Lonestar one step closer to building lunar data centers

You're reading The Vital Component, a breakdown of the week's engineering news delivered to your inbox. I’m Loukia, an editor at IE. Let's dive in.

In this edition, we are discussing how a Florida startup raised $5 million toward building lunar data centers, how the US Navy fielded cold spray tech to benefit warfighters, and how AI-powered robots cut out weeds while leaving crops untouched. As always, we have five more stories to delight and entertain you.

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Cloud computing startup Lonestar Data Holdings announced the results of its latest $5 million funding round, which will help it develop its technology for storing data on the lunar surface.

The Florida-based company aims to build lunar data centers on the Moon to help combat the environmental impact of large server centers on Earth. It could also help NASA in its bid to build a permanent colony on the Moon with its upcoming crewed Artemis missions.

A cold spray metallization technology that was first tested at Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) is currently being fielded by the U.S. Navy.

The new technology will help cut down on turnaround times for aircraft maintenance as well as expenses, according to a press release by the U.S. Navy on Friday. 

"With this mobile, autonomous cold spray system, we'll be bringing repair capabilities closer to the aircraft," explained Jessica Templeton, the Air Vehicle and Materials Engineering lead with the Naval Air Systems Command Fleet Support Team's Advanced Technology and Innovation Team at FRCE.

In farming, weeds can strangle crops and destroy yields. Unfortunately, spraying herbicides to deal with the intrusive plants pollutes the environment and harms human health and there simply aren't enough workers to tackle all the weeds by hand.

A new startup called FarmWise has come up with a solution: autonomous weeding robots that use artificial intelligence to cut out weeds while leaving crops untouched, according to an MIT report published on Thursday.