There is evidence of oxygenated lakes 1.1 billion years ago during the Stenian.

There is evidence of oxygenation in the form of red beds that were created during an orogeny around the Stenian/Ectasian boundary.

PaleoProterozoic:

Statherian microfossils from China suggest eukaryotes were moderately diverse by that point in time.

Evidence of the Huronian Glaciation has been discovered in China.  This may have been the first time a Snowball Earth scenario took place.

Phosphorite deposits appear to have come from a microbial reef in the Siderian of Australia.

Archean:

Features from 2.7 billion year old stromatolite formations hint at the presence of oxygen.

The is evidence of a shift from vertical to horizontal plate tectonics in the Archean.

During the Mesoarchean the bottom waters of the ocean appear to have been anoxic.

There appears to have been a cryptic craton core that emerged in the Paleoarchean.

Aerobic photosynthesis might have arisen 3.5 billion years ago during the Paleoarchean.

Origin of Life:

Abiotic amino acids from the Earth's mantle have been observed for the first time.

Are liquid crystal matrices an analog to the early protocells?

NASA Administrator Thinks SpaceX Dragon Capsule Test Will Slip to Spring

USA Today reports that NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine believes the SpaceX Crew Dragon flight test scheduled for Jan. 7 will likely slip into spring.

That would mean the mission, which will not have a crew aboard for its flight to the International Space Station, would launch no sooner than the first day of spring on March 20.

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US Gave Russia 60 Days to Return to Compliance on the INF Treaty

The United States on Tuesday formally accused Russia of violating a major arms control treaty, taking the first step to leaving the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty — which could lead to the eventual placement of ground-based cruise missiles in Europe.

Speaking at NATO headquarters, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said: “The United States today declares it has found Russia in material breach of the treaty and will suspend our obligations as a remedy, effective in 60 days, unless Russia returns to full and verifiable compliance.”

The decision to “suspend” is key, signaling that the U.S. has not yet made the full decision to withdraw from the agreement. Regardless of this 60-day window, the Trump administration can announce it is withdrawing at any time, but must include a six-month notice period to officially exit the treaty, per the language of the agreement.

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Terminator Times #52

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (Drones):

DARPA has tested the ability to have UAVs autonomously conduct missions in degraded environments.

Completion of the USAF drone base in Niger will be delayed.

The US Army is setting up the first stages of procuring micro UAVs for its infantry.

The USMC is taking deliveries of the InstantEye Mk-3 GEN5-D1 SUAS.

The US Navy is offering its Nomad drone tech to private companies for adaption for civilian applications.

The US Navy is conducting a cargo carrying drone demonstration in March.

Australia is buying the MQ-9 Reaper for its MALE UAV fleet.  The competition was between the IAI Heron TP and potential variants of the Reaper.

Belgium ordered the Sky Guardian MQ-9B.

The British are looking into fully autonomous hunter-killer drones.

The British are also looking at trialling a rescue UAV from ships.

One of the UAVs (Tiang Ying) shown off at the Zhuhai airshow in China may be intended for use aboard aircraft carriers.

China has UAV derived from an in service aircraft being marketed for export as a long range recon bird.

Egypt bought some 'stealthy' recon drones called the Scarab from Teledyne Ryan in the 1980s, but may have never used many of them...or might still he.

The European Union is having a demonstration of the Falco Evo UAV for maritime partolling.

Houthi UAVs are increasingly a threat.

Japan has ordered 3 RQ-4 block 30 Global Hawks.

Poland has ordered 40 Orlik UAVs.

Russia's EW UAV can jam cell phones 60 miles away.

Russia's Hunter-B UCAV is supposed to have entered taxi testing.

Turkey is procuring hundreds of micro VTOL UAVs.

China's CASIC has quietly rolled out a new missile for drones.

Jane's noticed the Divine Eagle HALE UAV was at the Malan air base.

Sweden has ordered the MQM-178 target drone.

Aurora Flight Sciences' Odysseus long endurance, solar powered drone will take flight in 2019.

General Atomics is looking at industrial collaborations with Japan.

General Atomics has opened an office in India.

General Atomics got a $27M contract to support the French Reapers.

Kratos has doubled its tactical UAV development projects and its Valkyrie UAV is expected to fly by the end of January 2019 with orders expected by the end of 2019 by the USAF.

Some think the Naval Vertical Landing Jet Drone could be what the navies of the world are seeking.

Piaggo Aerospace has gone bankrupt.  What went wrong?

Zala has unveiled its new ICE variant of the ZALA-421-16E5 UAV.

Unmanned Ground Vehicles (Bolos & Ogres):

To become effective squad members, UGVs will need to earn soldiers' trust.

The US Army's TARDEC is examining Israeli UGVs.

The US Army is far more interested in UGVs and other robopocalyptic systems for logistics than combat.

The US Army is buying 3,000 Scorpion UGVs for $400M.

The USMC is seeking a robot capable of carrying a Marine's full load for use at the squad level.

Belarus has a new UGV for export, the Beserk.

Chinese UGVs are closing in on American and Russian UGVs.

British Aerospace's Ironclad UGV gets profiled.

Endeavor Robotics is seeking to produce common chassis for the US Army's robots.

Rheinmetall is testing the Mission Master UGV.

The Russians are looking at creating remotely operated derived T-72B UGVs.

Sand-x has developed an unmanned version of its ATV.

Ukraine has been developing its own UGVs for combat.

Unmanned Surface Vehicles (Roboats):

Aquabotix just added 3 new models of its Swarmdiver submersible USV.

The Chinese showed a very edited video of tests of a new USV armed with missiles.

Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (Robo subs):

The US Navy wants the Virginia Mission Module to be able to launch UUVs from the Virginia class submarines equipped with it.

China is looking to build an unmanned, underwater base for UUVs in the South China Sea.

Japan is considering using UUVs to hunt subs.

3d Printing:

Lockheed is using 3d printing the manufacture of the F-35 simulators.

Norwegian researchers compared the production quality of items 3d printed in a factory vs those printed in a military shipping container.

Software bots:

If the enemy knows the data set your software bots trained on, they can figure out how to fake out your bots.

DARPA wants to use machine learning to improve its understanding of the RF spectrum.

The US Army isn't seeking terminators for the future of AI in warfare.

The US Army's AI task force has set up office at CMU.  They really ought to have done so in Silicon Valley.

Sandia National Labs produced a software bot that can detect drones.

META:

The US Navy is ramping up development of unmanned systems.

The Virginia Class' Payload Module will be able to launch both UUVs and UAVs.

The British are undertaking a massive testing exercise with robots and drones.

Russian Lunar Program Delayed to 2040

Russia's Moon exploration program will be implemented in several stages by 2040, the press service of the Russian space agency Roscosmos said on Wednesday.

The Russian Academy of Sciences' (RAS) Council earlier held a session with Roscosmos head Rogozin and RAS President Alexander Sergeyev to discuss the Moon exploration program.

"The goal of Moon exploration programs is to protect national interests on the new space frontier. The humanity's interest in Moon exploration is first of all linked with the fact that unique areas were found there that have favorable conditions for building lunar bases. The Moon exploration program will be implemented in several stages by 2040," the press service said.

Sergeyev noted the importance of exploring the Moon. "The issues of Moon exploration are on top of the agenda for today's session of the Council on Space Research. We understand that our resources are limited and that the geopolitical situation does not facilitate attracting more resources. This is why it is very important to choose the right strategy," he said.

Sergeyev said there are different opinions on what is the best moving forces - projects that may bring people people and the scientific community together, or something groundbreaking from the scientific point of view. "The Moon can become a very important project that includes both," he noted.

It was earlier reported that Russian cosmonauts will for the first time touch the Moon’s surface after 2030. Their mission will last 14 days.

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Dutch Government Confirms Russia Violating INF Treaty

The Dutch government has information that Russia developed a prohibited cruise missile, according to a letter written by Ministers Stef Blok of Foreign Affairs and Ank Bijleveld of Defense. It involves a SSC-8 missile that has a range of over 500 kilometers, which violates the INF treaty, NOS reports.

The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed in 1987 between the United States and Russia. It put an end to the Cold War. The treaty forbids the development of missiles with a range of more than 500 kilometers.

"The Netherlands can independently confirm that Russia has developed and is currently introducing a ground-based cruise weapon", the two Ministers wrote to the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament. This is based on "intelligence".

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Stealth Saga #42

Sixth Generation Fighters:

Germany and France are progressing on their FCAS.  They plan to launch demonstrator programs for the FCAS engine and airframe in mid 2019.  The Germans expect the next step taken by the end of the year though.  There are still a lot of hurdles ahead for the fighter.

Recommendations for the Sixth Generation Fighter for Europe were written up (PDF) by the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies.

Hunter-B:

The Russian stealthy Hunter-B cranked kite UCAV has supposedly entered taxi testing.

SU-57:

A Russian analyst has stated despite rhetoric about how good the Su-57 is, the Russians Air Force would lose to the USAF.

The Russians released another video showing the Su-57's capability to conduct aerial refueling.

The Russians also released a video of the SU-57 in Syria.  The two aircraft deployed conducted 10 sorties.

Supposedly, the SU-57's avionics have finished testing.

Watch two Su-57s conducting synchronized landings.

The SU-57 will get a new strike missile with "twice" the range.

The Su-57 gets panned by one of the lead F-35 haters.

J-20:

The aerial refueling capability of the J-20 has been confirmed.

B-21:

Robins AFB and Hill AFB will be the maintenance bases for the B-21.

Could the USAF end up with 200 B-21s?

F-22:

Another article about the belly flop by the F-22 pilot due to premature landing gear retraction.

F-35:

A USAF F-35A dropped a GBU-49 in combat training for the first time.

The USAF has announced a dedicated F-35 demo team for the 2019 airshow circuit.

Hill AFB just has an 'elephant walk' of 35 USAF F-35As.

USMC F-35Bs will start training at Okinawa's Iejima Auxiliary Airfield next month.

The US Navy stood up its F-35C wing to take responsibility for training, manning and operations.

A British F-35B landed backwards onto the HMS Queen Elizabeth.

The British have finished DTS-2 trials for the HMS Queen Elizabeth.

The British have awarded an infrastructure contract for RAF Lakenheath to prepare for the F-35.

British F-35Bs exercised with American F-15Es and French Rafales.

A Dutch F-35A got a spiffy paint job.

One of the contenders for replacing Finland's fighters is the F-35 and Finland has begun early negotiations with all the bidders, including Lockheed.

The Italian AF declared IOC for its first F-35A squadron.

It appears Japan is moving ahead with its plans to buy F-35Bs for its jeep carriers and another 100 F-35As for its air force.  Will Japan be able to afford its F-3 next gen fighter then?

Cubic is installing its integrated air combat training system on 500 F-35s.

Lockheed got a contract to mitigate the obsolesce of the F-35's processors.

META:

How China means to deter the USAF.

SpaceX to Launch First Commercial Crew Program Dragon V2 Capsule January 7th

NASA has set Jan. 7 as the date for the launch of the first commercial crew test flight, an uncrewed SpaceX Dragon spacecraft that will start a series of high-stakes missions over the next year.

In a Nov. 21 statement, NASA said the Falcon 9 launch of the Crew Dragon spacecraft on a mission designated Demo-1 is scheduled for Jan. 7 from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A, the former Apollo and shuttle pad that SpaceX has renovated to support launches of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy vehicles, in particular crewed Falcon 9 missions.

On that mission, the Crew Dragon spacecraft, also known as Dragon 2, will fly a mission to the International Space Station to test the vehicle’s systems. It will be the first orbital flight for the vehicle, and will not carry astronauts.

If that flight is successful, it will be followed in June by a crewed test flight, called Demo-2, where NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will fly the Crew Dragon to the ISS. Between Demo-1 and Demo-2, SpaceX plans to perform an in-flight abort test where a Crew Dragon will use its abort system to jettison from a Falcon 9 vehicle after liftoff.

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A Chinese Researcher Claims to Have Produced First Genetically Engineered Babies,Twin Girls

A Chinese researcher claims that he helped make the world’s first genetically edited babies — twin girls born this month whose DNA he said he altered with a powerful new tool capable of rewriting the very blueprint of life.

If true, it would be a profound leap of science and ethics.

A U.S. scientist said he took part in the work in China, but this kind of gene editing is banned in the United States because the DNA changes can pass to future generations and it risks harming other genes.

Many mainstream scientists think it’s too unsafe to try, and some denounced the Chinese report as human experimentation.

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India's First Ballistic Missile Submarine Conducted its First Nuclear Deterrent Patrol

When Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced earlier this month that the Indian Navy had completed its first sea-based nuclear deterrent patrol it was more of a statement of intent than a demonstration of a new capability.

The Indian Navy’s new ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) INS Arihant was the boomer that completed the month-long deterrent patrol. Whilst this is not insignificant – it is the first country outside of the five members of the U.N. Security Council to develop this capability – it also shows how far away India is to achieve its goal of joining the other great powers in establishing a credible sea-based deterrent.

Only the U.S., U.K., France and Russia can sustain continuous-at-sea deterrent patrols, which a provides continuous launch capability of a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) by maintaining at least one SSBN on station at any one time that could fire a nuclear missile. A continuous patrol requires a minimum of four SSBNs.

The patrol as a statement will have more effect in diplomatic circles than in military ones. India wants to join the club of countries that can support a sea-based deterrent and eventually achieve a continuous at-sea nuclear deterrent. It also means India will have the ability to launch all three air, land and sea-based types of nuclear weapons and a more robust second strike capability.

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Robopocalypse Report #110

Drones:

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Drones can provide the police with a surprising amount of data.

Drones can produce some stunning photography.

A DARPA kit converts any helicopter into being self flying.

The FAA is restricting drone flights near US Navy sub bases.

CyPhy wants to tether drones.

DJI drones have security vulnerabilities that could turn them into spies in the sky.

Some DJI Matrice 200 drones are falling out of the sky.

Drone swarms could help find hikers without GPS.

Hovermap is mapping underground spaces with drones.

Intel's drones will join the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall.

A test in Maryland demonstrated drones can carry donated organs without damaging them.

Nissan's Sentinel rescue truck concept has a drone launcher.

Roborace's self driving racing league will not drive self driving cars the first season.

Stanford drones can carry far more than their own weight.

Vanuatu is delivering vaccines to remote islands via drone. 

Self Driving Cars:

Have we been talking about self driving cars all wrong?

Tech companies are paying Kenyans to teach self driving cars how to drive.

Self driving vehicles might shape the future of urban tourism.

How DO self driving cars see the road?

Robotaxis are coming.  Why are we not preparing?

The Brits claim they will have self driving taxis and buses by 2021, refusing to be left behind by the Americans, Chinese and Japanese.

Einride's self driving, electric truck is already earning money.

Ford is working with Baidu to test self driving cars in China.

Ford views its future as including a self driving taxi service and deliveries.

Muji and Sensible 4 have teamed up to deploy all weather self driving shuttle bus.

Tesla rolled out an update to Autopilot for highway driving.

Did Tesla oversell its Autopilot capabilities?

Tesla's Summon function has the car drive itself in parking lots.

Uber is applying to be allowed to put its self driving cars back on the road.

Waymo has permission to put its fully autonomous self driving cars on the road in California.

A Waymo self driving car had an accident, but the human in the car was, supposedly, to blame.

Waymo may launch its self driving car service in the suburbs of Phoenix in early December.

3d Printing:

Watch 3d printed heart tissue beat.

Will 3d printed foods with probiotics make it to your table?

A 3d printed mammoth skeleton replica is for sale.

Concrete printing and 3d knitting have produced a sculpture in Mexico City.

Multiple component composites can now be 3d printed.

Wood furniture waste has been recycled into a 3d printable material.

Pulped paper has been made into a 3d printable material, too.

UL and Georgia Tech are investigating how much 3d printing pollutes indoor air.

A 3d printed dental implant shows promise over its traditionally made equivalents.

Researchers are 3d printing lunar regolith simulant into useful parts.

BigRep has 3d printed a prototype electric motorcycle.

Organs 3d printed from living cells could boost the senses.

Robotics:

More info here.

ABB will build a factory in China to use robots to build robots for the Asian market.

Furhat Robotics is trying to cross the uncanny valley.

Google is shutting down Schaft Robotics after failing to find a buyer for the firm.  Google bought Boston Dynamics and Schaft for some unknown purpose, but failed to find a use for their robots.  They found a buyer for Boston Dynamics, but not Schaft.  I have to wonder if Google didn't actually do serious harm to the development of nextgen robots by its ill-advised procurements.

iRobot has teamed up with Google to study your house.   Yes, really.

LG is turning loose self driving shopping carts in South Korea.

Madeline Gannon is a roboticist teaching them to act more like animals.

Supposedly, this mopping robot can sense and avoid dog poo.

This is how NASA plans to use robots to produce fuel on Mars.

Robots will attempt to reseed chunks of the Great Barrier Reef with coral larvae.

A robotic arm might help rehabilitate sufferers from chronic strokes.

Stanford has developed a electronic glove to give robots a sense of touch.

Starship has launched its robot package delivery service in London.

Toyota put a pizza making robot in the back of a hydrogen powered truck.

Teams will compete to in an XPRIZE to map the ocean floor with autonomous underwater vehicles.

Cyborgism:

German scientists have created an artificial "skin" that can point north.

Kaspersky Software is warning brain implants might be hackable.

Some scientists are growing organoids of brain tissue and connecting them to robots.

Other scientists have 3d printed bacteria into mushrooms to create electricity from light.

A brain computer interface gives the paralyzed the ability to control a tablet.

Software bots:

The US Commerce Department may regulate the sale of software bots to certain countries.

Is AI/ML hitting a wall of meaning?

The AI/ML revolution is a whole lot of old ideas being run on much faster hardware.

There are calls to teach AI common sense: the problem is common sense isn't.

What IS a bot?

One of the father's of modern "AI" is worried about its future.

20th Century Fox is using software bots to attempt to predict whether people will watch a movie based on its trailer.

Amazon now has all it needs to create popular bot generated fiction.

Apple has bought privacy minded bot company Silky Road.

Boston attempted to use software bots to optimize its bus schedule & routes.  What was learned from the experience?

China has deployed software bots on their news programs, replacing TV anchors.

Should you allow your children to be 'friends' with Alexa and other digital assistants?

Digital assistants like Siri and Alexa have yet to find their niche.

eHarmony is planning a software bot to prevent people from ghosting one another.

The European Union is testing an experimental lie detector software bot to screen people traveling to the EU.

Will Fei Fei Li make AI better for people?

Google is using a software bot to categorize and digitize millions of historical photos from the New York Times.

Google has promised $25M for software bot/AI research to solve social problems.

Google will take back DeepMind's health business.

Google will be rolling out is Duplex AI to select owners of the Pixel phone is certain cities.

INRS and the University of Sussex used software bots to tailor light sources.

Mercedes' research into software bots could improve package delivery.

MIT offers how to make AI less biased.

Russian researchers have developed a neural net based not for 3d metal printing.

Samsung has opened its Bixby digital assistant to developers.

Samsung's new chips have a dedicated section for "AI."

Software bots help accelerate malaria research.

Software bots can ID animals that deadly pathogens hide in.

Software bots can predict Alzheimer's years before formal diagnosis.

A new software bot can condense data from thousands of scientific papers.

A software bot is being used to create new materials.

Can software bots learn languages like a child does?

Software bots are being developed to find deep fake videos.

Software bots may solve bottlenecks in drug research.

Software bots can and do fail at analyzing data across multiple health care systems.

Software bots are being trained with video games.

Software bots help improve detection of new particles at the LHC.

Software bots may help ID the root cause of religious conflict?

Software bots can determine atomic positions in record time.

Software bot created portrait fetched over $400k at auction.

How much do software bots drive the narrative during news events?

Can software bots actually make art?

Software bots are being adopted by DIYers.

Software bots are now able to generate fake finger prints to trick biometric scanners.

Can software bots help people who have suffered trauma give court testimony?

Software bots greatly increase people's exposure to negative and inflammatory information on social networks.

Software bots are sorting which patients need immediate emergency admission to hospitals.

Could software bots help with the crush of peer review?

There's a software bot that will help make your resume more competitive.

Wired showed just about anyone can use software bots to create art.

Automata:

7-11 is testing Amazon Go-like cashierless stores in 14 locations.

Amazon is hiring less seasonal workers this year...due to robots making them unnecessary.

Amazon Go is the inevitable evolution of supermarket shopping.

Walmart wants to open an Amazon Go style Sam's Club.

META:

Japan is both obsessed with and resistant to the robopocalypse.

How Boston Dynamics' videos become hits.

Making the robopocalypse work for Africa's farmers.