What's Emerging mid-May 2024
A newsletter on interesting stuff that is emerging around the world so you can think about strategy.
Welcome to our end of April Newsletter
In the next few weeks Paul will be working on the strategy consultation process with RSL Victoria. He will also continue working with the SEGRA Foundation and is the keynote presenter and MC for the futures section of the Federal Agriculture Minister’s Agriculture Sustainability Summit in Queensland. He will also continue in his role of venture philanthropy organisation Social Venture Partners Melbourne that is conducting a wide-ranging strategy review in March (just completed - stand by for news from that). He is also setting up the business plan proposal for a new social enterprise business (we could tell you what it is, but we would have to kill you).
If you are interested in talking to us about any of our strategy approaches, foresight approaches, workshops, or conference presentations, please Contact Us.
The Emergent Futures Team
In case you missed it. The most popular link from the last edition (for the third time in a row) was:
Only walking for exercise? Here’s how to get the most out of it
Walking is cost-effective, doesn’t require any special equipment or training, and can be done with small pockets of time. Preliminary research shows there are ways to incorporate strength-training components into walking to improve your muscle strength and balance.……Read More
What are we Writing About?
Paul’s presentation to the Great Southern Investment Conference in Western Australia is now up. You can view it by going to your HOME PAGE and looking under “Our Latest Work”
What’s Emerging
Vauxhall makes EV ownership on par with petrol with new PCP offers
Vauxhall has unveiled a pioneering set of PCP (Personal Contract Purchase) offers. These effectively erase the financial gap between electric and petrol-powered vehicles. Under this new scheme, monthly payments for electric models like the Corsa, Mokka, and Astra now stand shoulder to shoulder with their petrol counterparts. Paul - talked at regional development conference last week about how battery production volumes and falling costs and massive increases in EV manufacturing capacity are accelerating the change to electric transport........…..Read More
Wind and solar are growing faster than any other sources of electricity in history, according to new analysis from thinktank Ember.
In 2023, more than twice as much new electricity generation from solar was added around the world as from coal, Ember says..........…..Read More
Discovery of mechanism plants use to change seed oil could impact industrial, food oils
Bates and his co-authors found that Physaria fendleri, a plant related to canola, can naturally change the fatty acid composition in its seed oil after it is already made, something nobody knew any plant could do. They discovered the genetic mechanism Physaria uses to makes those changes, then genetically engineered a related plant called Arabidopsis to make the same fatty acid changes..........…..Read More
154 million lives saved in 50 years: 5 charts on the global success of vaccines
New research led by the World Health Organization has found vaccines have saved an estimated 154 million lives in the past 50 years from 14 different diseases. Most of these have been children under five, and around two-thirds children under one year old............……. Read more
Grey nomad numbers falling in Queensland as seasoned travellers head overseas
The slow start on outback roads this season followed a drop in caravanning across the state in 2023. Tourism Research Australia (TRA) data showed in the last quarter of 2023, there were 200,000 fewer camping and caravanning trips in Queensland compared to the previous year.........……. Read More
Facebook’s referral traffic for publishers down 50% in 12 month
Aggregate Facebook traffic to a group of 792 news and media sites that have been tracked by the Chartbeat since 2018 shows that referrals to the sites have plunged by 58% in the last six years from 1.3 billion in March 2018 to 561 million last month. Traffic from Facebook fell by 50% in the last 12 months alone as the decline shows little sign of slowing. .....…..Read more
Summer 2023 was northern hemisphere’s hottest for 2,000 years, tree rings show
Across this vast area of land, encompassing Europe, Asia and North America, surface air temperatures were more than 2°C higher in June, July and August 2023 than the average summer temperature between AD1 and 1890, as reconstructed from tree ring records.......…..Read more
Dozens of stars show signs of hosting advanced alien civilisations
Sufficiently advanced aliens would be able to capture vast quantities of energy from their star using a massive structure called a Dyson sphere. Such a device would give off an infrared heat signature - and astronomers have just spotted 60 stars that seem to match.......….. Read more
De novo generation of multi-target compounds using deep generative chemistry
Polypharmacology drugs—compounds that inhibit multiple proteins—have many applications but are difficult to design. In binding data for >100,000 compounds, POLYGON correctly recognizes polypharmacology interactions with 82.5% accuracy. These results support the potential of generative modeling for polypharmacology.……. Read more
Amazon rolls out its biggest fleet of heavy-duty electric trucks
These electric trucks will transport cargo containers and customer packages in Amazon’s first- and middle-mile operations, complementing the hundreds of last-mile electric vans already delivering packages across California. With this addition, the fleet is expected to drive more than 1 million miles each year without producing any tailpipe emissions.……. Read more
Snail-inspired water-enhanced soft sliding suction for climbing robots
Snails can stably slide across a surface with only a single high-payload sucker, offering an efficient adhesive locomotion mechanism for next-generation climbing robots............….….Read more
Wayve Raises Over $1 Billion Led by SoftBank to Develop Embodied AI Products for Automated Driving
Embodied AI, which integrates advanced AI into vehicles and robots to transform how machines interact with, comprehend, and learn from human behavior in real-world environments, is paving the way for greater usability and safety in autonomous driving systems.........….….Read more
AlphaFold 3 predicts the structure and interactions of all of life’s molecules
Inside every plant, animal and human cell are billions of molecular machines. They’re made up of proteins, DNA and other molecules, but no single piece works on its own. Only by seeing how they interact together, across millions of types of combinations, can we start to truly understand life’s processes. AlphaFold 3, is a revolutionary model that can predict the structure and interactions of all life’s molecules with unprecedented accuracy........….…Read more.
DNA editing could make northern quolls cane toad-resistant and potentially avoid extinction
University of Melbourne professor Andrew Pask said cane toads were "one of the biggest threats to northern quoll populations". But by altering two genes in the quolls' DNA, Professor Pask said they could develop an immunity to cane toad toxins..……...… Read more.
Business and Other Tips
OpenAI releases a faster model free for all ChatGPT users - here's what you need to know
For example, free users can now experience GPT-4 level intelligence, get responses from the web via ChatGPT Browse with Bing, analyze data, chat about photos and documents, use GPTs, and access the GPT Store. Previously, all these features were available only to ChatGPT Plus subscribers. ....… Read more.
Research shows children produce better pieces of writing by hand. But they need keyboard skills too
The research found they produced longer and higher-quality handwritten texts. This was based on ten criteria, including ideas, vocabulary, spelling and punctuation....… Read more.
101 real-world gen AI use cases from the world's leading organizations
Google: In our work with customers, we keep hearing that their teams are increasingly focused on improving productivity, automating processes and modernizing the customer experience. These aims are now being achieved through the AI agents they’re developing in six key areas: customer service; employee empowerment; creative ideation and production; data analysis; code creation; and cybersecurity……… Read More
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