Found Energy, a startup in Boston, aims to harness the energy in scraps of aluminum metal to power industrial processes without fossil fuels. Since 2022, the company has worked to develop ways to rapidly release energy from aluminum on a small scale. Now it's just switched on a much larger version of its aluminum-powered engine, which it claims is the largest aluminum-water reactor ever built. Early next year, it will be installed to supply heat and hydrogen to a tool manufacturing facility in the southeastern US, using the aluminum waste produced by the plant itself as fuel. If everything works as planned, this technology, which uses a catalyst to unlock the energy stored within aluminum metal, could transform a growing share of aluminum scrap into a zero-carbon fuel. Rondo Energy just turned on what it says is the world's largest thermal battery, an energy storage system that can take in electricity and provide a consistent source of heat.

The Pixel 9 is Google's cheaper top-end phone, which keeps its standout design. The Pixel 9 is Google's cheaper top-end phone, which keeps its standout design. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Google's cheapest Pixel 9 offers almost everything that makes its top-flight sibling one of the best smaller phones available, cutting a few key ingredients to price match Apple and Samsung.

The Pixel 9 Pro is a rare beast: a smaller phone that keeps the same bold design, specs and camera as Google's biggest and most expensive model. It makes it an instant contender for the best small phone going. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. At 999 ( 1,099/ 999/A 1,699), it is cheaper than its larger Pixel 9 Pro XL sibling but still firmly in the high-end bracket.

Google's top Pixel is back to outshoot, outsmart and outlast the competition, promising seven years of full software support. But whether the Pixel 8 Pro's high-end features justify a sharp price increase is open to debate. The phone features a refined aluminium and glass design. The excellent 6.7in OLED screen is now flat, not curved at the edges as was the case for previous Pixel Pros. It is super smooth for scrolling and can hit an exceptional 2,400nit peak brightness, though only for a few minutes in hot sunshine before dimming to still very readable levels.

RoboCup is an initiative to promote research in robotics through standardized competition and cooperation. The RoboCup Humanoid League focuses on legged robots between 0.4–1 metres tall in the KidSize and 1–2 metres tall in AdultSize. This year the Hamburg Bit-Bots performed a survey of all KidSize teams participating in the RoboCup 2022 in Bangkok, Thailand. We aimed to capture the state of the art in the league. This article gives a summary of the results.

A highly dexterous, human-like robotic hand with fingertip touch sensors can delicately hold eggs, use tweezers to pick up computer chips and crush drink cans. The hand could eventually be used as a prosthetic or in robots that use artificial intelligence to manipulate objects. Weighing 1.1 kilograms, the hand is 22 centimetres long and made of steel and aluminium. Each finger is driven by three small motors that fit within the palm and move metal parts that act like tendons around a total of 20 joints. This enables the digits to tilt sideways, to flex back and forth and to fold, giving the hand a range of movements comparable to that of a human hand.

This is a preliminary work on configuration knowledge representation which serves as a foundation for building interactive configuration systems in Answer Set programming (ASP). The major concepts of the product configuration problem are identified and discussed with a bike configuration example. A fact format is developed for expressing product knowledge that is domain-specific and can be mapped from other systems. Finally, a domain-independent ASP encoding is provided that represents the concepts in the configuration problem.

Plastic waste poses a major challenge across both land and sea! Well, last year scientist calculated the total amount of plastics produced since 1950 and the result is 8.3 billion metric ton. Unfortunately, about three-quarters of which has become waste now. Having said that, many startups across the world are fighting plastic pollution. At present, there are two main global problems regarding plastic packaging.

Apple has revealed the brand new version of the MacBook Air, entirely redesigning its most popular computer. It is what Apple is calling its "greenest ever Mac" and while borrowing from the beloved design includes a complete revamp of the way it looks. That includes Apple's decision to finally introduce the Retina Display that has been missing from the computer for years. And that display will sit in a screen that has also been redesigning, getting rid of the aluminium bezels around the side and allowing the glass to stretch all the way up to the side. The computer also has TouchID, the fingerprint sensor that has gradually been arriving in Apple's range of Macs. That allows the computer to be unlocked and things to be bought just by pressing the sensor next to the keyboard.

All the G7 nations have agreed at their summit in Canada on the importance of a "rules-based trading system", despite tensions with the US. The joint statement signed by US President Donald Trump and his counterparts comes amid a row over high US tariffs imposed this month on steel and aluminium imports. The EU and Canada have taken steps to retaliate. Mr Trump says tariffs are needed to reverse America's trade deficit. Soon after the joint statement was announced, the US president tweeted defiantly about not allowing "other countries to impose massive tariffs and trade barriers on its on farmers, workers and companies".