Load/Path

Cars need computers that are ready the instant the driver turns the key. Normally a chip loads its operating system and AI model from memory outside the chip, and that takes time.

Aisin and Tohoku University built a 16 nm system-on-chip with STT-MRAM, a magnetic memory that keeps data with the power off, placed next to the processor. The operating system and the AI model both live on the chip. The partners say kernel boot, the core of the operating system starting, fell from 2,535.3 ms to 65.7 ms. AI processing fell from 594.6 ms to 58.5 ms, and object detection used about a fiftieth of the usual energy. They presented it at an IEEE circuits conference in Taiwan on 1–4 November.

Power electronics, the parts that switch big currents in chargers and inverters, waste energy as heat. Materials with a wider bandgap can stand stronger electric fields before they break down, so they can handle more voltage.

Cornell engineers grew thin films of silicon-doped aluminium gallium oxide on sapphire, with a bandgap above 7 eV against about 6 eV for the previous record. They built a field-effect transistor, the AlphaFET, and a diode from it. Current changed by more than four orders of magnitude between off and on. The study appeared in Nature on 7 October, and Cornell publicised it this week. Sapphire is produced at large scale, which could help manufacturing.

Service operation vessels carry technicians to offshore turbines. Charging one at sea means connecting an 11 kV cable to something that is moving.

Stillstrom has built a vessel container unit that holds the ship's end of that connection. It can go at the bow, stern or below deck, on a new ship or an existing one. The wind-farm end would be a local equipment room with a transformer and medium-voltage switchgear. In August, a separate trial with Esvagt and Semco Maritime showed the cable being paid out and retrieved while the ship held position with dynamic positioning. The new unit passed factory acceptance testing, witnessed by DNV. Semco Maritime is building the first one in Esbjerg for spring 2027.

A normal rocket engine burns fuel in a steady flame. A rotating detonation engine burns it in a shock wave that circles a ring-shaped chamber. The Swiss start-up Stellar Alpina, founded by four people from the student group ARIS, is building one called Genziana. It is designed for 1 to 5 kilonewtons of thrust and burns propane with hydrogen peroxide.

The company reports eight successful hot fires of its first prototype earlier in 2026, with up to five stable detonation waves. In October it said it had run more than 150 hot fires across 23 configurations. Its plan is a transfer vehicle, Monarch, then a lander, Morpho, to carry up to 50 kg to the Moon's surface. It has raised CHF 3.5 million.

After a spinal cord injury, doctors want to know what is happening to blood flow and tissue at the injury site. Moving a patient to a scanner is hard.

Johns Hopkins Medicine's MUSIC is about the size of a small bandage. A surgeon would place it over the spinal cord, where it images blood flow and tissue changes in real time. A second, exploratory mode uses focused ultrasound to act on blood flow. In a first proof-of-concept study in animals, published in Science Advances on 4 November, the team found temporary implantation feasible and safe, with real-time feedback. It has not been tested in people. It holds an FDA Breakthrough Device Designation from 2023.

A cold battery accepts power slowly, so a fast charger can't use its full output. The fix is to warm the battery before you arrive.

Volkswagen's ID. Software 3.9.1 adds manual preconditioning of the high-voltage battery before a fast charge to older ID. cars: ID.4 and ID.5 built before October 2023, ID.3 up to 2024, early ID. Buzz and older Škoda Enyaq, per electrive citing InsideEVs. The update also revises thermal management and cools the battery better after charging. It arrives over the air and needs the battery at least 50% charged. Newer software generations already do this automatically on the way to a charger.