DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF by Maryanne Kane, Journalist

 DAILY INNOVATION BRIEF

                                                                      

                 By Journalists Edward Kane & Maryanne Kane

ALEF's FLYING CAR MODEL A IS SOARING

                                                                 Source:  ALEF

• California-based flying car company ALEF Aeronautics has secured 2500 orders for its $300,000 flying and driving car Model A and the sales are surging - $750 million in pre-orders
• The company is achieving a number of firsts including: 

1. 1st flying car company to win FAA approval for a Special Airworthiness Certificate to perform extensive R&D on Model A including flying
2. 1st flying car company to sell the vehicle through a car dealership
3. alef could provide the first US flights in a personal car

• Here are some key details on Model A:

1. All electric
2. Flies and drives
3. Driving range 200 miles
4. Flying range 110 miles
5. Vertical takeoffs and landings
6. Distributed electric propulsion
7. Closed propellers
8. Carries 2 people
9. AWD
10. Fits within existing infrastructure
11. Model A customer deliveries in late 2025

• ALEF CEO Jim Dukhovny says he's close to starting hand-made production, then will start automated manufacturing and seek full FAA certification to fly.

GOOGLE'S NEXT-G OF MULTI-TASKING AI ROBOTS

                                                        Source:  Google DeepMind & Stock

• Google DeepMind (UK-US AI lab subsidiary) just unveiled a new RT-2 system, the first Vision, Language, Action (VLA) model that takes AI enabled robots to the next level of functionality and control
• RT-2 stands for Robotic Transformer and this new AI empowered tech is transformative
• Google's goal is to build general purpose robots that can reason, problem solve and interpret information to perform a wide range of tasks in the real world
• The new system was trained on text data and images from the internet - very similar to the large language models at AI chatbots like ChatGPT
• RT-2 is designed to continuously learn from multiple data sources, adapt to new circumstances and perform new functions that it hasn't been trained to do
• AI is empowering this new robotic system to create new robots that uniquely adapt to new situations and environments with valuable new capabilities.

DRINKING WINE FOR HEALTHY SKIN

                            Source:  Stock & Muscadine grapes

• A new study by scientists at the University of Florida has found that red wine helps to maintain youthful skin
• They specifically discovered that Muscadine wine, made from Muscadine grapes, helped sagging skin retain its elasticity and moisture
• The scientists used de-alcoholised wine because they were focused on bioactive compounds, specifically polyphenols, which they believe are responsible for the benefits
• In the research a group of 40-to-67-year-old women drank 2 glasses of wine a day and showed improved skin with more elasticity and water retention after 6 weeks, compared to another group of women who took placebos
• This new research was just presented to the 2023 American Society for Nutrition Annual Conference in Boston
• Red wine, rich in antioxidants, is known for health benefits including preventing heart disease, improving memory and lowering cholesterol - now healthier skin
• The researchers don't know how alcohol might have changed the results
• Cheers!!!

"Daily Innovation Brief" © By Edward Kane