3d

Who says we have to choose between driving to work or riding a bike? The idea of an electric vehicle that would bridge the gap between the two is not new; in fact, it goes farther back than the rise of electric vehicles to prominence. Whether called a carcycle, a car-bike, or car-ebike, this vehicle is best described as the illegitimate child between a small passenger car and an electric bicycle.

Using X-rays, artificial intelligence and 3D printing, two UCL researchers reproduced a “lost” work of art by renowned Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh, 135 years after he painted over it.

PhD researchers Anthony Bourached (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology) and George Cann (UCL Space and Climate Physics), working with artist Jesper Eriksson, used cutting edge technology to recreate a long-concealed Van Gogh painting.

For architects, engineers, and other designers, 3D printing is providing an opportunity to create truly innovative structures. One such project is the world’s first 3D-printed stainless steel bridge that has just opened over a canal in Amsterdam’s Red Light District. The new MX3D Bridge was designed by Joris Laarman Lab with MX3D, a startup founded by Laarman and Arup.

Interdisciplinary designer Iris van Herpen has partnered with Magnum ice cream to create the world’s first vegan, haute couture dress made from cocoa beans. Van Herpen is known for her integration of technology into fashion, and Magnum’s entry into haute couture is another step in the brand’s embrace of sustainability.

Waste cocoa bean husks from the production of chocolate were transformed into an organic, vegan biopolymer material. The design was then 3D printed before being finished by hand with upcycled organza, copper coating, and intricate, plant-inspired details.

The opening of Abba’s Voyage show is undoubtedly an event – even the band’s most famously publicity-shy member, Agnetha Fältskog, is in attendance – but it’s one accompanied by a genuine sense of mystery.

How many times do we hear stories about how an ingenious solution to solve one challenge ends up being a perfect solution for something the inventor had never thought about? This is how South African researcher Amir Patel’s fascination with the speed and maneuverability of the cheetah led him to the health care arena. In devising methods to understand the way cheetah’s move, he has come up with a more affordable and accessible mechanism to support the rehabilitation of patients suffering injury or neurological disease.