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Wild-haired moth named after Donald Trump

Neopalpa donaldtrumpi
Two views of the moth now known as Neopalpa donaldtrumpi highlight the yellowish-white scales on its head. (Vazrick Nazari Photo via ZooKeys / Pensoftbiolo

Donald Trump isn’t even sworn in as president yet, but he already has a species named after him: a micro-moth with a bushy head of yellowish-white scales.

Neopalpa donaldtrumpi is found in a habitat that, ironically, stretches across the U.S.-Mexico border – from California to Baja California. Biologists have long known that twirler moths inhabited the region, but until recently, they thought there was only one species in the genus.

Canadian evolutionary biologist Vazrick Nazari discovered that wasn’t the case when he examined insect specimens from the Bohart Museum of Entomology at the University of California at Davis. A few of the moth specimens didn’t match the description for Neopalpa neonata.

Among the distinguishing features for the outliers were yellowish-white scales on the moth’s head, and an orange-yellow coloration on the upper side of the forewing. The scales reminded Nazari of Trump’s signature comb-over, and led him to go with “donaldtrumpi” as the species name.

Nazari’s findings were published online today by the open-access journal ZooKeys.

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Boeing is in the middle of NASA-Russia deal

Soyuz
A Russian Soyuz craft approaches the International Space Station. (Credit: NASA)

NASA is considering a convoluted arrangement to reserve five more seats on Russian Soyuz capsules heading to and from the International Space Station, with the Boeing Co. as the middleman.

The plan to reserve more trips to orbit would give NASA additional breathing room as it waits for Boeing and SpaceX to complete the development of their commercial space taxis.

The first crewed test flights of those space taxis aren’t scheduled to occur until 2018. And in a procurement notice issued today, NASA acknowledged that they are “not expected to begin fully operational flights to the ISS until 2019.”

NASA has made a limited number of reservations on Soyuz craft in 2018, at a cost of more than $80 million per seat. But there’s not much of a margin to deal with further delays in the commercial crew schedule.

By a strange set of circumstances, Boeing could help fill the gap, even if its own CST-100 Starliner spacecraft isn’t yet ready to fly.

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Treasure Truck wins patent amid big ambitions

Treasure Truck
When the Treasure Truck is opened up, customers see a flashy array of signs. (GeekWire Photo)

If you’re thinking about building a knockoff of Amazon’s Treasure Truck, the funky delivery vehicle for flash deals ranging from cameras to candy, consider yourself warned: The design is now patented.

The patent was issued today, covering the ornamental design for the heavily modified Isuzu cab-over truck. The truck is typically stocked several times a month with one or two types of discounted goodies and makes deliveries to a few locations in the Seattle area.

The Treasure Truck been compared to an ice cream truck for grownups: Amazon app users can get alerts about the deals on their smartphones, but once all the goods are spoken for, that’s it. (Today’s deal, offering two pounds of wild Dungeness crab for $35, is already sold out.)

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Amazon patents self-driving lane control system

Amazon Fresh truck
An Amazon Fresh truck goes out for deliveries. (Image by Atomic Taco, via Flickr – CC BY-SA 2.0)

There’s been a lot of speculation about Amazon’s interest in self-driving delivery trucks, and a newly issued patent suggests that the Seattle-based retailer is putting a lot of thought into how such a system would work.

The patent, issued today, concentrates on how a wireless control system could help autonomous vehicles negotiate changes in reversible lanes.

The arrangement would keep self-driving cars and trucks in contact with a central roadway management system. That system would track how lanes are allocated, and could even shift lanes from one direction to the other depending on demand.

“The roadway management system can identify a period of time and a particular lane of the roadway that is best suited to assign to the autonomous vehicle while taking into account an outcome directive,” Amazon’s inventors explain.

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Microsoft’s CEO sees AI’s down side for jobs

Satya Nadella
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella talks about the “upscaling” effect of AI at the DLD tech conference in Munich. (DLD via YouTube)

Experts on employment trends have long raised concerns about how job markets are being disrupted so quickly by artificial intelligence and automation are disrupting the job market, and now it sounds as if Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella shares those concerns.

Nadella has made AI one of the pillars of Microsoft’s future growth. But during today’s fireside chat at the DLD tech conference in Munich, he acknowledged that the technology comes with moral imperatives attached. It’s not enough to create AI tools that make more money for Microsoft, he said.

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Airbus gets set to test flying car – in Oregon?

Airbus Group envisions Vahana as an electric-powered vehicle that carries individual passengers or cargo, and takes off and lands vertically. (MTSI Photo)
Airbus Group envisions Vahana as an electric-powered vehicle that carries individual passengers or cargo, and takes off and lands vertically. (MTSI Photo)

Airbus Group says it’s on track to test its prototype self-piloted flying car by the end of the year, and those tests may well take place in Oregon.

The European consortium’s CEO, Tom Enders, talked up the vision for Airbus’ Urban Air Mobility division today at the DLD tech conference in Munich. The plan would let passengers use smartphone apps to book rides in electric-powered, vertical-takeoff-and-landing vehicles.

“One hundred years ago, urban transport went underground. Now we have the technological wherewithal to go above ground,” Reuters quoted Enders as saying. “We are in an experimentation phase. We take this development very seriously.”

Airbus has been pursuing its flying-taxi initiative since last year.

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Last man on the moon leaves a dying wish

Gene Cernan
Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan wears a spacesuit smeared with lunar dirt in 1972. (NASA Photo)

Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan, the last human to leave footprints on the moon, passed away today – but his family says his dying wish remains to be fulfilled.

“Even at the age of 82, Gene was passionate about sharing his desire to see the continued human exploration of space, and encouraged our nation’s leaders and young people to not let him remain the last man to walk on the moon,” the family said in a statement released by NASA.

The family statement said Cernan had been suffering from ongoing health issues. He died at a Houston hospital, surrounded by relatives.

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SpaceX gets back to launching – and landing!

SpaceX Falcon 9 launch
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lifts off from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base. (SpaceX Photo)

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lifted off for the first time in five months to put 10 advanced Iridium Next telecommunication sateliites in orbit – and demonstrate that the company’s innovative launch-and-landing system was back in stride.

Cheers went up from a crowd of hundreds of SpaceX employees at the company’s headquarters as they watched the rocket ascend from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base at 9:54 a.m. PT. The cheers rose again minutes later when the Falcon 9’s first stage landed on a drone ship in the Pacific for the first time.

Today’s liftoff came after a spectacular launch pad explosion on Sept. 1 that destroyed a different Falcon 9 and its $200 million Amos-6 satellite payload.

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Moon Express’ moonshot is ‘go with funding’

Moon Express lander
An artist’s conception shows Moon Express’ lander extending its robotic arm to take a “selfie” of the spacecraft on the lunar surface with Earth in the background. (Credit: Moon Express)

An executive at Moon Express has been widely quoted as saying his company has reached its funding goal for this year’s planned commercial mission to the lunar surface, thanks to $20 million in new investment.

“We now have all the resources in place to shoot for the moon,” the Florida-based company’s CEO, Bob Richards, said in a statement. “Our goal is to expand Earth’s social and economic sphere to the moon, our largely unexplored eighth continent, and enable a new era of low-cost lunar exploration and development for students, scientists, space agencies and commercial interests.”

Space News quoted Richards as saying that the latest round of investment includes contributions from new and existing investors, including the company’s chairman and co-founder, Seattle-area tech entrepreneur Naveen Jain.

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No virtual Carrie Fisher in future Star Wars films

Carrie Fisher
Carrie Fisher portrays General Leia Organa in “The Force Awakens.” (Disney / Lucasfilm Photo)

Spoiler Alert: This item avoids discussing major plot twists in any of the Star Wars movies, but wait to read it if you want to stay totally in the dark about “Rogue One,” “The Force Awakens” or Episode VIII or IX.

Don’t expect Carrie Fisher to make a virtual appearance as General Leia Organa in the yet-to-be-filmed installments of the Star Wars saga.

That’s the word from Lucasfilm, which issued a statement today via its Star Wars website.

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