STAR POWER
By the end of the decade, Iceland may be getting some of its electricity from a solar power plant — in space. Reykjavik Energy has partnered with U.K. startup Space Solar, which is developing a power station of photovoltaic solar panels to collect sunlight 22,236 miles above the Earth. It will then be converted into energy, converted into microwaves and beamed down to receivers on the ground that will convert it back into electricity to be fed into the power grid.  Source: New Atlas2.7
The world’s fastest supercomputer, El Capitan, can operate at a peak compute power of 2.7 exaflops. That’s more calculations per second than a human being could make if they completed one calculation per second for more than nine lifetimes of the Earth. El Capitan was built by HPE for the National Nuclear Security Administration at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where it will be used to simulate nuclear weapons tests.  Source: TechRadar STREET SOUNDS
The University of Texas at Austin’s new Soundscape-to-Image Diffusion Model is an AI system that can accurately generate an image of a street based only on an audio recording. Assistant professor Yuhao Kang and colleagues trained the AI on 10-second audiovisual clips consisting of an image of a street and the ambient noise that goes along with it. The system learned which sounds and sound qualities correspond with different visual environments and was able to accurately produce images of streets when given only their recorded ambient sound.  Source: New AtlasHOT OFF THE CONSOLE
Sony’s PlayStation 5 gaming console is notorious for running warm, and Pizza Hut is looking to capitalize on that. The fast-food pizza chain has come up with the PIZZAWRMR, a 3D-printable add-on that does exactly what its name suggests. The PIZZAWRMR can keep your pizza warm at your desk using the heat from the console. Anyone with a 3D printer can download the specs to print their own.  Source: Mashable

This story originally appeared in the Winter 2025 issue of Government Technology magazine. Click here to view the full digital edition online.