Technology, Innovation & Outdoor News

DARPA honors drone teams for light copters that carry heavy loads

August 14, 2026 | Ben Coxworth
Presently, cargo-carrying helicopters and multirotor drones have at best a 1:1 payload-to-body-weight ratio. DARPA's Lift Challenge, however, recently asked teams to design drones with a ratio of 4:1 or better.

World's largest all-electric plane completes maiden flight

August 13, 2026 | David Szondy
Another record falls as the world's largest all-electric airplane makes its maiden flight. On August 12, 2026, Heart Aerospace's 25,000-lb (11,340-kg) X1 demonstrator aircraft took to the skies over Plattsburgh, New York for a 27-minute FAA flight test.

Compact tiny house embraces nomadic off-grid living

August 14, 2026 | Adam Williams
While many tiny homes have been trending steadily larger, this off-grid model takes things in the opposite direction. Created with mobility in mind, it would be a good fit for those wanting a nomadic lifestyle.

Top Stories

Following almost eight years of construction, work is complete on the Gordie Howe International Bridge. It features an impressive main span of 2,798 ft, making the longest cable-stayed bridge in North America.
We wouldn't call the all-new Invento Geo multitool "revolutionary" in the sense of changing the market forever, but it does blend physical revolution into the multitool formula. The result is what could prove a quicker of switching between tools.
Portable solar panels have long been a favorite of the off-grid camping and backpacking community, but they're limited by daytime use. Ventyra is aiming to solve this solar gap with an ultra-portable wind turbine called the R1.
Volkswagen often surprises with its annual Caravan Salon debuts, and this year it's revealing multiple world-first concepts that explore the future of van life. It starts off with a California Beach concept that packs a cabin full of inflatables.
Iris' new solar generator has a handy feature you don't often see on units like these: the ability to follow the sun around the sky. The T1 also a built-in battery to top off your personal gadgets while you're off-grid.
The MegCell Pulse is a 3D-printable robotic system that can fit on any acoustic guitar and play music you feed it in a digital tablature format. With this, you can hear compositions rendered right in front of you, no speakers necessary.

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Health and Science news from our sister site: Refractor
Longevity has become a bit of a buzz word, and has become increasingly aligned with the tech industry. But a timely report from Harvard Medical School reminds us that we have a lot of power when it comes to how we age – and it's backed by science.
In somewhat of a surprise announcement, the Food and Drug Administration has approved the first US influenza vaccine engineered from the mRNA technology that gave us one of the most administered COVID-19 shots during the pandemic.
“Remove the plank from your eye before pointing out the speck in another’s,” says a popular proverb. For millions with geographic atrophy, the speck is literal. Relief may now be coming, after a sight-restoring implant received approval for sale in Europe.
An AI present in your consultation promises better notes, less admin and more time for patients, but what exactly is being recorded, where does the data go, and did anyone really ask for your consent?
Hookworms are freeloaders that live at the host’s expense inside their gut, drinking about two drops of blood per day. This parasite could soon pay its way with engineered hookworms serving as living medicine factories.
Sixteen different PFAS compounds have been discovered in the feathers of Antarctic penguins, demonstrating that the insidious spread of "forever chemicals" now reaches the most remote wildlife on Earth.

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Editor's Picks

Dinosaurs may be long extinct, but 2025 made it clear that they’re anything but settled science. New fossils, reanalyses of famous specimens and increasingly sophisticated tools have helped us learn more about how they lived, moved, fed and evolved.
The all-new Urbanoid Booba is an impossibly cute, tiny acorn of a trailer designed to provide a stylish, carefree way of instantly escaping the urban grind. The towable clamshell unfolds and inflates into a cozy base camp in a matter of minutes.
AT Overland has introduced the Aterra Slide-In to turn any Toyota Tundra or Ford F-150 into an overland explorer with its own hard-sided shelter. Buy it as a shell and outfit it yourself or pick and choose from AT Overland's long list of options.
The new Aviator's Ember from Aerohart applies aerospace-grade materials to an age-old design, providing powerful fire-starting performance that carries lightly in a pocket. Like an engine piston, it compresses air for fast, furious combustion.
Britain's DragonFire laser weapon upped the ante on November 20 at the Ministry of Defence's Hebrides Range in Scotland when the high-powered, solid-state laser for the Royal Navy shot down drones flying at 351 knots (404 mph, 650 km/h).
Bürstner has teased some impressive new vehicle debuts ahead of the world's largest RV show. Among them, the Signature series subtly deletes the division between camper van and motorhome with a sleek, semi-integrated body and transformable interior.
After Volkswagen split its midsize van lineup into two distinct model lines, the future of VW van life took the proverbial fork in the road. Spacecamper is the latest to convert a Caravelle, and its new camper arrives as a fast, versatile adventurer.
Who could possibly compare to Superman, the Man of Steel? Definitely not a man of plastic! Right? Wrong. Scientists have discovered that unconventionally shaped plastics may rival steel bars as reinforcement materials in construction concrete.