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Media Platforms Design TeamIn the midst of five months of darkness this coming winter, the Norwegian town of will have one bright spot: a town square illuminated by sunlight bounced off giant mirrors placed atop the town’s neighboring mountains.RjukanCall it a mood enhancer. Or a tourist attraction. But the mirrors, which will be carried in via helicopter, will provide an oasis of light in an otherwise bleak location at the center of the 3500-population town....

If Wal-Mart can go green, so can the Pentagon. That was how Rocky Mountain Institute co-founder and energy pioneer Amory Lovins drove home his message that when big business executes efficiently, it’s not just about eco-image. It’s about making money.Lovins, sitting down for a conversation with Popular Mechanics at the first session of the 2007 Breakthrough Conference before he accepts this year’s Leadership Award, stressed that it has become “hard to get things done” in reducing emissions and increasing efficiencies on a national government level and that corporations need to take the lead....

A hard summer can make a lawn look faded, threadbare and full of holes as your favorite sweat shirt. If your lawn is among them–or has simply suffered from normal wear and tear—don’t rush to the conclusion that it’s time to replace it. Depending upon the damage, you may be able to restore it to its former glory without tearing up your old lawn. The rule of thumb is that if more than half your lawn is still covered with grass that is a healthy deep green, restoration is the better choice....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe clock is ticking on the search for clues to what caused a Beijing-bound Malaysia Airlines 777-200 to vanish suddenly from radar screens last weekend, forty minutes after leaving Kuala Lumpur. As leads and potential evidence surfaced and just as quickly fizzled, a flotilla of 40 ships from nine countries as well as two dozen aircraft scoured an area within a 50 nautical mile radius of Flight 370’s last known position....

Media Platforms Design TeamOne of the reasons that home offices are so popular these days is that the term can mean so many different things. We may call it a home office now, but it’s not much different from the den, library and study of days gone by. And though the electronic hardware may well have changed, the essential function has remained the same. It’s the place to work when you’re serious about getting something done....

In the mid-2000s, standardized head units were replaced by integrated receivers. Then came USB and Bluetooth connectivity. And yet, millions of vehicles out there predate these factory audio evolutions. How hard is it to bring these beasts into the era of podcasts and Spotify? I tested three approaches on three audio systems, each from a distinct audio epoch, to find the best solutions.Challenge 1: Someone stole my Alpine.Solution: Dual XDM16BT receiver ($20)Okay, nobody stole my 1993 Bronco’s stereo....

Media Platforms Design Team GENEVA — One of the highlights of the show so far is certainly a battery breakthrough that Benz officials here are touting as the first integration of next-gen lithium-ion tech into production hybrids. By working a Johnson Controls/Saft pack into its S-Class climate control system, Mercedes will insure that the battery always works at temperatures between 15 and 35°C to extend service life and max performance when it uses the innovative li-ion research in its series-production S 400 Blue Hybrid beginning next year....

Media Platforms Design TeamWiley Post traveling down Broadway, New York, on August 1, 1933, to his official reception after completing his first solo flight around the world. Credit: Getty Images.It’s easy to look back on the heroic earlier days of exploration and see the men who went into the great unknown as tougher, ballsier, and greater than those of us who spend our days shackled to a desk. In the case of Wiley Post, this isn’t just nostalgia....

Media Platforms Design TeamLAS VEGAS—Parrot is probably best known for its AR Drone Quadcopter, but since then the company has come out with a couple of other offbeat inventions, including the plant-monitoring gadget called Flower Power last CES 2013, and its Zik line of headphones. This year, the company is getting back to its roots and coming out with a couple of new toy drones: the MiniDrone and the Jumping Sumo....

Welcome to PM/AM, Popular Mechanics’ morning briefing on the top science and tech stories for today.View full post on Youtube"So it has come to this.“Yesterday we published a story on popularmechanics.com about the embittered console wars between Nintendo and Sega, and in a fit of nostalgia, we dug up this video from 1991 concerning the psychology of families that are “Nintenpendent.“Read ThisMimicking multitask windows on Samsung tablets, Apple will reportedly add the function in its upcoming iOS update....

Media Platforms Design Team1. ACQUIRE ACRYLICThis functional light-up shelf for a basement rec room adds wall-mounted storage for such playtime miscellany as Ping-Pong paddles, balls, darts, and boxing gloves. Acrylic panels, lit by an LED strip, add style to seldom-used materials. To get started, obtain two pieces each of 1/8-inch- and 3/8-inch-thick acrylic, cut by the supplier to about 6 x 12 inches. With a router or table saw, shave off 1/4 to ½ inch (depending on the width of your LED lights) from the long side of one of the 3/8-inch-thick pieces....

Riding Michael Killian’s sideways bicycle was never as easy as, well, riding a bike. Working with his contraption, one of a dozen gonzo reader projects featured in PM’s DIY Rally 2007, doesn’t just require front-to-back finesse; the sidewinder’s independently pivoting wheels—skinny little road-riding tires—make steering tricky. But in these challenges the designer saw an opportunity for evolution, and the result is a sideways bicycle that anyone can master. “The new version of the sideways bike is much easier to ride,” Killian says....

Media Platforms Design TeamCredit: Getty Images.The future of the Internet will be bleak, with governments further restricting access, surveillance breaking down trust, and failing algorithms ruining the web. That’s according to “Net Threats,” a new report conducted by the Pew Research Center as part of that think tank’s “Future of the Internet” project.In collaboration with Elon University, Pew canvassed 1,400 “high-profile technology thinkers,” posing one primary question: “By 2025 will there be significant changes for the worse and hindrances to the ways in which people get and share content online compared with the way globally networked people can operate online today?...

New-school urban farming is coming to an old steel mill in Newark, NJ, where a group of investors are putting together the largest vertical farm in the world. The plants are lit by LED and stacked not unlike servers in a server farm.The one-time superfund site is now called the AeroFarms project, which is not only an experiment in sustainable ag but also a big gamble on bringing jobs to Newark....

Future manned missions to the moon and Mars are going to need some next-generation buggies to get around. The Modular Robotic Vehicle is here, and while NASA’s new electric-powered ride looks like a golf cart, the vehicle handles more like a hot rod. Each of the four wheels can be independently controlled, giving it an incredible range of movement that perfect for dusty worlds like Mars, where it’s easy to get stuck and there’s no roadside service to come bail you out....

Any guitar player who strums this incredible custom axe is going to be shredding paper.Signal Snowboards, a company more associated with wintry sports gear than electric guitars, had been doing some design experiments with cardboard. In a flash of inspiration, they decided to team up with paper company Ernest Packaging and the custom shop at Fender to craft a guitar made of paper. Since it’s made of corrugated cardboard, this is not only a paper strat, but one that you can see through....

Media Platforms Design TeamTo many who viewed the video of the Ares I-X rocket on Oct. 28, 2009, it might have looked as if something went awry during stage separation at the end of the burn of the shuttle-like solid rocket booster (SRB) that it used for a first stage. To this analyst, it appeared that there was a recontact–in other words, a collision–between the first and second stages as they separated....

Self-driving cars are hitting public roads in greater numbers than ever. Meanwhile, some of the most barely autonomous vehicles are having trouble with the simple act of braking. U.S. safety investigators are starting to look into troubling complaints of cars with automated braking systems that are slamming on the brakes for no good reason. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is opening an investigation on 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokees after nine complaints about automated braking, two of which involved a sudden reduction in speed with “no objects on the road....

Media Platforms Design TeamIf you think you don’t have a spot for a desk, file drawers and some shelves, one place that might provide a solution is a closet in an unused bedroom. You can turn a closet into a mini office by installing shelves and a desktop supported on a two-drawer file cabinet. These installations are most practical when the closet has a 48-in.-wide opening and folding doors. We replaced the folding doors’ hinges with a specialized hinge system that allows the doors to swing to the side of the closet opening....

You can’t channel surf these days without tripping over infomercials about abdominal exercise machines. The claims sound fabulous. The chiseled models look great. The messages are hard to resist. “Men, get rock-hard, washboard abs! Women, get a flat stomach and a trim, sexy waist! A patented rocking motion makes exercising fun, safe and easy. It eliminates back and neck strain. Doubles the benefit in half the time. Reduces the spare tire around your gut....