World Records

It goes without saying that the heavier a load an aircraft can carry, the more useful that aircraft becomes. Well, the RG-1-A Alpha has reportedly just broken a record, by "dead-lifting" more weight than any autonomous VTOL has previously managed.

A machine named Cassie has set a Guinness World Record for the 100-meter dash by a bipedal robot, and while it’s far from the blistering pace of the world’s best athletes, it is an impressive demonstration of robotics and engineering.

An electric boat built from the ground up for maximum power has blazed past the 100-mph (161-km/h) barrier at the Lake of the Ozarks, proving the potential of all-electric watercraft and posting a new world record in the process.

Scientists in China have set a new world record for the strongest steady magnetic field ever generated on Earth. The hybrid magnet managed to produce a field measuring 45.22 Tesla (T), which is over a million times stronger than the planet’s own.

Scientists have broken the efficiency record for tandem silicon-perovskite solar cells, surpassing the milestone of 30 percent for the first time. The new record takes the technology beyond the upper limits of silicon alone, using low-cost materials.

Vienna’s Leitz Photographica Auctions celebrated its 20th year in business this week when it sold the camera of the man who invented 35-mm photography for €14,400,000, smashing the previous world record of €2,400,000.

Researchers in Japan have clocked a new speed record for data transmission – a blistering 1.02 petabits per second (Pb/s). Better yet, the breakthrough was achieved using optical fiber cables that should be compatible with existing infrastructure.

Optibike has a new ebike with enough battery power to travel 30 percent farther than the official world record. The bike is called the R22 Everest because it's the "only ebike able to climb Mt. Everest on a single charge ... if there was a road."

An autonomous race team from the Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC) has set a new land speed record for driverless cars, recording a two-way average of 192.2 mph (309.3 km/h) over a flying kilometer on a space shuttle airstrip at the Kennedy Space Center.

Inspired by the dual-focus visual system of a 500-million-year-old trilobite, researchers have created and tested a light field camera with the greatest depth of field ever demonstrated. Everything between 3 cm and 1.7 km from the lens stays sharp.

Stuttgart-based German aerospace company H2FLY has claimed a new world record for its four-seater HY4, which became the first hydrogen-powered passenger aircraft to reach an altitude above 7,000 ft (2,134 m) on April 13.

We will never complain about finding a parking spot again. The "American Dream," now stretches to more than 100 ft, seats more than 75 people, and has its own pool, diving board, jacuzzi, bathtub and mini-golf course. Oh, and a helipad.