$100,000 Diamond Found in India

Daily Upsider on August 6, 2024

In central India, a family man named Raju Gond discovered a 19.22-carat diamond worth nearly $100,000, changing his life forever.

“Our lives have changed forever,” he told CNN after opening his first bank account, anticipating the proceeds from the diamond’s sale.

Raju, 40, and his brother Rakesh live in Madhya Pradesh and typically earn around $4 a day by digging for gold on government-leased land. When gold is scarce, they work in fields driving tractors to make ends meet.

This uncertain livelihood left Raju heavily in debt, trying to support his family and renew his prospecting lease. His fortunes turned when he discovered the diamond in a makeshift mineshaft, a moment he knew was significant as soon as he saw the gemstone’s shine.

Excited, Raju and Rakesh rushed home on their bike, traveling 7 miles to share the good news. They soon took the diamond to the Panna Diamond Office for evaluation.

The process involves paying around $9.50 for the rights to prospect gemstones. Any finds are evaluated and held by a government office until they reach a value threshold—in this case, $360,000 for diamonds. At that point, an official auction is held, with the government taking an 11.5% royalty and the remainder going to the discoverer.

The monsoon season had reduced their work opportunities, prompting Raju and Rakesh to switch from gold panning to diamond prospecting. With a large family to support, including in-laws and seven children, Raju needed a significant find.

“The first thing I’ll do is pay off the $6,000 debt. Then we’ll invest in our children’s education, build homes, buy land, and maybe a tractor,” Raju said. The following morning, the brothers were already back at the mine, eager to find more diamonds.

Spray-On Shoes

Daily Upsider on August 6, 2024

The Cloudboom Strike LS shoes are designed for speed and acceleration, offering a lightweight construction that could make the difference between winning and losing a gold medal. They feature a carbon fiber sole with no heel cap or toe spring, and their upper is made from LightSpray, a thermoplastic that sets in just three minutes. On’s co-CEO, Marc Maurer, sees LightSpray as a potential step towards a more sustainable and circular future.

Hellen Obiri, who joined On in January 2022 after leaving Nike, wore a prototype of the LightSpray shoe when she clinched her second Boston Marathon victory in April. The concept was inspired by Johannes Voelchert, who was influenced by a child’s Halloween glue gun toy used for spraying spider webs.

Australian middle-distance runner Olli Hoare and Irish 1,500-meter runner Luke McCann have previously worn the Cloudboom Strike, and On hopes they’ll choose these new shoes for their upcoming races.

Available to the public for $300, the Cloudboom shoes are not just for elite athletes. With spray-on dresses already seen on Milan runways and spray-on sneakers gaining popularity, it’s exciting to imagine what other products might soon be available in spray-on formats—perhaps even spray-on furniture?

Electric Butterflies

Daily Upsider on August 5, 2024

A new study has revealed that the electrostatic field generated by butterflies and moths in flight enables them to attract pollen grains from flowers across air gaps several centimeters wide.

Researchers from the University of Bristol found that the static electricity carried by butterflies and moths varies among species, influenced by their ecology, including the type of flowers they visit, whether they are diurnal or nocturnal, and their habitat. The findings, published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface, suggest that this electric field enhances their efficiency and effectiveness as pollinators.

While it was known that animals like bees and hummingbirds use static electricity to collect pollen, it was unclear if this applied to butterflies and moths. “We set out to test this idea,” says lead author Dr. Sam England from Bristol’s School of Biological Sciences, “to see if butterflies and moths also accumulate charge, and if so, whether this charge is enough to attract pollen from flowers onto their bodies.”

The study examined 269 butterflies and moths across 11 species from five continents, each in different ecological niches. This allowed the researchers to compare the static charge and determine if ecological variables influenced it.

Dr. England explains, “We’ve discovered that butterflies and moths accumulate so much static electricity when flying, that pollen is literally pulled through the air towards them as they approach a flower,”” This means they don’t need to touch flowers to pollinate them, which makes them highly efficient pollinators.

A Zero-Emissions Fuel

Daily Upsider on August 5, 2024

A team from MIT has developed a chemical reaction that could allow ships and submarines to generate zero-emissions hydrogen power using aluminum pellets and seawater.

By making a few adjustments, the researchers managed to produce a significant amount of hydrogen gas, a potential alternative to fossil fuels for heavy machinery like construction equipment, trains, and planes. One of the key modifications involved adding coffee grounds, which made the process more sustainable by using aluminum from old soda cans. Hydrogen is being tested in various applications as it has zero carbon emissions, with water as the only byproduct.

However, concerns exist about the safety of transporting large quantities of hydrogen gas due to its volatile nature. Aly Kombargi, a Ph.D. student in MIT’s Department of Mechanical Engineering, and his team proposed using seawater as the hydrogen source and aluminum pellets as the onboard fuel, similar to how coal was once used in steamships.

“This is particularly useful for maritime applications like boats or underwater vehicles, as seawater is readily available,” said Kombargi, the lead author of the paper detailing the experiment.

The reaction involves dropping pure aluminum into water, which generates hydrogen gas. To reduce costs, aluminum soda cans can be used, but they must be pretreated with a rare alloy called gallium indium. This is necessary because the non-pure aluminum in soda cans forms a protective oxide layer that prevents the reaction. The alloy can be recovered if protected by a barrier of ions, which seawater naturally provides.

Initially, the process took about 2 hours, but by experimenting with different substances, the team discovered that coffee grounds, specifically the imidazole found in caffeine, reduced the reaction time to just 5 minutes.

With this approach, the researchers estimate that 1 gram of pre-treated aluminum pellets can generate 1.3 liters of hydrogen in just 5 minutes. According to MIT, the team plans to test the system in marine and underwater vehicles, and they have calculated that a reactor holding about 40 pounds of aluminum pellets could power a small underwater glider for approximately 30 days using seawater to generate hydrogen to power a motor.

A Cooling Tech We Apparently Forgot About

Daily Upsider on August 1, 2024

Humans are pretty smart, and we come up with a lot of great ideas. Sadly, sometimes those great ideas are forgotten even thought they could still be very useful.

Often, past technologies are replaced by better technologies. However, the original solutions can address issues with the newer techs. And using them in conjunction can often give you the best of both worlds.

So here is this fascinating video explaining why you should consider using this “obsolete” tech on your home.