DTN 090: Trump Taps Billionaire Private Astronaut to Lead NASA

Trump Taps Jared Isaacman, Billionaire and Private Astronaut, to Lead NASA

“President-elect Donald Trump has tapped Jared Isaacman, a billionaire entrepreneur, aviator and private astronaut, to lead NASA. The selection comes as the $25-billion-per-year space agency faces intense pressures to return U.S. astronauts to the moon as part of its over budget and behind-schedule Artemis program—while also balancing the denouement of the International Space Station and a vast, ambitious portfolio of space science and aeronautical initiatives.” (Scientific American)

• SpaceX satellite launch from Kennedy Space Center tops off three launches in 30 hours
• The US just made it way harder for China to build its own AI chips
• Over the weekend, China debuted a new rocket on the nation’s path to the Moon
• The quest to better recycle wind turbines and solar panels
• The US is making and deploying more solar panels than ever before
• Researchers launch "moonshot" to cure blindness through eye transplants
• China retaliates, bans exports of rare-earth metals after US chip ban
• Europe’s newest startup trend: Making AI-powered weapons
• Vivek Ramaswamy wants to shift defense spending to new technology
• NASA’s mission to return humans to the Moon has been delayed again until 2026
• Palantir teams up with Shield AI on AI-powered autonomous aircraft
• USC student rocket group shatters international amateur space record
• UK is paying £1B to waste a record amount of wind power
• Utilities are trying enormous 'glow' batteries big enough to oust coal power plants
• AI startup Helsing is now making attack drones for Europe
• Quantum tech startups get military backing to replace GPS
• Saudi Arabia bets on tech to make deserts bloom
• U.S. imposes export restrictions on advanced memory chips to China

Researchers have developed a digital printing technique that allows custom EEG sensors to be printed directly onto the scalp, overcoming traditional limitations of cumbersome electrode placement. By using a 5-axis microjet printing robot and personalized 3D head scans, they can create breathable, stretchable e-tattoos that enable comfortable, long-term brain monitoring. (via Cell Biomaterials)

• Google Deepmind’s new weather forecaster blows away the competition
• Radioactive ‘diamond battery’ could power spacecraft for thousands of years
• German researchers learn how to store solar energy chemically
• Experiment realizes quantum advantage in data storage with a photonic quantum processor
• Photonic processor could enable ultrafast AI computations with extreme energy efficiency
• Analysis of ground motions reveals the seismic signature of Hamas forces en route to their attack
• New laser technique achieves atomic-scale precision on diamond surfaces
• Artificial photosynthesis learned from nature: New solar hydrogen production technology developed
• A new reconfigurable structure could be used to make space habitats
• Researchers develop hyper-sampling imaging to deliver ultra-high-resolution images

• Heartcore Capital closes $180M fund to pivot towards infrastructure, synthetic biology, climate
• Manufacturing AI startup Tractian locks up $120M Series C
• Eos Energy lands $304M DOE loan for battery plant expansion
• Spanish startup PLD Space edges closer to Europe’s first private orbital rocket launch with €11M loan
• French startup Elyse Energy raises €120M for maritime and sustainable aviation fuel projects
• Fly Ventures sets its eyes on technical founders with a fresh €80M fund
• Rubi, a carbon-to-cellulose platform provider secures $1M Phase II grant from the National Science Foundation
• Yurts raises $40M to be the DoD’s AI Chatbot 
• Orikine Bio secures €800K in innovation research funding for precision-engineered bi-specific cytokine therapies
• Biopharmaceutical company Maze Therapeutics raises $115M in Series D financing
• SpinLaunch raises $11M but hoped to raise much more, source says
• FireDome raises $4.5M in funding to improve autonomous wildfire defense
• WeatherFlow-Tempest, a weather technology and environmental monitoring solutions company, raises $3M in Growth capital
• TRIO Pharmaceuticals, a biotechnology company pioneering bispecific antibodies for the treatment of cancer, completes $3.1M financing round
• ConnectDER raises $35M in Series D funding for resilient home energy technology
• SpaceX mulls tender offer at $350B valuation
• Biotechnology company Serina Therapeutics raises $10M in financing
• Heirloom Carbon raises $150M to remove CO2 from the air using rocks
• Cleerly raises $106M from Insight Partners for AI heart health early detection
• Newcells raises further £1.2M in funding to develop laboratory models that help speed up drug development and reduce reliance on animal testing
• Amp Robotics raises $91M to build more robot-filled waste sorting facilities
• Planet A Foods nabs $30M to make tons more cocoa-free chocolate
• Fuelled by €24M, UK startup gears up to put more thermal satellites in orbit
• Tenstorrent closes $693M+ Series D funding to build computers for AI
• Medical device company Ossio raises $27.6M in equity funding
• Orakl Oncology raises €11 to combine data and biology to bring new drugs to cancer patients
• European AI infrastructure firm Nebius raised a $700M funding round

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