Nightmare fuelTURIN, ITALY
This might look like something pulled from the depths of your unconscious mind during a nightmare, but in reality, it could be the key to eliminating global hunger.
One of the Sustainable Development Goals set by the United Nations is to create a world free of hunger by 2030. Arguably, the most promising (and slightly creepy) solution to reach this goal is insects. While crops and harvests are at risk from climate change, insects remain a useful source of nutrition. They’re sustainable, high in protein and farming them has a low environmental impact. This is why researchers are studying the best ways to not only farm insects, but to also promote them as a food source, both for livestock animals (in this case) and for people.
At the University of Turin, researchers are breeding Hermetia illucens (black soldier flies) to test the effects of insect meals on single-stomached animals, such as poultry, pigs and people. The hand reaching into this chamber belongs to Prof Laura Gasco, who is collecting boxes of the flies’ eggs to breed another batch.
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Laser guidanceKRUIBEKE, BELGIUM
Don’t believe what you see. This room isn’t bathed in red light; it’s actually pitch black, save for the laser shooting off to the right. An infrared camera allows you to see what’s happening here, which is a test of the laser-guided positioning system for the European Space Agency’s Proba-3 mission.
Due to launch from India in September, Proba-3 involves two satellites flying in precise formation to produce an artificial eclipse. One of the two (known as the ‘Occulter’) will be tasked with blocking the Sun’s light from the other (the ‘Coronagraph’). The artificial eclipse produced by the Occulter will enable the Coronagraph to gather data on the corona around our host star, which is otherwise invisible due to the Sun’s glare.
The shadow cast by the Occulter will be just a few centimetres wide, hence the need for a high-precision positioning system to keep the spacecraft aligned. With the help of laser guidance and other sensors, they will fly approximately 1
