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HOW TO CLONE A WOOLLY

MAMMOTH

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SOLV ING THE MYSTERY OF AMELI A EARHART W I TH A NUCLEAR REACTOR P.26

SAFET Y T IPS FOR ENTERING A BL ACK HOLE

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▶ July/August 2021 // STA NDA R DS //

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My POP Life Tips, gear picks, and vetted wisdom from our staff. p.4

From the Editor HarleyDavidson has some radical new motorcycles. p.8

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3 Drinks The new wave of craft IPAs (plus, homebrewing tips!). p.10

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Space Your complete guide to surviving a journey through a black hole. p.30

Deep Math Next time, math could save Texas from massive grid failure.

Here’s how. p.34

11 Outdoor Awards Elite hiking, cycling, and camping gear— plus outdoor gadgets. p.58

4 Cars & Trucks The new Ford Bronco Sport battles best-selling crossovers. p.12

12 This Changed Everything Is this the most important lightbulb since Edison’s? p.68

5 Military Tech These goggles let Army soldiers see through walls. p.16

6 Biology We’ve cloned an endangered species.

Could extinct species be next? p.18

13 Tools The best power sanders for any job, with expert instruction on how to use them. p.72

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Machines How science made your body a power source for wearable tech. p.22

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Editors’ Choice A leaf blower, mower, bluetooth speaker, and smart lock. p.76

Home Inside your garbage disposal, and ways to stop mucking it up. p.80

8 Physics A nuclear reactor might help solve Amelia Earhart’s disappearance. p.26

16 How to Be Good at What You Do After 124 years, Filson keeps standards high. p.88

J E S S E R I E S E R (S C I E N C E) ; CO U R T E S Y B O E I N G CO N C E P T A R T (N G A D) ; G E T T Y I M AG E S (B LU F O R D)

// FE ATURES //

Can Science Cure Death?

It Sure Looks Like It The only thing these life extensionists need to do to live forever is survive until it’s possible. p.38

How America’s New Fighter Will Outclass Its Competition

He Flew Cessnas, Spy Planes, and the Challenger.

Here’s What He Learned

Everything we know about the Air Force’s secret plane. p.46

A Q&A with former NASA astronaut Guy Bluford. p.54

// ON THE COVER // ILLUSTRATION BY RODRIGO AVELLA

POPULAR MECHANICS (ISSN 0032-4558) is published six times per year by Hearst, 300 West 57th St., NY, NY 10019 USA. Steven R. Swartz, President & Chief Executive Officer; William R. Hearst III, Chairman; Frank A. Bennack, Jr., Executive Vice Chairman; Mark E. Aldam, Chief Operating Officer. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc.: Debi Chirichella, President & Treasurer; Kate Lewis, Chief Content Officer; Kristen M. O’Hara, Chief Business Officer; Catherine A. Bostron, Secretary. Copyright 2021 by Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Popular Mechanics is a registered trademark of Hearst Communications, Inc. Customer Service: For changes of address, and subscription orders, visit service.popularmechanics.com or write to Customer Service, Popular Mechanics, P.O. Box 6000, Harlan, IA 51593. Popular Mechanics (PM) cannot be responsible for unsolicited material. Mailing lists: From time to time we make our subscriber list available to companies that sell goods and services by mail that we believe would interest our readers. If you would rather not receive such offers via postal mail, please send your current mailing label or exact copy to Mail Preference Service, P.O. Box 6000, Harlan, IA 51593. You can also visit preferences.hearstmags.com to manage your preferences and opt out of receiving marketing offers by mail. Periodicals postage paid at N.Y., N.Y., and at additional mailing offices. Canada Post International Publications mail product (Canadian distribution) sales agreement no. 40012499. CANADA BN NBR 10231 0943 RT. POSTMASTER: Send all UAA to CFS. (See DMM 707.4.12.5); non-postal and military facilities: send address corrections to Popular Mechanics, P.O. Box 6000, Harlan, IA 51593. As a service to readers, PM publishes newsworthy products, techniques, and scientific and technological developments. Due to possible variance in the quality, condition of materials, workmanship, PM cannot assume responsibility for proper application of techniques or proper and safe functioning of manufactured products or reader-built projects resulting from information published in this magazine.

July/August 2021

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My Pop Life

Alexander George EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

// EXPERT H ACKS, GE A R RECS & LIFE-TESTED W ISDOM FROM OUR STAFF //

@viewsfromthewolffden

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Open the app, point your phone at the sky, and know what you’re looking at (yes, that is Mars!).

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PRODUCTS I’M USING RIGHT NOW

I’ve learned that math can be cool.

This Tool Changed My Life

DESIGN + PHOTO Amy Wolff Photo Director; Colin McSherry Senior Art Director; Alyse Markel Art Director; Eleni Dimou Senior Designer; Ash Bartholomew Digital Designer; Kristen Parker Photo Editor; John Hamilton Associate Photo Editor EDITORIAL Molly Ritterbeck Health & Fitness Director; Bette Canter Deputy Editor; Taylor Rojek Features Editor; Tyler Daswick Associate Features Editor; Andrew Daniels How-To Editor; Courtney Linder Senior News Editor; Danielle Zickl Health & Fitness Editor; Jennifer Leman News Editor; Daisy Hernandez Associate News Editor; Drew Dawson Gear & News Editor; Jessica Coulon Assistant Editor; Leah Campano Editorial Planning Associate; Amber Joglar Administrative Assistant Caroline Dorey-Stein Assistant Special Projects Editor

Best Money I Ever Spent My first house! I was a renter in Brooklyn for 12 years. Now, living in Pennsylvania, my mortgage is way less, and home improvements are so much more worthwhile.

Matt Allyn Features Director; Christine Anderson Executive Director of Commerce & Content Strategy; Brian Dalek Director of Content Operations; Leah Flickinger Director of Content Creation; Lou Mazzante Test Director; Suzanne Perreault Editorial Operations Director; Jesse Southerland Creative Director

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OXO Electric Kettle

Makita String Trimmer

A full pot heats up to a high temp (200°F) in minutes. Bonus: The narrow spout comes in handy when watering plants.

The handle keeps things under control, and there are three different power modes for big and small jobs.

Chef’sChoice TriZor XV Knife Sharpener. I cook a lot, but my fancy knives are rendered useless when dull. I was using a rolling wheel stone before this super-fast electronic magic.

TEST TEAM Will Egensteiner, Jennifer Sherry Associate Test Directors; Jeff Dengate, Matt Phillips Senior Test Editors; Roy Berendsohn, Adrienne Donica, Brad Ford, Amanda Furrer, Morgan Petruny Test Editors; Lakota Gambill, Trevor Raab Photographers; Joël Nankman Logistician VIDEO Josh Wolff Director; Jimmy Cavalieri Production Manager; Pat Heine, David Monk Producers CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Caroline Delbert, Daniel Dubno, Wylie Dufresne, Kyle Mizokami, Darren Orf, David Owen, Joe Pappalardo, Richard Romanski, James Schadewald, Paige Szmodis, Joseph Truini, Nicholas Wicks EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Bill Strickland Popular Mechanics International Kim St. Clair Bodden Russia, South Africa • SVP/International Editorial Director

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GEAR Aid Tenacious Tape

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Between pricker bushes and my dog destroying everything upholstered, I’m embarrassed to admit how much of this tape I’ve used.

The dog destroys in other ways—this stuff works the best. It has a fragrance at first but once dry, that—and the stain—is fully gone!

Editorial Offices 132 South 3rd Street Easton, PA 18042 HOW TO REACH US: Customer Care Visit Online POPCustServ@ CDSFulfillment.com; Phone 800333-4948; Mail Customer Care Service Dept. Popular Mechanics, PO Box 6000, Harlan, IA 51593-0128.

LICENSING AND REPRINTS: Contact Wyndell Hamilton, Wright’s Media, at 877-652-5295 ext. 102 or hearst@wrightsmedia.com.

JULY/AUGUST 2021

CURRENT PASSION PROJECT

On My Reading List

I’m creating a water feature (we’ll call it a small waterfall with a tiny pond) in the backyard.

Calming water sounds for me, cold running water for the dog.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running: A Memoir by Haruki Murakami.

Running has helped me through the pandemic, but it became too routine and almost unpleasant. I needed a reset.

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July/August 2021

PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

T R E VO R R A A B ( W O L F F, S T R I N G T R I M M E R , S P R AY, B O O K) ; CO U R T E S Y OXO (K E T T L E) ; CO U R T E S Y G E A R A I D ( TA P E) ; CO U R T E S Y A M Y W O L F F (P O N D)

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ShopBot. Your path to creativity.

ShopBot manufactures CNC tools that inspire people to turn their ideas into something tangible. When we see our tools put to work in constructive ways, it reaffirms our commitment to the mission of making digital fabrication technology readily accessible and usable for everyone.

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ShopBot Desktop MAX ATC This ShopBot CNC tool has a 36” x 24” work area and industrial precision with the added efficiency of an Automatic Tool Changer (ATC). An ATC reduces production time by quickly and robotically changing cutters between tool paths, eliminating the need to change and zero tools individually.

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SVP, PUBLISHING DIRECTOR

// EXPERT H ACKS, GE A R RECS & LIFE-TESTED W ISDOM FROM OUR STAFF //

Current Passion Project DARREN ORF Contributing Editor Can be found with a book, a cat, or both.

My vegetable garden.

Last year it was more or less a disaster. This year—with some more research and planning— I’m hoping to discover my green thumb.

What I Love Researching

Coolest Thing on My Desk I just bought Kanto YU2 desktop speakers to upgrade my office audio. Despite the cheap price tag, they really deliver. Plus, they come in a bunch of different colors and finishes. I went with the white matte.

PRODUCTS I’M USING RIGHT NOW

The natural world and environmentalism.

I’m constantly in awe of our planet, and I’m becoming increasingly interested in the various ways technology and human ingenuity can save it.

HANDMADE OR MACHINE-MADE? 2

Gransfors Bruks Large Splitting Axe

Analogue Pocket

I finally installed the woodstove of my dreams in my home last winter, and this axe has been my Swedishmade wood-splitting friend.

OK, so it’s not available— yet. But my (currently unplayable) Game Boy collection and I are patiently counting down the days until October 2021.

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Normally, I’d say machine-made, but my splitting axe is stamped with the initials of the blacksmith who forged it—and there’s something special about that.

William Upton Associate Publisher; Cameron Connors Executive Director, Head of Brand Strategy & Marketing; Samantha Irwin General Manager; Chris Peel Executive Director, Men’s & Enthusiast Group, Hearst Magazines Digital Media ADVERTISING SALES OFFICES NEW YORK: Caryn Kesler Executive Director, Luxury Goods; John Wattiker Executive Director, Global Fashion & Retail; Doug Zimmerman Senior Grooming Director; John Cipolla Integrated Account Director Spirits, Entertainment & Travel; Kimberly Buonassisi Account Director; Kyle B. Taylor East Coast Sales Director, Hearst Autos; Joe Pennacchio East Coast Automotive Director; Samantha Wolf Integration Associate; Everette A. Hampton Executive Assistant; DETROIT: Marisa Stutz Group Advertising Director, Hearst Autos; Toni Starrs Integration Associate; CHICAGO: Justin Harris Midwest Sales Director; Autumn Jenks Midwest Sales Director; Yvonne Villareal Sales Assistant; LOS ANGELES: Stacey Lakind Southwest Sales Director; Anne Rethmeyer Group Advertising Director, Hearst Autos; Lisa LaCasse Digital Sales Director, Hearst Autos; Olivia Zurawin Sales Assistant; SAN FRANCISCO: William G. Smith, Smith Media Sales, LLC; DALLAS: Patty Rudolph PR 4.0 Media; HEARST DIRECT MEDIA: Brad Gettelfinger Sales Manager MARKETING SOLUTIONS Jason Graham Marketing Solutions: Executive Director, Integrated Marketing; Jana Gale Executive Creative Director; Karen Mendolia Executive Director, Events & Promotions; Mike Sarpy Design Director; Alesandra Ajlouni Senior Manager, Integrated Marketing; Caroline Hall Marketing Coordinator; William Carter Executive Director, Consumer Marketing; Peter Davis Research Manager ADMINISTRATION/PRODUCTION Aurelia Duke Finance Director; Regina Wall Advertising Services Director; Trevor Czak Business Coordinator; David Brickey Production Manager PUBLISHED BY HEARST Steven R. Swartz President and Chief Executive Officer; William R. Hearst III Chairman; Frank A. Bennack, Jr. Executive Vice Chairman; Mark E. Aldam Chief Operating Officer; Catherine A. Bostron Secretary HEARST MAGAZINES, INC. Debi Chirichella President and Treasurer; Kate Lewis Chief Content Officer; Kristen M. O’Hara Chief Business Officer Gilbert C. Maurer, Mark F. Miller Consultants 300 West 57th Street New York, NY 10019

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DeWalt Table Saw

Fjallraven Keb Pants

I spent the last winter transforming our toosmall-to-fit-a-car garage into a usable office and storage shed. This table saw made it possible.

This spring I hiked the Channel Islands in California, and these worked miracles.

Ventilated when super-hot, rugged when scrambling down steep cliffs.

July/August 2021

What I’m Reading Like many during the pandemic, I’m taking a break from reality and diving into the sprawling Malazan Book of the Fallen fantasy series. It’s as epic as Lord of the Rings, with characters equally as compelling as any that traveled Middle-Earth.

CO U R T E S Y DA R R E N O R F (P O R T R A I T, S P E A K E R S) ; CO U R T E S Y G R A N S F O R S B R U K S ( A X E) ; CO U R T E S Y A N A LO G U E (P O C K E T ) ; CO U R T E S Y D E WA LT (S AW ) ; CO U R T E S Y FJ A L L R AV E N (PA N T S) ; CO U R T E S Y TO R / F O R G E (B O O K)

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Jack Essig

My Pop Life

ATEM Mini Pro model shown.

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The ATEM Mini Pro model has a built in hardware streaming engine for live streaming via its ethernet connection. This means you can live stream to YouTube, Facebook and Teams in much better quality and with perfectly smooth motion. You can even connect a hard disk or flash storage to the USB connection and record your stream for upload later!

Use Professional Video Effects ATEM Mini is really a professional broadcast switcher used by television stations. This means it has professional effects such as a DVE for picture in picture effects commonly used for commentating over a computer slide show. There are titles for presenter names, wipe effects for transitioning between sources and a green screen keyer for replacing backgrounds with graphics.

Learn more at www.blackmagicdesign.com

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From the Editor // ALE X A N DER GEORGE //

Who Is HarleyDavidson?

(Who Cares?)

Harley-Davidsons are getting too old to keep riding, and too few young buyers are taking their place. Part of the solution, Harley management says, lies in a few brand-new motorcycles that will convince riders typically dedicated to other brands to reconsider. The strategy seems to be working— on me, at least.

Which is surprising. To me, the large, expensive cruisers synonymous with the brand never had the agility and affordability that made motorcycles special, or at least distinct from cars. But two new bikes have quieted my prejudices.

One is the all-electric LiveWire, which came out back in 2019. Yes, it’s expensive, but it’s also the closest thing I’ve ridden to one of those speeder bikes from The Mandalorian. The combination of useful range (about 70 miles), low center of gravity, and build quality puts it near the top of my list of things I’d buy now if I had bought more Dogecoin and Ethereum back in 2015.

The other bike, the Pan America, is just hitting dealerships. It’s an ADV, or adventure bike, meant for on- and off-road long-distance riding in an upright seating position. These bikes are comfortable, and can hop curbs when needed. They’re also loaded with genuinely useful technology, and powered by big engines that make them unexpectedly fast for their size.

I’ve always believed that KTM and Ducati do ADVs best, but every spec I can find on the Pan America has me thinking otherwise. The Harley is lighter than a BMW GS, the category king. The valves adjust themselves, so most of your maintenance will be 5,000-mile oil changes. It has an optional trick suspension that, when you roll to a stop, lowers the seat height to 31.1 inches, so you don’t have to go on your tippy-toes at stoplights.

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July/August 2021

HARLEY-DAVIDSON PAN AMERICA 1250 / Base price: $17,319

HARLEY-DAVIDSON LIVEWIRE / Base price: $29,799

And the 150-hp engine has variable valve timing, for immediate and smooth torque. On a V-twin like this, that means using twice as many control actuators as you would on an inline engine setup. Cool.

After my years spent reporting on news about slightly better smartphone cameras, a wild brand departure like Harley’s has my attention. It’s as close as a big, publicly traded corporation gets to doing something radical. It’s refreshing, and not only because of the corporate strategy. These bikes just make me want to travel again.

This is my last article as Editor-in-Chief. I still work at Pop Mech, in the service of making this publication even more awesomely useful for you, our readers. I'll be mostly busy working on Pop Mech Pro and our newsletters, but you can still find my name in our car and motorcycle reviews.

CO U R T E S Y H A R L E Y- DAV I D S O N

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Drinks // BY M A N DY N AGLICH //

Craft Brewers Have Broken the IPA beer landscape, with 10 or so styles laying claim to the name. Now there’s one more: the “clear hazy” IPA. San Diego’s Ballast Point Brewing Co. pioneered the category, which upset plenty of beer nerds and confused others, with the February release of Big Gus. “IPA is a familiar acronym to beer drinkers, regardless if you’re a novice or a total nerd,” says Dan Lamonaca, owner of Beer Karma Bottle Shop in Brooklyn, New York. That’s why so many brewers (and their marketing departments) label beers with these three letters, even if they don’t really fit the IPA mold. For example, Lamonaca says people who come in looking for sour IPAs are “not really looking for something that mirrors an IPA but definitely want something with bold flavors.”

Flavor, not appearance, is also at the heart of the somewhat absurd clear hazy term. The signature attributes of tongue-numbing bitterness and intense resinous hop aroma in clear IPAs give them a reputation of being hoppier than their hazy IPA counterparts that display less aggressive hop characteristics like soft mouthfeel and rounded tropical hop aromas. In truth, clear IPAs and hazy IPAs use about the same amount of hops per barrel. It’s not how many hops are used in brewing, but when in the process they are added, that determines the flavor and category of the final beer.

“With historical English IPA, hops were added during the boil, and then the wort was run over more hops in a hop back,” says Mitch Steele, author of IPA: Brewing Techniques, Recipes, and the Evolution of the India Pale Ale and brewmaster and cofounder at Georgia’s New Realm Brewing.

The boil addition extracted maximum bitterness from hops, as alpha acids become bitter iso-alpha acids at temperatures over 180°F. Meanwhile, the cooler, post-boil hop back preserves aromatic

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July/August 2021

American brewers like Ballast Point use the IPA as a template to experiment with new ingredients and techniques.

essential oils and converts fewer alpha acids into bitter compounds.

Bitter, earthy English IPAs remained the definitive style until an improved understanding of hops and access to newly bred American hops like Cascade met the nascent craft beer world’s search for more flavorful ales. This confluence catalyzed the inception of the American IPA in the 1970s and ’80s with beers like Anchor Liberty Ale. Steele, who was formerly the brewmaster at Stone Brewing, an iconic West Coast IPA producer outside of San Diego, says, “The Stone ‘standard’ hop regimen was like many West Coast brew-

CO U R T E S Y B A L L A S T P O I N T

I

N D IA PALE ALES DOM I NATE TODAY’S CRAFT

ers’ practices.” It consists of a boil addition for bitterness followed by a whirlpool addition—a postboil step similar to the old-school hop back. Once fermentation is complete, more hops are added to maximize flavor and aroma in a process called dry hopping. These three hop doses and the varieties of hops used create the recognizable dank grapefruit and pine aromas with substantial bitterness of West Coast IPA. The hazy New England IPA is made by dialing back the initial bittering hops and tweaking the dry-hopping timing. Here, hops are added at the height of fermentation, instead of waiting for yeast activity to finish. This allows a chemical interaction between hop compounds and the yeast called biotransformation that creates the juicy, tropical flavors that beer enthusiasts flock to.

Selecting bold, high-quality hops is central to the hazy style, too. Breeze Galindo, brewer at Other Half, an archetypal NEIPA brewery in Brooklyn, says hop varieties like Strata contribute “bright grapefruit, creamy pineapple-strawberry” flavors to Other Half’s hazy beers. Instead of introducing these hops in the boil, the team uses whirlpool and dry-hopping additions.

By adding less bittering hops during the boil, brewers also set up the conditions to create a lasting haze. Hops with lower concentrations of bitter alpha acids also have higher levels of polyphenols, says Scott Janish, author of The New IPA and cofounder of Sapwood Cellars Brewery in Maryland. Polyphenols bond with proteins in malt that are especially abundant in NEIPA brewing to create haze so stable that the beers can go through a centrifuge—typically used to make brilliantly clear beers by spinning out solids—and still come out distinctly opaque. In contrast, the hop schedule of clear IPAs reduces the interaction between these proteins and polyphenols, inhibiting the creation of haze. Any bonds that do form and create haze can be filtered out before packaging.

Further tinkering has led to IPAs named for specific characteristics or brewing techniques, instead of hop regimen. Adding lactose—an innovative or abominable move, depending on who you ask—creates a milkshake IPA. Yeast can’t ferment this milk sugar, so it winds up in the finished beer, lending a full, creamy mouthfeel. The milkshake moniker becomes even more appropriate when lactose is added to an already hazy NEIPA, but every now and then you’ll see it thrown into a clear IPA, too.

PEOPLE ARE FAMILIAR WITH THE TERM IPA. THAT’S WHY SO MANY BREWERIES LABEL BEERS WITH THESE THREE LETTERS, EVEN IF THEY DON’T REALLY FIT THE IPA MOLD. There are other beers on the shelf that are IPAs in name only, like session IPAs. These are brewed to a lower alcohol by volume, typically around 4% to 5%. Could these be called pale ales? Sure, but it seems the pale ale name just isn’t as catchy.

Trendy cold IPAs, which date back to 2019, borrow heavily from lagers. Cold refers to the style’s cooler fermentation temperature, which is usually reserved for lagers. Sometimes, brewers even use lager yeast in place of typical ale yeast. The idea is that the flavor will be lighter and more refreshing than a traditional IPA. Clear hazy IPAs might be the next big thing, or they may fade from memory as quickly as the dry and bubbly brut IPA to make room for the next creative spin a brewer decides to call an IPA. One thing is for sure, they won’t be the last brewing innovation to use those three recognizable letters.

Tips for Brewing an IPA at Home Just like in a professional brewery, making IPA at home is all about the quality and timing of the hops.

1 / Always smell hops before using them. A cheesy or sour odor is a sign they’re too old; if used, those flavors will end up in the beer.

matter. Tropical, fruity, and herbal notes from hop oils are clean and intense without being weighed down by grassy, vegetal flavors.

2 / For the brightest hop flavor punch, try using Cryo Hops. This hop powder is created by freezing hops with liquid nitrogen, then separating the lupulin—a waxy, yellow substance containing both alpha acids and ultra-flavorful essential oils—from the plant

3 / Add hops late in the boil to simulate a pro brewer’s whirlpool addition. Hops can sit in a whirlpool for an hour, while a home brew can be knocked out in 10 to 20 minutes. Try adding a large charge of aroma hops in the last five minutes.

Sources: Mandy Naglich, beer educator with Advanced Cicerone certification, and Joe Correia, head brewer at Torch & Crown Brewing

July/August 2021

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Cars & Trucks // BY ALE X A N DER GEORGE //

CROSSOVER TEST:

The Best of the Bestsellers (and a New Challenger)

The CR-V is a crash-test standout: IIHS Top Safety Pick+ and NHTSA fivestar rating.

stuff, you bought an SUV, and you accepted the body roll and expensive gas mileage that came with a body-on-frame truck. Today, you buy a crossover. It’s a comfort and utility ideal: a tall station wagon built into a sedan chassis, powered by a fuelefficient engine. The mass appeal of that combination has helped the Toyota RAV4 and Honda CR-V replace their sedan siblings as the best-selling cars in the United States in 2020—just behind pickup trucks from Ford, Chevy, and Ram. For 2021, both models have new hybrid drivetrains and updated safety tech. We tested them against Ford’s new crossover competitor, the Bronco Sport.

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HONDA CR-V EX HYBRID ($31,735) The CR-V has never been one for flash, just reliability. But don’t take our use of “just” there as a dig. The Honda has the kind of overall capability to do what you need, and do it well, without demanding much of the driver or calling attention to itself. During our test, it was nimble, and drove smaller than its 182-by-73-inch size would suggest. Cargo space is just north of 33 cubic feet, or 68.7 with the rear seats folded down. That’s near the top of the class for crossovers, easily enough for family errands or a weekend’s worth of gear.

Our fuel economy averaged in the low 30s—a bit

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Cars & Trucks

less than we would have liked for a hybrid driven mostly on the highway. And the exterior sensors could be annoyingly overactive, with inclines in parking lot entrances setting off the forward collision warning. But the tech, top safety ratings, and all-around convenience make its value hard to deny. Honda has planted its bestseller where it would meet popular demands. The CR-V makes a lot of sense for a lot of people.—Will Egensteiner

TOYOTA RAV4 PRIME SE ($39,425) The base Bronco Sport has 7.8 inches of ground clearance.

Spending $6,000 for the Badlands edition gets you 8.8 inches.

The RAV4’s high price includes an eightyear, 100,000-mile warranty on its hybrid components, and two years of scheduled maintenance.

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FORD BRONCO SPORT ($28,315) Fans awaiting the return of Ford’s much-anticipated (and, for some models, very much delayed) Bronco may ignore the new (and very much available) Bronco Sport because of its car-based platform shared with the Escape and Focus. That’s a mistake. The Sport’s boxy body not only recalls the original Bronco but also provides lots of interior space—32 cubic feet, just below the CR-V’s—within a compact, easy-driving footprint. We fit two mountain bikes and a ton of other gear in our $32,320 Outer Banks edition test model. The 1.5liter, three-cylinder engine produces decent power (181 hp and 190 lb-ft of torque) and gets 28 mpg on the highway. Ford also packed the Sport with standard tech, including lane-centering, cruise control that adapts to traffic speeds, and automatic evasive steering. It’s a small step away from the next-gen driver assistance that Ford is about to roll out, and is generally more sophisticated than other vehicles in this price range. The Sport comes with five traction modes and decent ground clearance, just under 8 inches. That makes it more of an occasional-dirtroader than an off-roader, but that shouldn’t deter buyers. Because, while it resembles the full-blown Bronco, it actually reminds us of another vehicle with a loyal following: the all-wheel-drive Honda Element. The Sport, like the Element, is roomy and practical, with a good engine and well-behaved road manners. But its retro-cool style, smart features, and Bronco badge should make it even more popular.—Louis Mazzante

CO U R T E S Y TOYOTA (R AV4) ; CO U R E S Y F O R D (B R O N CO)

The Prime is a plug-in hybrid that provides most of the benefits of electric driving without the inconveniences. After 12 hours connected to a 120-volt household outlet, the battery will last 42 miles, which, in our testing, provided for gasoline-free daily errands. In hybrid driving modes, the electric motor’s extra torque means a 5.4-second 0-to60 time. Being roughly three seconds faster than most of its peers translates to highway on-ramp confidence that most crossovers lack. Still, even with standard tech (automatic emergency braking, adaptive cruise control), adult-size rear seats, and all-wheel drive, $40,000 feels expensive for a RAV4—especially once you get inside and see the mid-aughts-era center display and CCTVquality backup camera. But if you can buy one early enough to get the $7,500 tax credit (that number goes down once Toyota sells 200,000 plug-ins), the RAV4 Prime becomes the modern exemplar of the genre it helped invent.—Alexander George

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Military Tech // BY K YLE MIZO K A MI //

Like a fighter jet’s heads-up display, the IVAS goggles project information, like maps, across the soldier’s field of view.

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July/August 2021

T

H E U . S . A R M Y I S D E V E L O P I N G I N T E G R AT E D

Visual Augmentation System (IVAS) goggles for close-combat forces, including mounted and dismounted troops, particularly infantry. The goggles can help soldiers see in the dark, check around corners, and even project digital maps and other data onto the lenses.

Because these goggles access feeds from the omnidirectional cameras mounted on the outside of armored vehicles, a squad of six soldiers, nestled safely in the back of a Bradley or Stryker infantry vehicle, can “see” through the walls of the vehicle, getting a clear picture of the scene.

“Now guys aren’t hanging out of vehicles in dangerous

CO U R T E S Y U . S . A R M Y (I VA S , S M A R T S CO P E)

The Army’s New Goggles Let Soldiers See Right Through Walls

situations trying to get views on what’s going on,” Sgt. Philip Bartel of the 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team said in an interview. “Leadership will be able to maneuver their elements and get view-ontarget without having to leave the safety of their armored vehicles. Maneuvering elements with that kind of information will minimize casualties and will overall drastically change how we operate and increase our effectiveness on the battlefield.”

The Army designed the IVAS goggles to mimic the heads-up displays (HUD) on fighter jets. Like an HUD, the goggles project information including maps, video, and night vision across the soldier’s field of view. Soldiers have long had that sort of data at their disposal, but IVAS gives them instant access during combat. Instead of digging through their pockets for a laminated paper map, soldiers can quickly call up a digital map on their goggles without taking their eyes away from the objective.

IVAS can also use a rifle-mounted thermalimaging night vision scope to project the soldiers’ surroundings across their field of vision. A soldier can point a rifle from behind cover or around a corner and see through the scope, gaining a view that would otherwise expose the soldier to enemy fire.

Soldiers can even use IVAS to access microdrone cameras as they fly over the battlefield.

A 2020 report on the IVAS system describes how soldiers train with it. According to the Pentagon, soldiers with IVAS can enter and clear six rooms as a team in a building with virtual training targets using synthetic M4 airsoft rifles and trackers.

BATTLEFIELD INNOVATIONS OF THE FUTURE

LEADERSHIP WILL BE ABLE TO MANEUVER THEIR ELEMENTS AND GET VIEW-ON-TARGET WITHOUT HAVING TO LEAVE THE SAFETY OF THEIR ARMORED VEHICLES. After each run-through, soldiers are critiqued on their shots taken, kills, and shots received. The soldiers can then use the goggles to watch their avatars replay their actions in a virtual recap.

With IVAS, even mounted soldiers can see outside their vehicles. Mechanized infantry, cavalry, and engineers usually ride in the back of armored vehicles. They know where they’re going, but the soldiers often rely on a single screen or vehicle crews to let them know where they are in real time. Once the vehicle stops and the ramp comes down, the soldiers must quickly acclimate to their surroundings, determine where the enemy is, and orient themselves to carry out the mission.

The Army requested to spend $1.1 billion in 2022 to buy 40,000 IVAS goggles—enough to equip every frontline soldier. Congress pumped the brakes on the program this year, cutting the requested budget by 20 percent. But the Army has already resolved many of the issues that concerned lawmakers, such as GPS accuracy, which means soldiers may be wearing these super goggles soon.

SMART SCOPES

JETPACKS

HAND WARMERS

The Army recently tested the Israeli-made SMASH scope, the infantryman’s version of the targeting computer built into main battle tanks. The scope mounts on top of a rifle or carbine and includes night vision and a ballistic computer. A soldier equipped with the scope can simply place crosshairs on the target and pull the trigger, but the weapon will only fire when the scope determines that a round will hit the target.

The Pentagon is holding a competition to develop a “portable personal air mobility system” that would allow a soldier to conduct scouting, search and rescue, infiltration and exfiltration of a combat zone, and special-operations missions. Think jetpacks, gliders, wingsuits, and parafoils, possibly powered by electricity, hydrogen cells, and traditional jet fuel. The system should be capable of lowto medium-altitude flight with a range of 3.1 miles.

Subzero temperatures—like those in the Arctic, a potential theater of war—can slow blood flow to soldiers’ extremities. And cold hands lose dexterity, making tasks like loading a rifle difficult.

So the Army has developed battery-powered armbands that warm a soldier’s blood, especially in their hands. Not only can soldiers retain feeling in their fingers, but they can also wear thinner gloves, allowing them to perform more complex tasks.

July/August 2021

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6

Biology // BY JEN NIFER LEM A N A N D CA ROLINE DELBERT //

New Individual

Outbreeding

Higher Diversity

Increased Fertility

Lower Mortality

Population Growth

Natural Selection

Stable Population

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F

O R T H E F I R S T T I M E , S C I E N T I S T S H AV E C R E AT E D A

clone of an endangered U.S. species—a black-footed ferret named Elizabeth Ann. The researchers used cells from a donor that had been dead for more than 30 years, and the procedure’s success could mean not only rescue for one of North America’s most endangered mammals, but a watershed moment in conservation biology.

After the donor ferret, Willa, died in 1988, scientists sent her cells to the Frozen Zoo at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance in order to preserve her DNA. Their foresight paid off in November 2020, when Willa’s genes were injected into an embryo, zapped “awake” with a bolt of electricity, and implanted into the uterus of a domestic ferret, who gave birth to Elizabeth Ann on December 10. “Cloning, itself, is actually not cutting-edge,” says Ben Novak, lead scientist at the California-based nonprofit Revive & Restore, which led the black-footed ferret project. “What’s

I L LU S T R AT I O N S BY CO L I N M C S H E R RY U S I N G G E T T Y I M AG E S

Elizabeth Ann Is the First Clone of a U.S. Endangered Species. She Was 33 Years in the Making

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really innovative about what we’ve done is that we reached back in time to bring back something that had been lost.”

The greatest threat to endangered species like the black-footed ferret is the loss of genetic diversity, Novak says. Genetic variation bolsters a species’ fitness, or its ability to bounce back from environmental stresses like disease, habitat loss, and climate change. Critically, diversity lowers the risk of inbreeding within a species. “Inbreeding creates problems for [an animal’s] fertility, so they end up having fewer offspring, which of course leads to less diversity,” Novak says.

Many endangered species don’t see an influx of new genetic material. That’s when genetic rescue—a range of techniques that includes everything from low-tech fixes like introducing new individuals into closed populations, to high-tech solutions like cloning and genetic engineering—can revive these dwindling species. One of the first steps of genetic rescue, though, is to map a species’ genetic information, or genome.

“It’s a cascade of information,” says Oliver Ryder, Ph.D., about the genome. The director of conservation genetics at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance and head of the Frozen Zoo explains that the order of the genetic information within a species’ genome can dictate things like fur color and resistance to disease, but also reveal an evolutionary phenomenon called a genetic bottleneck—essentially a point where a species’ genetic diversity shrinks.

The roughly 400 to 500 black-footed ferrets alive today—except for Elizabeth Ann—are descended from a gene pool of just seven individuals.

With the genome sequenced, scientists can decide which methods of genetic rescue will benefit the species most. The cloning method used to produce Elizabeth Ann won’t work on a reptile or bird, for example, because those types of animals have complicated reproductive strategies and hard-shelled eggs. “Cloning is not the silver bullet to saving endangered species, but it can be a valuable tool, infusing unique genetic material into managed breeding and wild populations,” says Paul Marinari, Ph.D., a senior curator at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, who manages the Species Survival Plan for black-footed ferrets.

In the future, Novak’s team hopes to combine reproductive technologies like cloning with genetic engineering. Even though Elizabeth Ann has a separate genetic lineage than all other black-footed ferrets alive today, her genetic material stems from the same population, a group of ferrets once native 20

July/August 2021

to Wyoming. Researchers could increase genetic diversity further by mapping the genome of extinct black-footed ferret populations native to another region, say Texas, pinpoint sections of their genetic code with beneficial traits, and then edit those traits into the DNA of future clones.

This strengthens the case for the kind of DNA sample collection that scientists performed on Willa in the ’80s. Elizabeth Ann is alive today because Willa’s cells were cryo-preserved years ago. Not all endangered species have any preserved tissue around for scientists to work with.

Novak is hopeful that continued preservation practices will eventually pay off. “People could be going out and saving the genetic diversity that exists in rare species,” he says. A tissue sample the size of a grain of rice could save a species like the California condor or the mountain gorilla from future extinction. Biological samples from insects, birds, and reptiles could prove valuable, too, while we wait for cloning methods to catch up to the nuances of nature’s various reproductive methods.

After all, it was forward thinking that led to Elizabeth Ann’s birth. “There was no technology at the time that could have made those cells into an animal again,” Novak says. “They were banking those with the hope that someday it was coming.”

DE-EXTINCTION DEMYSTIFIED

QUAGGA LAST SEEN: 1883 The South Africa– based Quagga Project is working to revive the extinct quagga, a striped plains zebra subspecies. In 1983, scientists mapped the Quagga’s genome, the first mapped genome of an extinct species.

Reviving long-dead animals sounds like sci-fi. But advances in genetic engineering could someday allow scientists to resurrect extinct species like the passenger pigeon, little bush moa, and even the woolly mammoth .

THYLACINE (TASMANIAN TIGER) LAST SEEN: 1936 The Thylacine Cloning Project replicated some Tasmanian tiger DNA in 2002, but couldn’t complete a genetic picture of the animal. In 2017, scientists finally sequenced the species’ entire genome.

WOOLLY MAMMOTH LAST SEEN: 1650 B.C. Revive & Restore believes that by tweaking the genome of the Asian elephant—the closest living relative of the woolly mammoth—they could create a hybridized “mammophant.” But it’s estimated to cost tens of millions of dollars and is reliant on degraded DNA samples.

G E T T Y I M AG E S (T I G E R , M A M M OT H , Q U AG G A )

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Machines // BY CA ROLINE DELBERT A N D COURTNE Y LIN DER //

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July/August 2021

P With this device, a brisk walk could generate enough electricity to power your fitness tracker.

Fitbits, and other wearable devices could soon run on a new kind of renewable energy: you.

A tiny new wearable gadget called a thermoelectric generator (TEG) directly turns your body’s heat into electrical energy. TEGs use a difference in temperature—like your body’s temperature versus the surrounding air—to turn that energy into power. To establish equilibrium, heat automatically dissipates into cooler locations, and TEGs harness the electric current produced when energized particles move from hot to cold along a chip.

That’s convenient, since body heat is a pretty stable resource. To maintain a constant temperature of about 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, your body must regulate a tight balance between heat gain and heat loss. And because your body isn’t actually that efficient, you lose approximately 75 percent of the energy it produces through heat.

While the part of the gadget that touches your skin turns your warmth into energy, the wearable shields its cold side from the sun’s rays with a wavelength-selective film to preserve the temperature differential.

But this gadget’s success as a wearable comes down to its extreme flexibility and self-healing properties, which allow it to bend with your body and bounce back from damage. A special material embedded inside the gadget heals itself from cuts by re-sealing breaks on a micro level. It’s flexible because each component is flexible in turn, like building elastic circuitry on a rubber band by using stretchable wires.

Ronggui Yang, a professor of energy and power engineering at Huazhong University of Science and Technology, who was involved in the study, says that this design vastly improves on previous, more rigid wearable thermoelectric generator designs.

That’s thanks to a few significant enhancements. For the substrate, or base, of the wearable, Yang’s team combined three commercia lly available compounds to synthesize a stretchy polyimine material. The resulting substrate is bendy, sort of like a rubber bracelet.

By laser-cutting slits into this polyimine substrate, the researchers created small notches for the power-generating thermoelectric chips. To

P H OTO I L LU S T R AT I O N BY A LY S E M A R K E L U S I N G P H OTO CO U R T E S Y X I AO L A B

Scientists Just Figured Out How to Turn Your Body Into a Battery

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create a wearable of a different size or shape, the scientists can simply cut in more notches to add more chips, or reorganize their order.

The end result: “superior stretching, selfhealing, recycling, and Lego-like reconfiguration capabilities,” Yang says. These qualities mean that the final product is durable like never before.

The researchers say the flexible design will tile and stack, allowing for many kinds of devices with the same basic pieces. While the team of researchers—comprised of scientists from China and the University of Colorado Boulder—behind the stretchable device tested their TEG in the form of a small ring, this modularity and scalability means that the tiny generator could theoretically be larger, depending on how much power you want to generate. The greatest amount of power could be gathered by, for example, a Fitbit-like “sports bracelet” that powers a watch—or even a full sleeve of modular “generator” cells.

These new forms of TEG could create even more power, charging up devices with higher electrical requirements. Still, considering that these wearables can generate only about one volt of energy for every square centimeter of skin space, which is less voltage per area than most existing batteries, there’s still work to do. An AA or AAA battery is rated 1.5 volts, for instance, and that’s about how much power it takes to run some insulin pumps.

Batteries, for their part, are a pretty dirty technology that sometimes use rare-earth metals and corrosive materials. When batteries break down in landfills, the chemicals inside—including hydrochloric acid, the same stuff found in your digestive tract—leach into the soil, contaminating ground and surface water. Lithium-ion batteries, which are common in fitness wearables, frequently explode and catch fire in landfills, releasing noxious greenhouse gases.

If your body could do the same work as a watch battery with cleaner, more recyclable technology, that’s a win for the environment. Yang’s wearable even features completely recyclable technology.

You can simply soak the TEG in a special recycling solution for six hours at room temperature, causing the polyimine substrate to break down.

Better yet? For people with implanted medical technology like pacemakers, wearable batteries like this TEG could mean a future without battery24

July/August 2021

IF YOUR BODY COULD DO THE SAME WORK AS A WATCH BATTERY WITH CLEANER, MORE RECYCLABLE TECHNOLOGY, THAT’S A WIN FOR THE ENVIRONMENT.

replacement surgery. According to Johns Hopkins Medicine, patients with pacemakers must undergo this kind of surgery every five to 10 years, as the lithium-ion battery inside their implant starts to fail.

The TEG design may seem lofty and complex.

In reality, it’s just a masterfully balanced combination of technologies meant to open the door to personalization. Yang says users will be able to customize circuitry on their own using something as simple as a home soldering kit. Enthusiasts could even build out their own custom wearable tech with the exact number of battery cells they desire.

The best part? You could see these wearables in stores in the next five to 10 years, the researchers believe, with medical devices to follow. In the meantime, don’t toss that Fitbit charger.

Sweaty Wearables When it comes to wearables, body heat isn’t the only human byproduct that scientists are interested in.

Researchers at North Carolina State University have developed a wearable prototype that uses your sweat to provide an overall picture of your health.

Using a replaceable test strip embedded with chemical sensors, the device can measure the amounts of certain metabolites present in your sweat to analyze your body’s glucose, lactate, pH, and temperature levels.

One day, that could tip off your doc to underlying health conditions.

“We’re optimistic that this hardware could enable new

technologies to reduce casualties during military or athletic training, by spotting health problems before they become critical,” says Michael Daniele, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at NC State who was involved in the work.—Courtney Linder

CO U R T E S Y N C S TAT E U N I V E R S I T Y / M U R AT YO K U S

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Physics // BY CA ROLINE DELBERT //

O

N J U LY 2 , 1937, A M E LI A E A R H A R T A N D

her navigator, Fred Noonan, were en route from Lae, Papua New Guinea, to Howland Island in the Pacific, about 1,700 miles southwest of Honolulu, in their Lockheed Model 10 Electra. By then, Earhart had already become the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic and the first person to fly solo from Hawaii to the U.S. Mainland; yet her globetrotting trek was to be a

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July/August 2021

Noonan and Earhart atop the Lockheed Model 10 in which they ultimately disappeared.

crowning achievement for the aviation pioneer.

But Earhart and Noonan never made it to Howland, and researchers have spent decades searching the surrounding ocean for any sign of the Electra, Earhart, or Noonan. With no definitive clues to what happened on July 2, a cottage industry of Earhart theories and hoaxes has attempted to fill in the fateful details: possible Earhart skeletons, an argument that her remains were scattered by giant crabs, firsthand accounts of people who claim to

G E T T Y I M AG E S

A Small Nuclear Reactor Might Help Solve Amelia Earhart’s Disappearance

Physics

have seen Earhart, and suspected pieces of plane debris.

That latter group includes one particular piece of aluminum that Richard Gillespie, head of the International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery, found in 1991 on the island of Nikumaroro, roughly 300 miles from Howland Island. In global terms, and with our limited understanding of Earhart’s distressed flight, that’s just a stone’s throw. And a popular theory holds that Earhart and Noonan landed on the island’s reef after missing Howland.

While design plans and photos of the Electra have shown that the metal may have come from the plane, the field of neutron science could finally determine whether it’s a legitimate clue.

Daniel Beck, the manager of the engineering program for the Penn State Radiation Science and Engineering Center (RSEC), home to the Breazeale Nuclear Reactor, invited Gillespie to test the scrap at the university using reactor-generated neutron radiography, after seeing Gillespie and the aluminum sheet in a documentary on Earhart. Using a form of imaging that utilizes neutrons to show what the inside of objects look like, Beck’s laboratory can see trace amounts of substances, like paint, that look to the naked eye to have worn off.

“The neutron radiography provides us with an image that is analogous to an X-ray image you may have taken for a broken bone,” say Beck and his colleague, Kenan Unlu, Ph.D., director of Penn State’s RSEC. Inside the 1-megawatt Breazeale reactor, neutrons are gathered into ports and aligned into a beam. The neutron beam—with the help of bismuth and sapphire crystals, which remove the reactor’s gamma rays that cloud results—is then transmitted

A GIANT MYSTERY, SOLVED BY PHYSICS 28

July/August 2021

The Breazeale Nuclear Reactor, which first went critical in 1955, at Penn State in State College, Pennsylvania.

through an object, with neutrons being absorbed differently by certain elements, like hydrogen and carbon. The neutrons are measured by an imaging plate behind the artifact to produce its X-ray equivalent.

The Penn State scientists will also study the edges of the patch to understand how it was removed using a second technique called neutron activation. One side of the metal, they say, appears to have axe marks. The neutron beam can identify any axe material that could be left in quantities as small as in the parts-per-million.

The patch will require months of detailed study, but Unlu and Beck expect to release findings this summer. Even if the researchers determine that the metal has no ties to Earhart, eliminating the artifact still aids in the search for answers, says Gillespie. And Unlu and Beck believe that, either way, the testing will advance the search for Amelia Earhart. “Each step toward solving this mystery keeps the intrigue fresh and creates discussion that leads to more findings,” they say.

In July 2012, researchers announced that they had observed the elusive Higgs boson at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Scientists working independently on the ATLAS and CMS particle detectors both measured a new subatomic particle

that was similar in makeup to the theorized Higgs boson. After nearly a year of further analysis, scientists confirmed that the “measured interactions of the new particle with other particles” strongly indicated it was indeed a Higgs boson. The dis-

covery validated decades of work and furthered our understanding of the Standard Model, a group of theories explaining how the building-block particles for everything in the universe interact with each other.—Daisy Hernandez

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Space // BY K ELSO H A RPER //

How to Safely Enter a Black Hole

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July/August 2021

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U R U N D E R S TA N D I N G O F B L AC K H O L E S H A S E X P L O D E D

in recent years, with landmark works like the photograph of the Messier 87 galaxy’s supermassive black hole and the recent discovery of a “tiny” three-sun-mass black hole in our own galaxy. But what would it be like to make the next leap: to visit—and even enter—a black hole? We asked the experts.

First, to survive long enough to explore a black hole, you must find a big one, says Janna Levin, Ph.D., an astrophysicist at Barnard College of Columbia University. Black holes form when matter condenses into a tiny amount of space, like when a massive star collapses in on itself. This creates a point of infinitely strong gravity—a singularity—and a surrounding region that traps anything that wanders too close, called the event horizon.

P H OTO I L LU S T R AT I O N BY A LY S E M A R K E L U S I N G G E T T Y I M AG E S

Supermassive black holes are ideal for visiting, but 1 in 1,000, as illustrated, have dangerous accretion disks and blast jets of particles at near light speed.

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As matter gets packed into a black hole’s central singularity, its event horizon grows. This means if you hopped into a small black hole—say, 100 miles across—you’d enter relatively close to its point of infinite gravity. The change in gravity even before the event horizon would be so steep that you’d get steadily stretched from head to toe in a process irreverently called spaghettification.

Instead, you should aim for a supermassive black hole, like the one within M87, which is over 3 million times wider than Earth. You’d be so far from the singularity when you crossed the event horizon—about 12 billion miles—that it would be “as unspectacular as stepping into the shadow of a tree,” Levin says.

You would simply float across, and keep floating, for a while. In the biggest black holes, Levin adds, “you might be able to make it for a year before you are ultimately demolished in the center.”

Next, avoid black holes with accretion disks.

About 1 percent of supermassive black holes accumulate these fast-spinning rings of matter. They can heat up to millions of degrees and create “some of the largest magnetic fields that we’ve measured,” says Leo Rodriguez, Ph.D., a theoretical physicist at Grinnell College in Iowa. Magnetic fields this strong would shut down your nervous system and stretch your atoms into skinny rods until you dissolve. But if pressed for options, says Levin, you could attempt to enter one of these black holes perpendicular to the disk, far from the edge of the fiery ring.

If you’re still uneasy about crossing over into (almost) certain oblivion, you can also probe the black hole’s ergosphere. This is the region just outside the event horizon where space itself spins with the black hole. “People have theorized that you could probably have entire solar systems living inside this area,” Rodriguez says. At this point, you could still attempt a grand escape. By throwing, say, a small asteroid into a black hole, you could steal some of the black hole’s spin energy and get “slingshotted” to safety, Rodriguez says.

If you’ve steeled yourself for the big plunge, you’re in for a spectacular show. As you approach the black hole, you’ll see the light of the universe warped by the black hole’s intense gravity. “It will be like crossing into a funhouse mirror,” Levin says. The light from stars will smear across the sky, and you may see copies of the same objects as the black hole bends the light that bounces off them.

But the light show doesn’t end there. The inside of 32

July/August 2021

So, How Do Scientists Really Study Black Holes?

The groundbreaking snapshot of M87*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy about 55 million light-years away from Earth, was a product of the Event Horizon Telescope, an international collaboration between over 200 researchers.

Using a technique called very long baseline interferometry, eight synchronized groundbased radio observato-

ries around the world formed, in essence, one Earth-sized radio telescope powerful enough to make high-resolution observations roughly 4,000 times those of the Hubble Space Telescope.

The team recently released additional

images that reveal the pace at which M87* gobbles up its surroundings and display the web-like structure of magnetic field lines, which swirl around the black hole and shape massive jets of energetic particles emanating from its center.

a black hole isn’t black. Instead, it’s a one-way window to the universe that contains eons of trapped light. “You would be able to see an entire history of the black hole since it was formed,” Rodriguez says.

Time slows near a black hole’s intense gravity. To the outside world, you’ve slowed so much that you’re a frozen image on the event horizon, even though you’re already inside. But from your perspective, the motion of the universe has accelerated. If you look back out as you float toward the singularity, you may see the universe zip by without you. “You would be watching the film of the entire galaxy unfold in front of you before you died,” Levin says.

There is still one potential exit, but it lies in a far-afield realm of theoretical physics. Your black hole could double as a wormhole, transporting you to another part of the universe—albeit disintegrated into your most elementary particles, says Levin. “All you can really hope for is that your quantum information will make it out of the black hole, and some kind soul will spend an eternity reassembling the biological machine that was you.”

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operators at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) must supply up to 75,000 megawatts of power to meet demand. But a cascade of events on February 14—rare plummeting temperatures, up to 11 inches of snowfall, thousands of people turning up their thermostats simultaneously, and power plants spontaneously going offline—meant an extended loss of power for millions of people.

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At ERCOT, experts plan for the grid’s worst nightmares: climate variability, cybersecurity threats, and changing power demands.

Functions often fail at the edge of their range of validity, leading to so-called edge cases: a situation that occurs only at an extreme operating parameter. An edge case can be expected or unexpected. A stereo speaker might distort audio when played at maximum volume, or a website designed to handle 10,000 users might crash when 50,000 people try to log on. Quantitatively different behavior happens at a system’s boundaries, and a failure to plan for these anomalies can have devastating consequences.

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Deep Math

“Our all-time peak demand record is about 75,000 megawatts,” says Joshua D. Rhodes, Ph.D., who works in the Webber Energy Group at the University of Texas at Austin. “In order to keep the lights on in Texas, we would have had to push the system up to 76,000 megawatts, further than we’ve ever pushed it before.” Professor Rhodes’s research focuses on the bulk electricity system, and the grid optimization models he builds frequently result in edge cases.

“I push the grid to extremes—or what I thought were extremes.”

In the past, that might have meant testing solar or wind extremes on the grid and making sure supply kept up with demand. “We went into winter 2021 having run scenarios where we had high demand and low supply, but all of these showed as fine,” Rhodes says. “That’s because we were using historical weather norms to look into the future.”

Planning for edge cases is formidable, expensive, and sometimes overlooked. At best, unconsidered edge cases fail to address users at the margins; at worst, they cause drastic system failures. A confluence of edge cases brought down the Challenger space shuttle in 1986 (see sidebar).

When two or more edge cases meet, they form a corner case. Corner cases are valuable when debugging a complex system, but they are often harder and more expensive to test because they require maximal configurations in multiple dimensions. What happens when a self-driving car misinterprets a traffic signal because of a lightning flash, and plows through an intersection? These corner cases are improbable, but not outside the realm of possibility, and experts plan for them through equations that test a system’s validity.

Functions are most useful. “Zero is always a

good case test, because something might go wrong at zero,” says Tony Mann, director of the Maths Centre at the University of Greenwich in London. Given that a function can’t be divided by zero and zero has no logarithm, this value might cause software to malfunction if it wasn’t specifically planned for.

“Or we take the square root of a negative number and see if software would fail, because most systems can’t handle complex or imaginary numbers.”

Zero is used to signify any kind of null input (whether that’s undefined, an empty array, or the number zero), revealing whether a system behaves as expected. Testing 1 and 2 in a function, by contrast, shows how the system operates with “normal” input. Testing “max” (that is, the upper limit of an application) is a way to stress-test an application—even if the max seems implausible. An error can provide valuable information that might change the design of a product or service ahead of any real-life disaster. “Typically, an edge case arises when you build something and, over time, conditions arise that weren’t foreseen; the assumptions you made originally are no longer valid,” Mann explains.

In the case of the Texas power failure, frozen cooling-water systems and fuel-supply issues pushed the grid toward an extreme corner case that saw the power plant fleet unable to supply enough power to meet demand, according to Rhodes. This failure underscored “the need to plan a reliable grid with the constraint (or boundary) on that supply,” he explains. Boundary testing for such scenarios can be expensive, but the costs of forgoing testing might be greater. “I don’t know that the multisystem failure pushed us to the edge,” Rhodes says, “but it certainly brought the edge closer to us.”

CHALLENGER: A CASE STUDY A mere 73 seconds after liftoff, on January 28, 1986, NASA’s Challenger space shuttle blew apart, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

A review commission found a few edge cases that contributed to the spacecraft’s demise, but most notably, exceptionally cold temperatures were to blame.

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Challenger’s solid rockets were rated for temperatures of 39 degrees Fahrenheit or higher, but ground temperature at launch was just 24 degrees. That, in turn, caused a seal located on the shuttle’s right solid rocket booster—known as an O-ring—to malfunction at launch, letting out hot, pressurized gas. The gas ruptured a strut connecting the booster to the external fuel tank, destroying both.

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PH OTO G R A PH/ I LLU S T R AT I O N BY T EEK AY N A M E

Cure Death?

It Sure Looks Like It.

PH OTO G R A PH/ I LLU S T R AT I O N BY T EEK AY N A M E

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N I C K S A R A E V I S 2 5 Y E A R S O L D , FA R T O O YO U N G , I T W O U L D

seem, to be thinking about death. And yet, since he turned 21, he has taken steps to prevent the infirmities of old age. Every day, he takes 2,000 mg of fish oil and 4,000 IU of vitamin D to help prevent heart disease and other ailments. He steams or pressure-cooks most of his meals because, he says, charring meats creates chemicals that may increase the risk of cancer. And in the winter, he keeps the humidity of his home at 35 percent, because dry air chaps his skin and makes him cough, both of which he considers manifestations of chronic inflammation, which may be bad for longevity.

Based on the life expectancies of young men in North America, Saraev, a freelance software engineer based near Vancouver, believes he has about 55 years before he really has to think about aging. Given the exponential advances in microprocessors and smartphones in his lifetime, he insists the biotech industry will figure out a solution by then. For this reason, Saraev, like any number of young, optimistic, tech-associated men, believes that if he takes the correct preventative steps now, he might well live forever.

Saraev’s plan is to keep his body in good enough shape to hit “Longevity Escape Velocity,” a term coined by English gerontologist Aubrey de Grey to denote slowing down your aging enough to reach each new medical advance as it arrives. If you delay your death by 10 years, for example, that’s 10 more years scientists have to come up with a drug, computer program, or robot assist that can make you live even longer. Keep up this game of reverse leapfrog, and eventually death can’t catch you. The term is reminiscent of “planetary escape velocity,” the speed an object needs to move in order to break free of gravity.

The science required to break free of death, unfortunately, is still at ground level. According to Nir Barzilai, M.D., director of the Institute for Aging Research at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, scientists currently understand aging as a func40

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tion of seven to nine biological hallmarks, factors that change as we grow older and seem to have an anti-aging effect when reversed. You can imagine these as knobs you can turn up or down to increase or decrease the likelihood of illness and frailty.

Some of these you may have heard of, including how well cells remove waste, called proteostasis; how well cells create energy, or mitochondrial function; how well cells implement their genetic instructions, or epigenetics; and how well cells maintain their DNA’s integrity, called DNA repair or telomere erosion.

Saraev doesn’t think he, personally, will figure out how to fiddle with these anti-aging knobs to make humans live longer. He is not a doctor (though he once considered it). He’s just noticed that more and more people—researchers, scientists, podcasters, denizens of Reddit—are talking about human lifespan as a number that could change dramatically in the next century. Just three years ago, after much lobbying by research and industry groups, the World Health Organization added a distinction that characterizes aging as a disease—one that humanity might cure eventually. So Saraev’s question is the same one we all have, one that intensifies as the years slide by: How soon?

ONE COMMONALITY AMONG

people who advocate for longer human lifespans is an intolerance of death even as a concept. Many proponents of super longevity remember the moment they first learned that a family member would die, and will tell you their refusal to accept it has led to a lifetime searching for a solution. Whereas many of us hoard money, amass achievements, or have children in search of surrogate immortality, longevity enthusiasts are determined to bring about the real thing, whatever it takes.

James Strole, for example, considers himself a warrior against a “deathist” paradigm. At 72, he doesn’t have Nick Saraev’s luxury of time to wait for science to solve aging. Instead, he is trying to bring about the solution himself. After a career in realestate investing, Strole cofounded People Unlimited, a community to inspire people to live infinite lifespans, in 1995, then added the nonprofit Coalition for Radical Life Extension (CRLE) in 2016.

A major goal of both organizations is to introduce the public to anti-aging developments so that when innovations come, they can be integrated into society as naturally as possible. CRLE now hosts an annual scientific conference and festival called RAADFest, which stands for Revolution Against Aging and Death. Strole calls it “Woodstock for

A L A N T H O R N TO N / G E T T Y I M A G E S (G R AV E V I E W ) ; G O C L AYG O/ G E T T Y I M A G E S (D I R T )

cated, with promising, incredible science on one side, and worthless radical life extension.” nostrums on the other. Before the science matured, consumers had a RAADFest seems wild. Prior to the 2020 feshard time telling which was which. tivities, which went online because of Covid, the That confusion hasn’t stopped Strole from experimenting on his annual event took place in Las Vegas. Sizzle reels own body. He’s bullish on senolytics, drugs that purge the body of of previous years intersperse panel discussions deteriorating cells, and exosome treatments, which infuse the body with on-stage exercise classes, rock and vocal perwith little packages of extracellular communication materials, usuformances, flamenco dance exhibitions, and a guy ally from immortal stem cells. Neither is approved by the U.S. Food in a leopard-print hat playing a flute next to what and Drug Administration, but Strole says he feels like a teenager, livlooks like the android from Ex Machina. Suzanne ing and working in the retirement paradise of Scottsdale, Arizona.

Somers showed up. People did squats in businessBut how long can that last? If you look at actuarial tables, the risk wear. A speaker informed the audience that they of death after age 30 doubles every eight years (a mathematical curiwere between “the last mortal generation and the osity dubbed the Gompertz-Makeham Law of Mortality). The oldest first immortal human generation,” which might humans have only made it to their 120s. Even if those stats start to be true, depending on how you define “between.” change, it’s unlikely human lifespan will jump to that of Galapagos In some ways, Strole’s views are progressive, tortoises (~100+ years) or bowhead whales (~200 years) overnight, even refreshing. He stands against ageism, and let alone approach infinity. Strole’s cofounder in People Unlimited, believes that people should act without concern for whether their choices, behavior, or clothing are age-appropriate. But some RAADFest vendors could ↘ On Medium, Nick induce a bout of skepticism in Saraev refers even the most credulous consumer to his lifeextension habits (see sidebar, pg. 45). Vendors and as “practical immortality.” sponsors include supplement suppliers, biohackers, purveyors of eye creams, mystic oils, and an $8,500 air filtration system. There’s a group that hawks a pendant to protect the body from electromagnetic radiation, and another advertising a mat that beams electromagnetic radiation at the body to reduce age. (One hopes these antithetical booths aren’t located across from one another at RAADFest.) Some companies associated with RAADFest parrot wild claims about the threats of 5G networks—a common conspiracy theory—while Quantum Cellular Medicine, a “gold sponsor,” promotes misinformation about the coronavirus vaccine. It’s hard not to look at some of the products, in their hyperbolic packaging, and compare them to 1800s newspaper ads for Dr. You-Can-Trust-Me’s life-extending potions. Or worse.

Strole says in order to make strides in superlongevity, people will have to invest in anti-aging research the way they have in fighting cancer. That might be a more apt analogy than he realizes. The early, confusing days of cancer treatment were also bifur-

PH OTO G R A PH BY A L A N A PAT ERS O N

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↗ James Strole hopes one day humans will live like bristlecone pines, some of which stand for 5,000 years.

Charles Paul Brown, died in 2014 at the age of 79, of complications from Parkinson’s and heart disease. What happens if Strole doesn’t make it? If his doctor says he’s got six weeks?

“First I’d do everything to turn that around, but I would look then at staying alive on some level. I probably would look at Cryo[genic freezing]. That wasn’t my first choice, but I think that’s very noble work,” Strole says. He admits the question gives him pause. “It’s like when they asked [Mike Tyson] whether he had a plan when he went in the ring. And he said yeah, but the first punch in the face, it’s all over.” any earthling is going to live forever in the next 500 years, which is bad news for the immortality-chasers, because David Sinclair is the guy in longevity. An impish, Australian 52-year-old, he runs sister genetics labs at Harvard and the University of New South Wales in Sydney, has published dozens of articles DAV I D S I N C L A I R , P H . D . , D O E S N ’ T T H I N K

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in publications as prestigious as Nature and Science, and was named one of Time magazine’s top 50 people in healthcare in 2018.

Sinclair believes we will solve aging. But living forever is an ambitious project, and while Sinclair does not believe there is an upper limit on human lifespan, he is realistic about how quickly we can push the current average.

It’s still not clear how, exactly, to tweak the knobs of longevity to increase our lifespan far past current levels, but Sinclair, at least, has an idea about which knobs are most important. His most substantial contribution to longevity is what he calls the first real unified theory of aging—a single mechanism he believes explains various types of cellular dysfunction (those hallmarks of aging we mentioned earlier). Sinclair says getting old is a problem of information loss, a dysfunction in the way DNA is read and implemented in cells. He’s basically putting all his money on the epigenome, a flexible DNA interpreter that turns genes on and off based on environmental conditions.

As we live, our DNA takes damage from stressors such as UV rays, stress hormones, and X-rays. Certain families of proteins (sirtuins, for example, a family of enzymes that manage the DNA reader) can repair damaged DNA, but while they are doing it, they are unavailable to perform their usual epigenetic work, protecting other genes and preventing unnecessary genes from being transcribed. When the proteins finish making the repairs, they sometimes don’t go back to the places they came from, leading to a progressive sloppiness in how genes are implemented all over the body (see sidebar at right).

Sinclair compares aging to a scratch on a CD (or DVD). “The genome is the music, the reader is the epigenome, and the scratch has stopped the reader from reading the music in the same way,” he says. “I think aging stops cells from reading the right genes to remember how to be a brain cell or a liver cell.”

In other words, according to Sinclair’s theory, cells that had mastered their roles as blood or bones or brain become less capable of performing those functions, even though the instructions

PH OTO G R A PH BY J E SS E R I E S ER

are still right there. Some interesting evidence he puts forward for this idea comes from cloning.

When you transfer old DNA from an animal into a new cloned cell, you don’t get an old clone, but a young one. Therefore the DNA itself must contain all the instructions it ever did. That leaves the operating system as the most likely offender.

Sinclair, it should be noted, is not immune to the mad optimism that seems to strike everyone who works on longevity. He takes vitamin D, vitamin K, aspirin, the diabetes drug metformin, the grape extract resveratrol, and the sirtuin booster NMN daily, and has recommended a similar plan to his 81-year-old father.

Though he doesn’t officially endorse supplements or treatments, he has happily detailed his personal plan on The Joe Rogan Experience (it’s also in his book, Lifespan: Why We Age— and Why We Don’t Have To). Not everyone loves this: Scientists who worry about maintaining legitimacy in a field swarming with crystals and essential oils grind their teeth when they hear someone as respected as Sinclair talking up unproven treatments in the popular press.

Barzilai says that if he had to rank Sinclair’s the-

ory among the ideas out there about old age and mortality, he would “rank it as first.” But he also says it doesn’t explain everything about aging. “There’s still radiation that’s going to change our DNA. There are still metabolic abnormalities that are independent of epigenetics and maybe related more to food…The problem is that all of those hallmarks of aging are not totally dependent on epigenetics,” he says.

None of this means Sinclair is wrong. In a recent study, his lab used gene expression to return vision cells in old mice to a younger epigenetic state (they used a CD cleaning solution to buff out the scratches, you could say). The researchers observed damaged optic-nerve cells in the mice regrow their connections, supposedly impossible in an aged nervous system. They also restored old mice’s vision in a model of mouse glaucoma. That study landed on the December 2020 cover of Nature. And anyway, Sinclair isn’t recommending gene therapies for humans right now. His preferred anti-aging methods include things like exercising, eating a lot of plants, and not smoking. It would be difficult to find a doctor on earth who disagrees with those ideas. He does, however, prefer to eat stressed plants—those that have been intentionally under-nourished as they’ve grown—reasoning that mild stress turns on anti-aging defenses in the plants that benefit humans who eat them. (One assumes he has the saddest-looking garden in his neighborhood.)

Much of Sinclair’s research focuses on sirtuins, whose levels in the body decrease as we age. Two of the drugs he takes daily, NMN

Young CD

THE UNIFIED THEORY OF AGING, ILLUSTRATED

Old CD

Label

In a CD

Land

Pit Polycarbonate Laser Analog pits and lands represent digital code.

Analog changes affect how the digital code is read, but the code remains unchanged.

DNA in a Young Cell

Scratches on the CD confuse the laser reading the disc.

DNA in an Old Cell

In a Cell Histones DNA strand

DNA base pairs determine cell function.

Healthy DNA is structured tightly around proteins in the chromosome.

Transcription factors

Aging disarranges proteins and damages DNA, confusing transcription.

DNA presentation affects how its “digital” code is read, but the code remains unchanged.

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and resveratrol, are purported to goose the sirtuin system. (NAD+, another sirtuin booster, is the main ingredient in the anti-aging supplement Basis, from the popular longevity company Elysium, helmed by Sinclair’s postdoctoral mentor Leonard Gaurente.) But even these promising molecules have little to no chance of making us immortal by themselves. Much of Sinclair’s practical advice is still limited to behavioral interventions: The most effective involve a concept called “hormesis,” when mild stress damages the body just enough to set off positive cellular changes. Exercise, for example, sweating in a sauna, and allowing yourself to get cold spur the body to protect itself.

Probably the most supported intervention for living a very long time is as simple as changing your diet. “If I could only give one recommendation, it would be to eat less often,” Sinclair says. Studies dating back to the 1930s have shown that reducing calories around 30 percent has improved the lifespan of mice and monkeys, and improved biomarkers of age in humans. The research is so convincing that Barzilai uses it as a control in his study of other methods, to see if anything else works as well. Both Sinclair and Barzilai (as well as a number of other researchers) do it personally. Sinclair practices intermittent fasting. Barzilai follows the 16:8 diet, in which he only eats during an eight-hour stretch.

But plenty of people fast for health reasons, and still no one has exceeded the human age limit of roughly 122 years. What needs to happen to get humanity from where we are now, floating in a sea

of partial, mostly behavioral cures, to the point when living much longer, healthier lives becomes the norm?

The first challenge is education, Sinclair says.

Most people still don’t think of aging as a disease.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration doesn’t.

And as long as that remains the case, studying and prescribing drugs to treat aging will be difficult. Sinclair brings up metformin, a drug that is approved to treat diabetes, but which has also been shown to slow aging in animals and decrease neurodegenerative disease and cancer in humans. (A large, nationwide trial of metformin, called TAME: Targeting Aging with Metformin, was postponed due to Covid but will begin shortly.) It’s likely that, like metformin, the first potential anti-aging drugs will trickle down to the young and healthy from populations of people who need them to treat specific diseases. That will be easier if doctors don’t have to prescribe them off-label.

Another challenge: There’s no reliable test for the body’s cellular (as opposed to numerical) age, which makes it difficult to know whether a given treatment is working unless a research

K E N R I C H A R D S O N (S I N C L A I R)

↙ David Sinclair, Ph.D., is an inventor on 35 patents, many related to anti-aging innovations.

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study follows people all the way to death. Sinclair says he is starting a company to build such a test, hoping the product will be cheap and easy enough to become ubiquitous. “Lowering the barrier to doing this test routinely…will get the public accustomed to the concept that you can measure aging and that how you live affects that rate,” he says. He is not alone in this belief: Alex Zhavoronkov, a founder at the company Deep Longevity (and a scientist involved in lobbying the WHO to name aging a disease), is also developing a test of true age. The anti-aging supplement company Elysium has one as well, called Index. It remains to be seen which test will capture the most users, and which will be the most accurate, but the fact remains that you can’t make people live longer until you know how they’re dying, and how quickly they’re dying.

Other concerns involved in creating a population of immortals go beyond the pay grade of a Harvard biologist. Who will be allowed to live forever? What will happen to the Earth when humans stop dying? Will any of this involve robots? These are the questions we ask of philosophers, ethicists, and artists—and also of Natasha Vita-More, executive director of the transhumanist nonprofit Humanity+.

Vita-More predicts that seriously extending human lifespan will require advanced technology, helpers such as nanorobots that can rove the body and continually repair cellular damage.

She doesn’t worry about overpopulation, because birthrates have been plummeting (in wealthy countries, at least) for years. As for climate change, she believes some of the biotechnological wave that lifts human lifespan will be used to treat the breakdown of the Earth, “by repairing, renewing, and regenerating its ecology.”

But it won’t all be wine and roses. A society that lives indefinitely will have to find new things for people to do after our current retirement age, as well as reimagine the healthcare industry, once most older people are no longer spending their later years sick. There will need to be regulation to ensure corporations don’t sell fake anti-aging cures, or jack up prices to absurd heights, or engage in any number of other unethical practices. And we will still need to raise up the impoverished, secure an equitable physical and economic infrastructure, and agree politically on doing the right things. But Vita-More believes we can do it.

“Is this too hopeful? I do not think so,” she says. “I think that the idea of death will take on new defining factors and parameters and that people might become a new type of human that

AN EXPERT CRITIQUES INTRIGUING RAADFEST PRODUCTS

RAADFest presents some potentially compelling innovations in longevity. We asked Nir Barzilai, M.D., director of the Institute for Aging Research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, which ones might be too good to be true.

VIBRANZ ORION SERIES MYSTIC OILS Inhaling one to two drops of these plant-based essential oils will balance your mind and body, Vibranz attests.

The oils supposedly harmonize with the frequencies of your cells.

Dr. Barzilai says: “Bullshit. Cells are not synchronized in any way that you could just breathe oil [and see results].”

DEFYTIME AGING CARE CREAM Activated molecules within this face and neck cream detect telomeres in your skin to vanish wrinkles and inhibit shortening, a key cause of aging. The price tag is steep: $1,500.

Dr. Barzilai says: “Elongating telomeres or overexpressing telomerase can be harmful and possibly cause cancer, and having nice skin doesn’t mean you won’t die.”

AGELESS RX NAD+ INJECTION One injection can drive up to 100 mg NAD+ into the bloodstream via fatty tissue, boosting sirtuins to enhance your energy and slow down signs of aging.

Dr. Barzilai says: “This is an OK dose, but sometimes, when you have an expensive, invasive treatment, you elicit a placebo effect because people want to believe in it.”

SEDONA WELLNESS MAT Pulsed electromagnetic frequencies vibrate through the mat to heighten your circulation and oxygen supply, strengthening your cardiovascular and skeletal systems.

Dr. Barzilai says: “Physics is an important part of our health, but there has to be more of a scientific connection than a mattress.”

is not restricted by chronological age, gender, race, size, and all the other criteria used to normalize society.”

This is possibly a little optimistic in the short term. But it is true that the quest to live longer doesn’t have to be about vanity. “People who survive chemotherapy and radiation from cancer, they are aging rapidly. They need help. People with HIV get age-related diseases 10 years before they should,” Barzilai says. Sure, those of us who are young and healthy, like Nick Saraev, might seek a cure for mortality because dying sounds unpleasant, but effective anti-aging treatments could also create health equality among those of us who are living out vastly different lifespans right now—those who have to use wheelchairs, who can’t afford fresh vegetables, or who develop early onset Alzheimer’s because of bad genes. James Strole once characterized his dream of superlongevity as “heaven on earth.”

Is that what this is? Not exactly. But it’s a start.

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◀ In September 2020, the Air Force announced they had flown the NGAD (or F/A-XX). It could be the world’s first sixthgeneration fighter jet.

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BY ALEX HOLLINGS

HOW AMERICA’S NEW FIGHTER WILL

Competition I LLU S T R AT I O N BY RO D R I G O AV ELL A

July/August 2021

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A

s China and Russia inch closer to rivali n g A m e r i c a’s t o p fighte rs, the U.S. Air Force is on the hunt for a new jet.

Dubbed the Next-Generation Air Dominance program (NGAD), this effort is intended to replace America’s hobbled fleet of F-22 air superiority fighters. While maintenance records indicate that just 33 F-22s are flight-ready at any given time today, China’s fleet of Chengdu J-20 Mighty Dragons is estimated to number around 50 aircraft, and Russia’s fleet of Sukhoi Su-57 Felons is growing, expected to reach 76 planes by 2028. America’s air supremacy is at risk.

The J-20 and the Su-57 are stealth fighters designed for the contested airspace of a near-peer war. Most modern fighters specialize. America’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter serves a primary ground-attack role, while the F-22 Raptor is considered an air superiority fighter.

Details are scarce regarding the sixth-generation NGAD fighter, but it will likely boast awe-inspiring capabilities that improve upon or offset the advancements of the previous generation, including the J-20 and Su-57. Examining the NGAD’s competition provides clues as to what the new plane might bring to the table. The Air Force’s next jet can’t just compete with these fighters. It has to exceed them.

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▶ The Su-57 is the first Russian plane to use stealth technology.

”Russia considers stealth useful... but they show no interest in winning a stealth competition with the U.S.”

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STEALTH

ALAMY

Stealth’s series of overlapping technologies, production methods, and combat tactics is about surviving contested airspace, not becoming invisible. While some fourth-generation fighters leveraged topical treatments like radar-absorbent coating to delay detection, the Su-57 and J-20 were designed with stealth in mind from the ground up. The NGAD aircraft will thus have to lean into new technologies to make it harder to detect than any fighter before it.

Su-57 Felon » The Su-57’s stealth capabilities fall between the advanced fourth-generation International Roadmap Super Hornet and the fifth-generation J-20, and it’s “closer to the former than the latter,” says Tyler Rogoway, aviation analyst.

This caliber platform would offer a reduced radar cross section compared to fourth-generation jets in operation today, and it isn’t comparable to America’s fifth-generation fighters.

“Russia considers stealth useful in aircraft design, but they show no interest in winning a stealth competition with the U.S.,” says Steve Trimble, defense editor for Aviation

Week. Yet Trimble concedes that the first-production Su-57s demonstrate an evident improvement in body-panel tolerance over the prototypes.

J-20 Mighty Dragon » Experts can only speculate about the makeup and capability of the radar-absorbent materials coating China’s J-20, but a clear influence from stolen design schematics for America’s F-22 Raptor indicates stealth at least better than the Su-57’s.

Computer modeling suggests the J-20’s front canards make it difficult to detect when approaching head-on, but the plane’s design has room for

improvement. The J-20’s fourth-gen engines dump heat out the back of the aircraft, but a rectangular faceted nozzle design in those engines would be more effective at minimizing radar returns and reducing infrared detectability, according to a study from Michael J. Pelosi, Ph.D., a professor of Information Technology at the University of Maryland, and Carlo Kopp, Ph.D., associate fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

NGAD » The NGAD will almost certainly leverage an advanced radarreflecting design and a full-body coating of radar-absorbent materials.

Advanced heat distribution as energy is released from the aircraft, or a reduction in heat from the engines, could further lower the aircraft’s infrared signature. Onboard electronics that can jam enemy radar and communications, similar to those employed by the EA-18G Growler, could further harden the NGAD for a fight behind enemy lines.

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America’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is often referred to by pilots as a “quarterback in the sky.” It’s a flying supercomputer designed to present vast amounts of data — friendly and enemy aircraft, ground assets, mission objectives, and more — in a single, simple user interface. Russia and China have each emphasized this technology in the Felon and the Mighty Dragon, so the NGAD must access and interpret data from a broader range of sources. Doing so may require artificial intelligence.

Su-57 Felon » The Su-57 exchanges data with nearby aircraft and ground assets, and couples that data with existing intelligence to offer a streamlined understanding of the battle space. These avionics operate on a concept called network centricity, a new architecture for the Russian military that can be improved 50

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via software updates to increase automation over time, freeing the pilot to engage opponents.

The Su-57 also pairs side-facing radars with a nose-mounted X-Band N036 Byelka (Squirrel) AESA radar system. These offer the Su-57 a wide field of view, enhancing the pilot’s situational awareness.

J-20 Mighty Dragon » The J-20 is believed to leverage a secure data link for advanced communications and data transmission. It boasts a chin-mounted infrared/electro-optical search-and-track sensor that scans the horizon for enemy aircraft, and a passive electro-optical detection system to identify target aircraft at a distance without putting off any electromagnetic energy that might compromise the aircraft’s profile.

Onboard systems combine radar information with infrared imaging for an integrated view of the battle space via holographic heads-up display and LCD touch screens. These systems can determine speed, rate of closure, and even the type of aircraft being targeted. The primary screen in the J-20’s cockpit is 24 by 9 inches, with

ALAMY

2

AVIONICS

3

ARMAMENT

In order to maintain a stealth profile, fighters carry weapons internally, but some offer external hardpoints for mounting extra firepower. Russia and China maintain large fleets of non-stealth fourth-generation fighters, so their fifth-generation fighters will likely be leveraged in low-profile operations. The NGAD fighter might likewise carry its weapons internally as well, with an internal payload exceeding those of the F-35 and F-22.

Su-57 Felon » The Felon boasts a unique internal weapons bay configuration that can likely support between four and six medium-range air-to-air missiles.

Two secondary weapons bays can be found in triangular structures under the fighter’s wing roots. These open like clamshells to reveal short-range air-to-air missiles.

Six external hardpoints can carry extra munitions.

The Su-57 employs a single 30mm Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-1 autocannon, in Russian service since 1980, for close-range engagements. With a firing rate of 1,800 rounds per minute and incendiary armor-piercing projectiles, this weapon can be deadly at an air-to-air range of 800 meters and an air-to-ground range of more than 1,800 meters. ◀ China’s first J-20s reached a top speed of Mach 2.55.

three smaller auxiliary displays.

NGAD » Its avionics, sensors, and onboard computers should surpass the F-35’s, thanks to an “open system architecture” approach similar to your smartphone’s. Just as your phone is a collection of multifunction sensors and data processors, upgradable via periodic software downloads, so will NGAD’s avionics be open to improvements over the platform’s lifetime.

“Today’s fighters are not just airplanes,” says Major Justin Lee, U.S. Air Force F-35 pilot. “They are systems of sensors and weapons fused together in an efficient package. And because everything is tied together, one software update can make the entire system significantly better in a matter of minutes.”

J-20 Mighty Dragon » The J-20 utilizes one large primary bay for a variety of missiles and bombs meant for air-to-surface engagements, as well as two smaller lateral bays used for air-to-air weapons. The lateral bays allow the J-20 to keep its primary weapons bay closed while engaging other fighters, minimizing the jet’s radar signature even while it engages opponents.

But the J-20 was not designed for close-up dogfighting.

As such, it has no cannon, making it the only fifth-generation fighter in the world that forgoes the guns. The J-20 also boasts four additional external hardpoints beneath its wings. In total, it can carry four weapons in its primary internal bay, one in each lateral bay, and four externally.

NGAD » The NGAD will likely come with the ability to operate in a formation of pilot-guided support drones, like those being developed by the Air Force’s Skyborg or Boeing’s Loyal Wingman programs. These networked platforms will be able to extend the NGAD’s sensor reach, engage targets on the NGAD’s behalf, and serve as nodes between the NGAD and other nearby assets.

A power surplus on the new plane might support future directed energy weapons and defenses, including laser-induced plasma filaments that can create infrared holograms to confuse inbound missiles.

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◀ The Su-57 has an expected service life of 35 years.

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MANEUVERABILITY

While the Su-57 is acrobatic and built for close-up dogfights, the J-20 emphasizes avionics and weapon performance to engage at longer distances. The U.S. favors the latter approach, thanks to their weapons with overthe-horizon reach, though the F-22 demonstrated surprising agility for this leaning. That could indicate the NGAD will invest in high maneuverability, even if its offensive systems continue the Air Force’s long-range legacy.

J-20 Mighty Dragon » The first J-20s did not incorporate thrust vector controls, but China has announced their latest iteration of the fighter, the J-20B, will include the capability. Some experts think the J-20’s length and aerodynamic profile make it poorly suited for the acrobatics of an air superiority fighter, but J-20 test pilots have said the aircraft is comparable in agility to China’s fourth-generation fighter, the J-10. Analysis from Chinese aeronautical engineer Song Wencong, Ph.D., also suggested the jet could be more agile than what many experts predicted, but the plane’s acrobatic chops remain in question.

NGAD » The F-22 Raptor offers similar, but inferior, thrust vector controls to those of the Su-57, suggesting the Air Force prefers a sharpshooter fighter that can maintain the ability to scrap in close quarters. However, recent Air Force renderings of the NGAD program depict an aircraft without a vertical tail like those found on the F-35 and F-22. While not without precedent on a stealth fighter, this absence could indicate a stealth-heavy platform that sacrifices greater control surface on the tail, and thus acrobatic performance, for a lower profile.

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▶ As depicted

by Boeing, the NGAD’s engine intakes are shielded from radar below.

NGAD’s design can lean into specificity while its competitors are forced to balance disparate capabilities.

A L A M Y (J -2 0) ; CO U R T E S Y B O E I N G CO N C E P T A R T (N G A D)

Su-57 Felon » The Su-57 is the only stealth fighter on the planet today to utilize 3D thrust vectoring controls.

These allow the pilot to direct the outflow of thrust from the engines independent of the direction the aircraft is pointed, so the Su-57 can execute dramatic rolls and loops at low speeds, as well as orient itself in unique positions for attack (for example, pointing the fighter’s nose down toward enemy aircraft while the engines’ outlets keep the plane traveling in a forward direction).

OVERALL PERFORMANCE

The Su-57 and J-20 represent their respective nations’ first effort to field a tactical stealth aircraft, and as such, they’re meant for broad mission sets with low specialization. The NGAD might shine via the opposite approach: It will likely be purpose-built for sky combat. NGAD’s design can lean into specificity while its competitors are forced to balance disparate capabilities.

with America’s F-22 Raptor. Concerns about the J-20’s agility and lack of onboard cannon place it behind the Su-57 in terms of close-range dogfighting capabilities, however. But defense experts don’t agree on how practical close-range dogfighting is in the 21st century, so it’s difficult to say whether these deficiencies will haunt the plane.

Su-57 Felon » Future iterations of the Su-57 are expected to field new Izdeliye 30 engines, but the current Felons’ less-powerful AL-41F turbofan engines are capable of speeds in excess of Mach 2, with a service ceiling of 66,000 feet, and a rate of climb of 1,180 feet per second. This power, combined with thrust vector controls, makes the Su-57 a speedy and acrobatic adversary. While exact range figures vary, it is believed the Su-57 has a supersonic range of more than 900 miles, or 1,900 miles at subsonic speeds and carrying external fuel tanks.

The Su-57 also boasts directional infrared countermeasure systems

N G A D » The Air Force has taken pains to present the NGAD program as anything but a traditional fighter development effort. This is not the production of a single platform, but rather a family of systems, and that might be the future plane’s greatest strength. Advancements made under NGAD will likely find their way into crewed and drone platforms that work in concert with one another, making the heightened capabilities offered by these aircraft more than the sum of their parts. The stated aim of NGAD is air dominance, and with China’s J-20 now a decade-old design, and Russia’s Su-57 even older, that goal seems within reach.

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that use laser turrets to blind incoming infrared missiles, and robust landing gear to utilize less-developed airfields. It might not be the best fifthgeneration fighter on the block, but the Su-57 appears well balanced and fierce.

J-20 Mighty Dragon » The J-20 jettisoned its Russian-designed AL-31 engines in favor of a modified version of China’s Shenyang WS-10 turbofan, which will offer a slight increase in thrust until China’s more advanced WS-15 engines—purpose-built for high-performance stealth applications—come online. Chinese officials claim the WS-15 will bring the J-20’s overall performance to an even footing

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▲ Bluford at the Great Lakes Science Center in Cleveland in April 2021. ▶ Bluford poses for his NASA portrait in 1978.

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PH OTO G R A PH BY A M B ER N . FO R D

has flown

and the

Here’s what he’s learned

By De’Aundre Barnes July/August 2021

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→ What would you tell someone who wants to pursue a career as an astronaut, or in aerospace engineering? / I tell kids to chase their passions. I did not know as a kid that I would want to be an astronaut. I didn’t even think about flying. But I did find that I was passionate about airplanes. I wanted to learn as much as I could about them.

And my whole career has been geared toward learning as much as possible about airplanes and spacecraft.

The possibility of being an astronaut is very small. We just selected astronauts maybe a couple years ago; 18,000 people applied and only 12 got selected. So you want to make sure that you’re doing a job that you really enjoy, even if you don’t become an astronaut. → You

enlisted in the United States Air Force after college. What inspired you to do that? / Male students going to Penn State had to take two years of R.O.T.C. So I took Air Force R.O.T.C. After t wo years, I elected to continue, and go advanced R.O.T.C. [The advanced program teaches military tactics and leadership, and comes with a commitment to serve as a military officer after you graduate.] It gave me an opportunity to satisfy my draft requirements as well as an opportunity to serve my country. I thought that I would spend four or five years in the Air Force and then get out and become an aerospace engineer.

But between my junior and senior year at Penn State, I went to R.O.T.C. summer camp and found out that I could fly airplanes. And so I decided to go into the Air Force as a pilot, with the thought that I would learn how to be a better aerospace engineer if I flew airplanes. In my senior year, I learned to fly a Cessna 150. And in ’64, I graduated

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from Penn State with a degree in aerospace engineering, a commission in the Air Force, and a private pilot’s license. → What was it like to be selected for

NASA? / I was very fortunate. We had 8,000 people who applied, and 35 of us were selected. I was surprised that I got selected. I’ve spoken with people at NASA and I asked them, Why did they select me? And they basically said I was tough.

In ’77 NASA started going through their 8,000 people and they would send out letters to those eliminated.

For most of ’77 I sat around waiting for my letter. In the middle of that year, NASA started selecting finalists in groups of 20. So every week you’d see 20 to 40 names of people that NASA had selected to bring to Houston. In October or November, I was in Washington, D.C., on a business trip, and I came back to my hotel room and found a note on the door that said, “Contact NASA.” So I called, and the guy said, “You’ve been selected as a finalist; we’d like to have you in Houston.”

Bluford and his STS-61A Challenger crewmates walk to the launch pad a few days ahead of their mission in 1985.

→ Did you ever experience racism or

racial profiling in your career? / I’m pretty sure all African Americans see that. I didn’t let it bother me. I grew up in a world where I felt I could do anything I wanted to do through hard work.

And I was able to do that over the years. → What were some of the challenges

you faced being the first African American man in space? / When I came into the program, there were six women in our class. And you had me and Ron McNair and Fred Gregory, three African Americans. And one Asian American, Ellis Onizuka. So G E T T Y I M AG E S ; P R E V I O U S PAG E : N A S A (H E A D S H OT ) (H E A D S H OT, P R E V I O U S PAG E

Guy Bluford was a crew member aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger when it launched from Kennedy Space Station on its third mission, making Bluford the first Black astronaut to fly to space. Here he reflects on the importance of that achievement and the role he filled— and offers advice to young people seeking their way in the world.

I spent a week in Houston. I saw the 19 other people in my group of 20, and they were strong people. We all went through a physical—I’ve never had a physical that thorough—and a psychiatric exam. And I got an opportunity to meet astronauts, which was exciting.

But you didn’t know if you were going to make it or not.

In January, I was driving to work [in Ohio], and I heard on the radio that NASA had selected 35 astronauts.

So I assumed that I hadn’t gotten my rejection letter yet. But I got to work, and about 10 o’clock, I got a call from NASA. And this guy at the other end asked me what the weather was like in Dayton. And I’ll tell you, the weather was miserable. So I complained about that. And he calmly said, “You know, it doesn’t snow in Houston; would you like to come to Houston?” And so that was the call that told me that I had been selected for the astronaut program.

Bluford checks out the sample pump on the Continuous Flow Electrophoresis System on the Challenger shuttle in 1983.

G E T T Y I M AG E S

Guy Bluford was interviewed and photographed for Project Tell Me, which records the wisdom and life experiences of Black Americans ages 75 and older by connecting them with a new generation of Black journalists. The interview series will run across Hearst websites around Juneteenth 2021. Go to hearst.com/projecttellme for more information.

we recognized that we were breaking the mold, with reference to astronauts who are primarily male and white. We knew that one of us would eventually get selected first woman, first African American. Ellis Onizuka didn’t have any competition for first Asian American. I didn’t anticipate being selected.

I was happy to learn that in ’82, I would fly as part of STS-8. And it just so happened to be a historic mission, in reference to being the first African American to fly in space. I feel honored to be in that role.

Once I got down, I wanted to fly a second time, which I did, in ’85. And then we had the Challenger accident [in 1986] and we lost Ron McNair and company. I wanted to stay around, and I flew a third and fourth.

One of the things that I really wanted to do was not only to break the mold, but to help pull other African Americans into the program and get them to fly. I feel honored with reference to not only leading the charge,

but helping a bunch of other African Americans who came behind me. I take a great deal of pride in that.

you can achieve it, but it requires hard work and perseverance. → How

→ How

did you do that? / One of the things that I tried to do was just do the best I could. Whatever advice I could provide to those who came behind me, I would try it. But encouragement, opening the way for other African Americans, I thought was my responsibility.

With African American organizations, we help those that come behind.

Victor Glover just got down from flying in space. He will go and try to help Jeanette Epps. Jeanette Epps will help Jessica Watkins, and so forth and so on. Once you get down, try and help the team behind you.

Is there any advice you have for Black scientists and students in particular? / Aim high and work hard at it. And I really tell them that if I can do it, they can do it. If you can dream it,

→

would you sum up your life? / I’ve been a fighter pilot with over 5,200 hours of jet time and a commercial pilot license. I’ve been an astronaut, I’ve f lown four times in space. I’ve got four earned degrees and 14 honorary doctorate degrees.

I’ve been inducted into three halls of fame. I’ve been a researcher on both the aero side and the space side. I’ve been a senior aerospace engineering executive with three different companies. And I’m an explorer—I’ve scuba-dived all over the world. But I am basically a kid who grew up in West Philadelphia, got interested in airplanes, and has had an exciting career as an aerospace engineer. I’m an aerospace engineer who has found something that he enjoys doing.

De’Aundre Barnes is a 2020 graduate of North Carolina Central University.

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11

Outdoor Awards

THE FRONTIER OF

DESIGN In the past year, the world has operated on a different frequency, but outdoor gear makers have hardly slowed down. Instead, companies are breaking into new categories, reimagining what their modern classics can be and refining designs to create equipment that’s innovative and intuitive. Among the results: hiking packs that haul heavy loads without slowing you down, an e-bike that makes shredding trails practically effortless, and some of the most comfortable, ultralight backpacking gear we’ve tested. ¶ Our test team got their hands on the most promising standouts and rigorously evaluated it all on trails, on roads, and at camp. Through this real-world testing and some headto-head comparisons, they determined which new products lend performance advantages. Whether you’re building your kit or replacing worn-out equipment, this gear can make your next hike, camping trip, or bike ride easier and more fun.

CAMPING

HIKING

CYCLI N G

GADGETS

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p.61

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CAMPING

IN NO VA TI ON SP OT LI GH T ◀ BACKPACKING TENT

Sea to Summit Telos TR2 $499 Ultralight backpacking tents aren’t prized for their livability. Despite manufacturers’ best efforts, these pint-size shelters can get stuffy fast.

Sea to Summit found another way in the Telos—part of the Australian outfit’s first line of tents—by rethinking traditional tent architecture.

The Telos’s V-shaped Tension Ridge pole, which supports the ceiling and fly, is a striking contrast to other ridge poles that curve down. By flipping the design, Sea to Summit achieves a relatively lofty 43.5-inch peak height that made the twoperson, 28-square-foot tent feel less cramped. The Tension Ridge also helps create the fly’s massive lofted ceiling vent, which—along with a vent on each vestibule—reduces condensation inside. In the company’s testing, the Telos had over 30% better airflow and at least 17% less humidity compared to other popular tents. We didn’t verify those numbers, but we didn’t wake up to find our duds had grown soggy overnight, either.

Importantly, the unconventional construction is also strong. The 3.3-pound tent didn’t falter sans guy lines during a night of persistent gusts on an exposed hilltop. It’s a pricey shelter but worth it if you don’t want to sacrifice weight or comfort.

PH OTO G R A PH Y BY T R E VO R R A A B

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CAMPING ▼ BACKPACKING STOVE

Jetboil Stash Cooking System $130 It’s a race to the bottom when it comes to backpacking gear, particularly stoves. Jetboil has pulled ahead (or below, if you will) with the Stash.

It sacrifices conveniences like a piezo igniter for match ignition, but the 0.8-liter pot and 4,500-BTU burner weigh a hair over seven ounces. Plus, the Stash boils half a liter of water in a respectable 2.5 minutes.

▲ BEST VALUE SLEEPING BAG

Kelty Tuck 40 $70 The snug yet spacious mummy shape of the synthetically insulated Tuck let us sleep in a variety of positions and still stay warm. The hood and draft tube felt like luxurious touches for the price. On warm nights, leave the lower portion of the zipper open to create a heat-dumping foot vent.

▲ PILLOW

Klymit Drift $40 We never thought a pillow would be partially responsible for our stoke ahead of car-camping weekends.

Then we slept on the Drift. Shredded memory foam creates a supportive yet forgiving platform. A reversible case repels dirt while lending nextto-skin softness.

◀ CAMPING HAMMOCK

ENO SkyLite $170 Asymmetrical hammocks wish they could deliver as flat a sleeping surface as the SkyLite. Two collapsible bars spread the sling into a threefoot-wide bed, so we could sprawl in any position, including on our stomach. The built-in bug net thwarted pests. Notable omissions: suspension straps and a rain fly. ◀ BACKPACKING CHAIR

Nemo Moonlite Reclining $140 We were impressed with the way that Nemo brought reclining functionality to a sub-two-pound chair. A strap of webbing on each side runs through a buckle and loop before ending in a stopper that forms a sort of handle.

Sit up and pull forward on the straps to cinch them higher up in the buckles, straightening the back. Pull the end of the straps back to slacken them and recline. It’s beautifully and reliably simple. And comfortable.

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HIKING

▶ DAYPACK

IN NO VA TI ON SP OT LI GH T

Matador Beast18 $135 Most stuffable daypacks consist of little more than fabric and zippers, which is why they fold down so discreetly, then feel terrible on your back after just a few miles. The 18-liter Beast, though, has a clever design trick that allows the spring steel suspension frame that snakes around the perimeter of its padded back panel to fold down and then regain its shape once unpacked.

Spring steel is common in midsize and large pack frames, but Matador selects a thinner version, then heat-treats it to increase resilience so it’s flexible enough to twist and bend in half. On the trail, the Beast felt as comfortable as any traditional framed daypack we’ve tested.

Granted, it comes with sacrifices of weight and space. The Beast measures 1 pound 5 ounces—hefty for a travel-ready pack—and it looks more like an extra-thick frisbee when stuffed inside its mesh storage sack.

But given that it’s suitable for summit pushes and less-intense day trips, the Beast is a one-quiver pack that’s worth making a bit of extra room for.

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HIKING ▶ JACKET

Houdini Mono Air Houdi $200 The comfortable and slightly stretchy Mono Air, made from Polartec’s second-gen Power Air recycled fabric, is less polluting than other fleeces.

The polyester’s tiny bubble wrap–like baffles shed up to five times less microfibers than other materials and boost warmth. ▶ HIKING SHOE

Merrell Moab Speed $120 Merrell retooled its best-selling Moab—a clunky boot by today’s standards—into the light and agile Moab Speed. A thin mesh and TPU upper replaces the leather-swathed one, and a new, less dense midsole lends a spongier ride. Our 10.9-ounce test sample tackled technical passes with aplomb, thanks to a new outsole with ground-grabbing 4mm lugs. ▶ HIKING SOCKS

SynchroKnit Axiom Light Low $17 Our feet often get the raw end of the deal when hiking and trekking. Show them a little love with the Merino wool–blend Axiom, available in five heights. Wigwam’s patented construction method reduces stitching throughout to create a foot-hugging, secure fit, while padding at the ball and heel add comfort.

◀ BACKPACKING PACK

Osprey Ariel Plus 60 $340 Our penchant for overpacking doesn’t end when we head into the backcountry.

For the heaviest loads, we reach for the feature-rich Ariel Plus. The redesigned AirScape back panel has an injection-molded framesheet with sections of raised foam, all topped by mesh. Paired with an aluminum peripheral frame, the 60-liter pack felt incredibly stable and balanced, and it didn’t leave us totally drenched in sweat.

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▲ HYDRATION RESERVOIR

Gregory 3D Hydro Trek 3L $45 We’re water bladder devotees, but we admit they can be useless outside of a pack. Thanks to a pour spout and hanging strap, we put the Trek to work at camp. Also great: the internal plastic support to speed drying.

CYCLI NG

IN NO VA TI ON SP OT LI GH T ▲ E- M O U N T A I N B I K E

Specialized Levo Pro Carbon $13,000 Specialized is one of the few brands that develops its own motor and software for its e-bikes. Armed with this level of control over ride feel, the company doles out some pretty great electric models with intriguing features. One such detail: the new MicroTune pedal-assist mode on the third-generation Levo.

Part of the revamped MasterMind Turbo Connect Unit, MicroTune let us adjust the assistance in 10 percent increments using the handlebar switch.

PH OTO G R A PH BY M AT T PH I LLI P S

We had more control as compared to alternating between the Levo’s three preset levels or relying on an auto-adjust setting like Bosch’s eMTB mode.

Implementing the software changes was relatively straightforward, but Specialized needed the inspiration. Beyond an improved ride experience, rider research showed a tunable system could extend battery life and increase traction by not over-torquing the motor on slippery climbs. Mostly, though, it’s great for group rides when the people you’re with are on different equipment and of various fitness levels.

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CYCLI NG ▶ HELMET

Bontrager Starvos WaveCel $100 Bontrager’s WaveCel technology, with its collapsible impact-absorbing honeycomb-like structure, drew attention in 2019 when the company claimed it was “up to 48 times more effective than traditional foam helmets” in protecting against head injuries. But like a lot of new tech, it was pricey. At $100, the Starvos brings the protection to formerly boxed-out budget-minded riders. Even better, it’s the most comfortable WaveCel helmet yet.

We prefer it to the $300 XXX WaveCel, on account of the Starvos’s better padding placement and comfy occipital gripper. ▶ LIGHT SET

Blackburn Luminate 360 $110 Outfit your ride with the Luminate 360 and drivers will have a harder time missing you.

Credit the 400-lumen headlight, 65-lumen taillight, and two 85-lumen amber side lights that attach to your bike’s fork, downtube, or top tube. The battery life on the four rechargeable lights—between one and 10 hours, depending on the lamp and its settings—isn’t stellar, but it’s a fair trade-off for being seen.

◀ SMART TRAINER

Elite Suito $850 This direct-drive smart trainer performed mostly on par with higher priced models. It offered fast, buttery transitions between resistance levels and held momentum superbly, despite sacrificing a smidge of accuracy. It comes with a preinstalled Shimano 11-speed cassette and legs and can operate independently of virtual platforms, like Zwift.

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◀ MOUNTAIN BIKE SHOE

A M Y W O L F F (R I M E F L AT )

Specialized Rime Flat $130 Hoofing it up hills doesn’t make you any less of a mountain biker, but you need the right shoes, like the new Rime Flat. Specialized uses a proprietary rubber sole that was just the right amount of sticky against pedals.

Meanwhile, a flexible toe, EVA-foam midsole, and impact-absorbing shank made it comfortable to walk in.

▲ E- B I K E

Aventon Pace 350 Step-Through $1,199 Affordable and reliable, the Pace 350 is a great entry-level e-bike for casual riders looking for a boost on climbs or over long, flat stretches. The comfort-oriented rig has five levels of e-assist and

a throttle, both topping out at 20 mph. Add in the seven-speed Shimano Tourney drivetrain and we had plenty of pedaling options. Off the line, the Pace quickly and steadily gained speed without jolting. Although it’s a couple years old, this bike, and its 35-ish-mile range, is still great for commuters.

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GADGETS

IN NO VA TI ON SP OT LI GH T ▶ POCKETKNIFE

CRKT Bona Fide $100 The Bona Fide is a simple enough folder, save for the sliding button on the aluminum handle that’s part of CRKT’s newly redesigned Field Strip technology. The Oregon company first debuted this tool-free disassembly, invented by knife maker Ken Onion, in 2016. That wheel-based system made thoroughly cleaning a knife dead simple, but it required two steps—disengaging the pivot by moving a lever and spinning a release wheel—before each side of the handle separated from the blade.

Gen two is even simpler. All we had to do was slide the lever up and to the left to release the new internal hook mechanism. CRKT also upgraded the pivot to its very smooth IKBS bearing system, so the 3.6-inch D2 steel blade glided open before locking securely in place without any play or wiggling.

The Bona Fide is on the bigger side for an everyday carry, but that makes it well suited for light-duty outdoor tasks. And when it inevitably gets dirty, there’s no excuse not to clean it.

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◀ BACKCOUNTRY COMMUNICATIONS

Zoleo Satellite Communicator $200 Even in 2021, sat-comm devices can feel clunky. Zoleo isn’t the only company to skirt that issue with an intuitive messaging app, but unlike competitors, it prioritized sending our texts and emails through cellular data and Wi-Fi when we were in range. That’s good news because Zoleo’s service plans are pricier than its competitors’. ◀ ACTION CAMERA

GoPro Hero9 Black $450 The newest Hero captured remarkably steady footage during runs, now that GoPro took the horizon-leveling functionality from its app and installed it directly into the camera.

The improved stabilization algorithm also helps, and necessitated the 30% larger battery. At last, you can breakup with your gimbal.

▼ P O R T A B L E W A T E R F I LT E R

MSR Guardian Gravity Purifier $250 With this gravity-based water treatment system, all we had to do was fill, hang, and wait. The 0.02-micron pores on the hollow-fiber membrane block waterborne viruses, along with bacteria and protozoa, while activated carbon zaps bad tastes. The massive 10-liter reservoir is good for groups or arid destinations.

▶ SMARTWATCH

Fitbit Sense $300 Health has rarely been such a focus of daily life than in the past 17 months. This sensor-packed smartwatch put us in control by monitoring our fitness routine, skin temperature, blood oxygen saturation, sleep quality, stress levels, and heart rate and rhythm, via a new on-wrist electrocardiogram.

Other watches have this tech, too, but most are more expensive. Beyond stats, the Sense is user-friendly and boasts a 1.6-inch screen that’s easy to read.

THERE’S MORE TO EXPLORE → Visit popularmechanics.com to discover all the gear that made it into this year’s Outdoor Awards, including a four-person tent under $200, our favorite pair of running headphones, and skis ready for any mountain.

July/August 2021

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12

This Changed Everything

The Smart Bulb That Gave Light a New Purpose

B

EING ABLE TO CHANGE THE ENTIRE

look and feel of a room with the press of a button or a quick voice command is one of those rare things that makes you feel like you’re living in the future. Color-changing lights have existed for years, but never in a form that was useful. They were typically big, clunky fixtures that you had to plug into a wall, took up valuable shelf space, and required a remote to control. They certainly weren’t elegant—mere novelty items at best.

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The Philips Hue bulb as it looks today, not much different from its original debut LED form in 2011.

Plain white LED bulbs had an equally rocky start.

By the end of the 2000s, you could replace a standard incandescent bulb with one, but they were still generally ugly, with bizarre fins around the bases, and they often cast an unpleasant shade of light. That left room for the development of LED bulbs that weren’t eyesores and produced light that was more pleasing and useful. In 2011, a team at Philips had the idea of a bulb that could address several of those issues while providing some health benefits. But they ended up with something far more versatile, creating color-changing lighting that didn’t require a specialized gadget.

“When we started the design of Philips Hue, we were going for tunable whites,” says George Yianni, head of tech for Philips Hue and the person who orig-

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12

This Changed Everything

inally conceived the project. “We were aiming for something that could go from warm whites to cold whites.” The benefits they were after ranged from boosting concentration to making reading more comfortable to helping you wind down for sleep.

“The only way we could actually build that and still have a decent light output was to use these special color LEDs (whitish green, a red/orange, and a blue/purple), and mix those to get these different shades of white,” Yianni continues. “And that gave us the benefit of color, which we found very early on in the process was actually very well appreciated by consumers.”

Yianni said he and his team realized they were onto something after they seeded some very rough prototypes of Hue to consumers to see how they would use them in their day-to-day lives. Many testers refused to give the bulbs back.

What engendered that love were the two major aspects that differentiated Hue—and fixed the problems with LED whites and color-changing lights in a single product. Not only could the bulb emit virtually any color of the rainbow, but it pretty much looked like a normal lightbulb. The weird fins were gone, and the light it cast was even and diffuse. Most importantly, it fit in the standard E26-size light sockets. You could pop a Hue into virtually any fixture you already owned, from overhead lights to your grandma’s antique lamp, and it could transform the look of the whole room.

The other big differences were the way the bulbs communicated with each other and the way you communicated with them. Hue had a Bridge, a small puck that plugs into one of the Ethernet ports on your Wi-Fi router. This allowed you to create and save elaborate lighting schemes, control them all from an app on your phone, or even automate them with other devices, in turn making those better and more useful. One Philips tester had the light blink pink whenever she received an email from Facebook. And the bulbs being able to talk to each other effectively extended the range, with each acting as a relay station, so you could control your lights even in rooms where the Wi-Fi might be spotty.

To get Hue ready for prime time, Philips had some engineering hurdles to overcome. Getting an LED array, a microchip controller, and a radio into a standard bulb was challenging. Yet surprisingly, that wasn’t so much due to size limitations as it was thermal constraints.

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YIANNI AND HIS TEAM REALIZED THEY WERE ONTO SOMETHING WHEN MANY TESTERS REFUSED TO GIVE THE BULBS BACK. ONE HAD SET THE HUE TO BLINK PINK WHENEVER SHE RECEIVED AN EMAIL FROM FACEBOOK. “Early LEDs were very much heat-limited because you can’t run them super hot or the electronics fry,” Yianni says. “You kind of play this balance of how you manage the heat with getting enough light output. We actually had to make custom LEDs to get a decent amount of light output in white. So we developed a special lime LED—kind of a whitish green—that’s super energy-efficient.

Your eye is most sensitive to green light wavelengths, so at the time this was one of the most energy-efficient ways to create perceived brightness. These multiple lime LEDs, together with direct red-orange and royal blue LEDs, were what we combined in our first-generation Hue bulb to deliver good-quality white light.”

Similar to how Philips set out to make tunable white bulbs and ended up with full-spectrum colorchanging ones, another crucial design decision within Hue, was sort of a happy accident. In the lead-up to the launch, Yianni and his engineers were behind schedule and didn’t have time to develop all the features they had hoped to build in. They had to back-burner some in favor of working on a new one: making the software in the bulbs themselves updatable. This ended up being a boon, allowing Philips to roll out numerous updates and features over the years, including tricks for automation, compatibility with various sensors and switches, and rapid channel adjustments.

Philips sold out its launch stock in the first week, and the same has happened for many subsequent Hue releases. Yianni says the team has ambitions toward sleeker automation, but also to pivoting back to focus on those potential health benefits that were the original goal. Whether or not we can have better living through better lighting remains to be seen.

But homeowners appreciate good design and problem-solving (and evidently, attractive colors).

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New UCLA Discovered “Biocell” – Thicker Hair in as Little as 30 Days Clinical trial from the University of California results in 74% more hair growth – 100% naturally T

housands are rushing to get a new hair restoration method based on surprising new studies from the University of California. ,W LV WKH ZRUOG·V ÀUVW DQG RQO\ KDLU ORVV VROXWLRQ WKDW UHYLYHV GHDG KDLU IROOLFOHV $QG VWXGLHV FRQÀUP it helps men and women regrow a thick, full head of hair, even after years of balding.

Now, with news of this breakthrough spreading OLNH ZLOGÀUH ³ WKH PDQXIDFWXUHUV DUH VWUXJJOLQJ WR keep up with overwhelming demand.

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As Jeanne F. from San Diego, CA reports: “When my husband began to use this product, all he had on top of his head was fuzz. His hair began to grow after 30 days and now it is about 2 to 3 inches long!”

Surprising Truth About Hair Loss It is commonly believed that hair loss is hereditary.

Unfortunately, most people think there is nothing they can do to stop it. However, while many doctors will tell you that thinning hair, a receding hairline, and bald spots are due to your genetics, this is not the whole story.

“While genetics play a role, it’s not the main reason you lose hair,” says Dr. Al Sears, the nation’s top anti-aging doctor. “And surprisingly it’s not just your age, thyroid, hormones, stress, or a vitamin deÀFLHQF\ HLWKHU μ 7KH ODWHVW VFLHQWLÀF UHVHDUFK UHYHDOV WKDW KDLU ORVV is primarily caused by the stem cells in your hair follicles dying.

“This discovery is a true breakthrough because by reviving these stem cells on your scalp, you can stop hair loss dead in its tracks and trigger new hair growth, even in areas that have been thinning for years,” explains Dr. Sears.

Now, at his world-famous clinic, the Sears Institute for Anti-Aging Medicine in Palm Beach, Florida, Dr. Sears and his team have used this game-changing discovery to develop a brand-new hair restoration formula that is taking the country by storm.

Sold under the name Re-Nourish LW LV Á\LQJ RII the shelves with men and women of all ages raving about the results it delivers. ´, KDYH VHHQ D VLJQLÀFDQW LPSURYHPHQW LQ KDLU growth. Previously, you could see thinning areas at the back of my head and now hair has grown over it,” says Peter W. from Ontario, Canada.

And Susan D. from Fort Pierce, Florida reports, “My hair was thinning. So, I began to use Re-Nourish every day on the front part of my scalp. Now I have thicker hair.”

Regrows Hair In Just 30 Days Scientists now know that stem cells are the lifeblood of your hair follicles.

Research from the University of California shows they’re the reason you’re able to grow hair.

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“Your hair grows in three phases,” explains Dr. Sears. “First, Breakthrough research proves this discovery helps fill-in bald you have the anagen phase, the spots, re-nournishes thinning hair, and leads to noticeable growth hair growing phase. Then the catagen phase, when hair gets in as little as 30 days.

UHDG\ WR VKHG $QG ÀQDOO\ WKH Re-Nourish uses a unique blend of all-natural intelogen phase, where your hair is gredients.

By spraying it on your hair once per day, pushed from the follicle and falls out.”

VFLHQWLÀF VWXGLHV VKRZ \RX FDQ UHYLYH GHDG VWHP FHOOV As you get older it becomes harder for your hair and improve the appearance of thicker, fuller hair. follicles to complete this three-phase cycle. The results? Your hairs get stuck in the telogen phase. This For example, the key nutrient of Re-Nourish was is when they start falling out and stop regrowing, no tested on a group of severely balding women.

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Sears.

Most exciting of all, they grew new hair on parts of ´$W ÀUVW \RXU KDLU GULHV RXW EHFRPLQJ EULWWOH WKLQ their scalp that had been bald for years.

DQG KDUGHU WR VW\OH 7KHQ \RX VWDUW ÀQGLQJ KDLUV RQ your pillow and down the drain. Finally, you’re left In another study, Italian researchers gathered a group of both men and women with thinning hair with bald spots that age you prematurely.” and applied the core ingredient of Re-Nourish.

Fortunately, Re-Nourish puts a stop to this. It reAfter 12 weeks, they reported a staggering 74% invives the dead stem cells in your hair follicles and crease in hair growth. reactivates your hair’s three-phase cycle, triggering QHZ JURZWK LQ DV OLWWOH DV GD\V ³ HYHQ LQ DUHDV “It’s really mind-boggling that my hair started growing back,” says Zan R., another Re-Nourish that’ve been balding for years. customer.

With results like this, it’s no surprise that demand Dr. Al Sears, M.D., is America’s leading antifor Re-Nourish is soaring. Thousands of men and aging expert. He’s authored more than 500 women are scrambling to get their hands on the scientific papers, and his discoveries have limited-supply available. appeared on more than 50 media outlets Re-Nourish is not currently available in any store including, ABC News, CNN, ESPN, Discovery at any price. But we’ve secured a small batch for Channel, National Geographic, Lifetime, and our readers.

many more.

Reawakens Dead Hair Follicles )RU \HDUV VFLHQWLVWV FRXOGQ·W ÀJXUH RXW ZK\ KDLU follicle stem cells died.

However, a study from the University of CaliforQLD ÀQDOO\ IRXQG WKH DQVZHU ,W KDV WR GR ZLWK 7 FHOOV ³ DQ LPSRUWDQW LPPXQH cell in your body. The researchers discovered these T-cells are the only way to command hair follicles to grow new hair.

More importantly, they showed that T-cells helped UHYLYH WKH VWHP FHOOV LQ \RXU KDLU IROOLFOHV ³ VSXUULQJ QHZ JURZWK ÀOOLQJ LQ EDOG VSRWV DQG QDWXUDO hairline.

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13

Tools // BY ROY BEREN DSOH N //

and-True Sanding Method (and the Best Power Sanders for the Job)

A

P OW E R SA N D E R I S A S I M PL E TO O L T H AT C A N

smooth a piece of furniture you’ve proudly built, strip rust, deburr a sharp metal edge, or remove weathered paint. But the appliance isn’t harmless, either. Use it incorrectly and the surface is liable to be worse than when you started. Fortunately, with a little direction and practice, you should have no problem using your sander properly. On these pages, we’ll show you the fundamentals on how to get a glass-smooth surface, explain the nuances in levels of grit, and offer thoughts on the best power sanders we’ve tested that are worth your money.

Before you can begin, put on a dust mask, preferably one with a foam seal where it meets your face. And wear a covering like a work apron or an old shirt, something you don’t mind potentially getting covered in sawdust. Then follow these steps to get a clean, even surface with your sander.

Step by Step

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1 / Select an appropriate disc. Choose the coarsest grit (or lowest number) that’s suitable to begin the job. (Consult our grit guide on the next page for guidance if you’re unsure.) If you start with too coarse a disc, it’s liable to scratch the surface or remove too much. When in doubt, take a quick test run on scrap wood.

July/August 2021

2 / Attach the disc to the sander. Both are hook-andloop, so just align the holes on the disc with the holes in the sander’s base and push the disc on. Once you’ve done that, plug in a vacuum hose to the sander’s outlet or ensure the bag is empty. Most sanders can easily hook up to a vacuum if you prefer, either directly or with a separate adapter.

3 / Start the sander and bring it gently in contact with the wood. Move it slowly and steadily over the work surface, being sure to sand edge to edge without tipping the sander over those edges, which would round them off.

Establish a pattern and sand that pattern in a clockwise direction and then counterclockwise. Repeat. You’ll know you’re done when the surface is evenly abraded, with no unsanded corners or areas. Vacuum clean the

PH OTO G R A PH Y BY T R E VO R R A A B

surface of whatever you’re working on, in case any dust snuck out of the bag or vacuum hose. This is especially important, as is using the bag or a vacuum in the first place, so that the dust doesn’t potentially damage what you’re working on or grind down the disc faster. Then dump out the dust bag—though it’s not a bad idea to save the dust in a Ziploc, as it can be handy later on (see page 75).

4 / Move to the next grit. Don’t skip more than one grade as you move from coarse to smooth. For example, you can go from 100grit to 150 (skipping 120), but don’t go from 100 to 220. Use the same method as above in terms of movement and alternating clockwise and counterclockwise. When finished, vacuum the surface again, this time adding another step: Wipe it clean with a tack cloth (a sticky piece of fabric, sold in the paint aisle, used to pick up dust). Again, be sure to empty the dust bag.

5 / Proceed to final sanding with your finest grit, working over the surface as you did before. As a final quality-control check, vacuum and wipe down the workpiece and take a work light and shine it at various angles. This can reveal any swirl marks or undersanded areas. At this point, you should have a smooth, evenly sanded surface.

6 / Clean up. The best thing you can do for the sander is to blow the dust out of it with compressed air or use a shop vacuum and work over its exterior, especially the air vents. Vacuum the workbench and the floor. Finally, vacuum yourself. Take off your apron or shirt or peel off your coveralls and leave them in the work area. Wipe your feet before you leave the shop or, better still, take your shoes off and leave them there. In short, do everything you can to avoid bringing sanding dust into the house—it’s unhealthy to breathe in, and you also run the risk of tracking in some sanding grit, which can scratch wood floors.

GRADES OF GRIT

Sanding grit is sized from coarse to fine, with lower numbers being more coarse than higher numbers.

To illustrate grit coarseness and how it affects the surface you’re working on, we applied two coats of semigloss blue enamel to a board, marked off six- inch sections, and applied different grits (60, 80, 100, 120, 150, 220, 320) to each from top to bottom, leaving the sander in contact for 15 seconds at each grit.

60: Great for paint stripping and removing marks left by planers or saws, but leaves a rough surface.

80: Same attributes as 60 grit, just doesn’t work as quickly. Good for getting a smoother surface after you’ve finished with 60 grit.

100: Not an effective stripper but will nicely smooth out scratches from the previous, rougher grits.

120: Levels out brush marks and surface imperfections in paint. You can start with 120 on softwood and hardwood when the surface is already reasonably smooth and there are no machine marks to remove.

150: Use this for removing gloss from painted surfaces. It’s gentler than 120, so it’s particularly effective if you have to sand a surface around a carved area that you don’t want to disturb or potentially mar.

220: A fine grit that’s good for the final sanding of bare wood; also good at removing paint gloss.

320: An extremely fine grit, excellent for the last sanding for bare wood that will be finished with low-sheen oil finishes.

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Tools

O U R T E S T WA S S I M P L E B U T T H O R O U G H . W E D R E W R E C TA N G L E S O N P I E C E S O F OA K

The Best Power Sanders We Tested This Year

and maple, plywood, and softwood, and sanded each with an 80-grit disc. Next, we emptied the dust bag to check the volume of dust the sander collected. We also carefully wiped down the work surface to get a sense of how much dust the sander missed. As we worked, we assessed the sander’s vibration and whether it produced an unpleasant gyroscopic effect when we lifted it off the test board. As important as any of the other tests was to examine the sanded surface to see whether the tools left swirl marks.

EDITORS’ CHOICE

B O S C H R O S2 0VS C

Price: $69 | Weight: 3.5 lb

MOST VERSATILE

D E WA LT DW E 6 4 21

Price: $59 | Weight: 2.9 lb DeWalt’s DWE6421 is a journeyman power tool—a solid, smoothly operating machine. And we should add, it’s simple. It has no speed control, operating solely at 12,000 rpm. Twist its dust

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bag on or off; it seals tightly to the discharge port with a quarter turn and comes off just as easily. And when you empty the bag, you’ll be pleasantly surprised that it’s packed with dust. That means it’s in there rather than on you, on whatever you’re working on, or in your lungs. In your pursuit of a finish-ready surface, the DeWalt delivers the goods.

CO U R T E S Y B O S C H ; CO U R T E S Y D E WA LT

This Bosch is comfortable, sands quickly, and has the best dust collection of the corded sanders we tested.

Because its dust control is so good (owing to a rubber O-ring seal on the dust port, good airflow, and an airtight dust canister), less dust stays on the surface to get ground into the abrasive pad.

That means the pad stays cleaner and lasts longer. Its speed-control dial is behind the handle; you can get at it easily, but it’s possible to accidentally move it out of position. The sanded surface the ROS20VSC left was very nice—not the absolute smoothest of our test crew but still professional quality.

D.I.Y. WOOD FILLER WITH LEFTOVER SANDING DUST

Leftover dust has a surprising use, one that I turn to because of my dislike of premade wood fillers, which tend to sit around and dry out before I have a chance to use them to cover nail heads.

So I make my own, using sanding dust and wood glue. To do this, I pour out a small mound of dust from my supply.

Next, I add a little glue and mix it with a putty knife on a paper plate. To test its consistency, I roll the glue-dust mixture between my thumb and forefinger, forming a little cylinder. If the cylinder crumbles, I add another drop of glue. If the cylinder is too soft and smears, I add a pinch of dust.

To use this cylinder plug, I press it into a cavity, then strike off the excess with a putty knife. I let it dry. So little is left behind, you can barely see it. When I sand the filled surface smooth, nary a trace of the filled hole or defect can be seen.—R.B.

BEST DUST PICKUP

KO BA LT KO S 4 5 0 B - 03

Price: $89 | Weight: 6.5 lb | Battery: 4.0 Ah, 24 V If you’ve already invested in the Kobalt 24-volt power tool system, you can feel good adding this to your fleet. Although it’s heavy, in part due to our equipping it with a four-amp-hour battery, it packs a fair amount of sanding power. In any case, the KOS450B-03 will get you a nicely sanded sur-

face in no time. We found its dust collection to be very good, while its vibration isolation is pretty good—just not quite at the level of most of the corded models we tested. This powerful little tool sands smoothest and with the least vibration on its full-speed setting, so we recommend turning the speed dial to six and leaving it there. It’s worth mentioning that the tool isn’t available as a kit, only solo. A big deal? No. But be sure to keep that in mind when you go to buy it.

AGGRESSIVE & EFFECTIVE

M A K I TA XO B 01T

CO U R T E S Y KO B A LT; CO U R T E S Y M A K I TA

Price: $119 | Weight: 3.8 lb | Battery: 5.0 Ah, 18 V This Makita seemed as fast as the DeWalt, which is surprising given that its top speed is a full 1,000 rpm less than its little yellow competitor. Even with the big battery, it felt well-balanced, and its dust pickup is good. Downsides? The sander does have a powerful gyroscopic action that requires a slight forward bias to keep it on track. Once you get used to that, you’re good to go.

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Editors’ Choice // AWA R D-W IN NING TOOLS A N D GE A R RIGOROUSLY VETTED BY OUR TEST TE A M //

◀ Kwikset Ha lo Touch Fingerp rint Sma r t Lock

▼ Sony SRS -XB33 Ex tra Bass Por table B l uetooth Spea ker Equipped with two fullrange audio drivers and two passive radiators, the XB33 delivered detailrich sound, even when we cranked the volume. Blast tunes on the beach or in your workshop without fear of damaging the resonably priced device—it’s waterproof, dustproof, and shockproof. One more thing we love: the 24-hour battery life. $150

In this biometric age, it’s only fitting that smart locks can operate at the touch of a sensor. We like the Halo Touch deadbolt, which encrypts and stores fingerprint scans for up to 50 people locally, not in the cloud. From the Kwikset app, we easily performed functions like registering and removing fingerprints and scheduling access windows.

Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa integration allow for voice commands, too. $249

▲ Chef ’sChoice Trizor X V EdgeSelec t Model 15 Knife Sharpener The Trizor restored a razor-sharp edge to the dullest kitchen knives quickly and easily. Credit its premium diamond abrasives that chewed away blunt metal, its acute 15-degree sharpening angle, and the stropping stage that buffed out imperfections. In just nine passes, our chef’s knife cut as well as the day we got it. $160

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PH OTO G R A PH Y BY L A KOTA G A M B I LL

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Supersonic CBD Breaks the “Sleep Barrier” Clinical trials confirm: deeper, longer-lasting sleep in as little as 15 minutes after it reaches the bloodstream

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f you struggle to fall asleep and stay asleep, your prayers have been answered.

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News of this discovery is sweeping the nation as long-time sleep sufferers report finally getting the 8 hours of uninterrupted, deep sleep their bodies need to stay healthy, youthful, and energetic at any age.

Countless scientific studies have shown the crucial role sleep plays in our life.

Research suggests it can help improve heart health, reduce joint pain, boost cognitive function, decrease anxiety and mood swings, and strengthen overall health.

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DEEPER SLEEP IN MERE MINUTES Fortunately, this stunning new discovery ends this problem once and for all.

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Furthermore, unlike prescription drugs, this new compound is often well-tolerated, non-habit forming, and doesn’t even require a prescription. IMPRESSIVE CLINICAL RESULTS “In my 20-year career,” says Dr. Al Sears, The Supersonic CBD in Canna LS has shown “I’ve never seen anything quite like it. remarkable clinical results.

Supersonic CBD truly is remarkable.”

In one placebo-controlled study, the core WHY SO MUCH EXCITEMENT compound in Canna LS helped increase sleep Dr. Al Sears, M.D., is considered the leading duration, allowing participants to feel more pioneer in anti-aging medicine. He’s published rejuvenated and energized upon waking. over 500 scientific papers and is a frequent In another clinical trial, this all-natural compound guest on ABC News, CNN, Discovery, National was given to adults who reported suffering from Geographic, and many other media outlets. both anxiety and poor sleep. After the first month, Working with his team at the Sears Institute overall anxiety decreased in 79% of the adults while for Anti-Aging, Dr. Sears has formulated 66% dramatically improved sleep.

Supersonic CBD into a new, fast-acting, feelAnd in one of the largest studies of its kind, young formula called Canna LS. 2,736 men and women over the age of 65 were The results have been so incredible that Dr. gathered. They all experienced joint pain that Sears is having a hard time keeping up with the worsened their quality of life and prevented them rising demand. “We’ve sold out multiple times from doing the activities they used to enjoy. in the past and expect to sell out again soon.”

After being given this natural compound, 93.7% of the participants reported their pain was 94% OF CBD GOES TO WASTE cut in half, after only six months of treatment.

The reason most CBD oils fail to deliver Lastly, in another clinical trial, 85% of seniors results is because of the liver’s filtering system. given this powerful agent were able to soothe their “Think of it as a mesh strainer,” explains Dr. pain significantly, in only 21 days. And a third of Sears. “It catches almost everything, and only a handful of the tiny particles are able to pass them were able to soothe their joint pain completely. through.”

“Before I started Canna LS, pain from my hip In other words, almost all CBD products replacement surgery made it hard to walk for promising better sleep, mood, blood pressure, more than a few minutes. Now, I can get out of cognitive function and even pain relief, all the house and spend time with friends. I played get filtered by your liver before they can even 9 holes of golf, which I had given up after the surgery.” — Jonathan Wilson, age 73. attempt to fix the problem.

The World Health Organization recently reported only 6% of CBD ingested makes it to the bloodstream, while the other 94% goes to waste. This explains why so few people get any results from CBD oils and other alternatives.

However, since Supersonic CBD is broken down into such small particles, it’s able to bypass the liver’s filter more effectively.

“If it’s not Supersonic CBD,” says Dr. Sears, “it can’t bypass your liver, it won’t help, and frankly, it’s only wasting your money.”

Canna LS solves this problem for anyone wanting to get better sleep, while also feeling younger.

Thanks to the unique Supersonic CBD inside Canna LS, there is finally an all-natural way for anyone to get a better night’s rest, improve blood pressure, cognitive function and even soothe stiff, sore joints.

49-year-old Katherine H. reports, “I can whizz through my four-bedroom bungalow with the vacuum cleaner. I have so much more energy.”

“It has helped my lower back pain and overall I am just better!” says Kenneth O., a man from Troutdale, Oregon who’s tried various CBD oils without success, prior to Canna LS.

HOW TO GET CANNA LS This is the official nation-wide release of Canna LS in the United States. As a result, the company is offering a special discount to anyone who calls.An Order Hotline has been set up for local readers to call. This gives everyone an equal chance to try this powerful pain-reliever for themselves. All you have to do is call TOLL FREE 1-866-256-2857 right now. Then, provide the operator with this exclusive discount approval code: PME0821CAN. The company will do the rest.

It’s called Supersonic CBD and it works in a remarkable new way.

By shrinking the CBD particles and making them 10,000 times smaller than normal, this new form of CBD oil can do what no other oil can — bypass the liver’s rigorous filter up to 450% more effectively, which leads to greater benefits.

Important: Due to the recent media exposure This explains why, unlike ordinary CBD, “Many of my patients report feeling more of Canna LS, phone lines are often busy. If Supersonic CBD is able to help deliver uninterrupted, deeper sleep, along with a energized after only a few weeks of using Canna your call doesn’t go through, please try again smorgasbord of other health benefits. because this product is worth having LS,” says Dr. Sears.

THESE STATEMENTS HAVE NOT BEEN EVALUATED BY THE FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION. THIS PRODUCT IS NOT INTENDED TO DIAGNOSE, TREAT, CURE OR PREVENT ANY DISEASE. RESULTS MAY VARY THE VIEWS AND OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN THIS ADVERTISEMENT ARE THOSE OF THE ADVERTISER AND DO NOT REFLECT THE OPINIONS, POLICY OR POSITION OF THIS NEWSPAPER OR ITS PARENT COMPANIES OR AFFILIATES. THIS PRODUCT IS NOT INTENDED FOR USE BY INDIVIDUALS UNDER THE AGE OF 18. OFFER NOT AVAILABLE TO RESIDENTS OF ID, IA, MI, MO, NE, NC, SD

We put the latest tools, outdoor gear, and tech through the wringer every day in the Pop Mech Test Zone. Only the best of the best earn the Editors’ Choice Award. Every product here has been thoroughly evaluated by our team, and each offers exceptional performance, durability, value, or innovation—or a combination of all those traits. This is the stuff that makes every project or adventure easier and more enjoyable.

▶ Stih l B R 80 0 C- E Ma gn um Leaf B lower Gas power makes the Magnum a heavy, loud, air-moving monster. Firing up the engine while the blower was on our back was simple, thanks to the spring-loaded starting mechanism on the side. Once it was running, we took an anemometer and measured its airspeed at 195.6 mph. That’s powerful enough to skim a 4.6-pound brick over pavement like a hockey puck, if you were wondering. $650

▲ Ego Power+ Selec t Cut XP Self- Propelled M ower The Select Cut is the first cordless mower designed with three interchangeable lower blades. Maximize mulching, bagging, or run time by affixing the corresponding blade, then get cutting. In our test, the mulching blade gave a quality trim to 8,280 square feet before the 10-Ah battery died. The sophisticated machine also boasts a variable rear-wheel drive speed from 0.9 to 3.1 mph and a lever to adjust the height of the 21-inch deck. $750 for mower, battery, and charger

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ADVERTISEMENT Karen James is a noted journalist and expert in sex and relationships.

Ask The Expert

Love, Marriage, and

Sex After 50!

The Amazing Sex Secret Of A 78 Year-Old ‘Italian Stallion!’

A Secret Any Man Can Use…

This month I got a letter from a reader in Texas about a “little secret” that has renewed her sex life with her husband!

Tina writes: Dear Karen, For years my husband and I had a wonderful love life, but when he reached his 50s, he lost some of his old spark, especially in the bedroom.

He tried every product available, but nothing worked. For the past few years, it’s felt like we were roommates, not husband and wife.

Well, last month he came home from a business trip in Europe and shocked me with more energy and passion than he’s had in years. He took me in the bedroom like we were newlyweds and gave me a night I’ll never forget. It was just incredible, and our love life has been like that ever since. So here we are, closer than ever and enjoying the best sex of our lives… in our 50’s!

On his trip, my husband stayed in a hotel room next to an Italian nutritionist and his wife and heard them passionately making love every night. He figured they must be in their twenties, but one morning he encountered them in the hallway and it turns out, they were in their 70s!

“My husband shocked me with more passion than he’s had in years. He took me in the bedroom like we were newlyweds and gave me a night I’ll never forget!”

Karen, my husband has been taking one tablet each morning with breakfast, but the pack is almost empty and we both desperately want more. Do you know about these European tablets and how to get some in the States?

Sincerely, Tina D., Fort Worth, TX

Tina, you’re in luck, I do know about them. Ever wonder why older men from Italy and all over Europe are famous for staying energized, passionate, and sexually active well into their golden Instead of being embarrassed that they’d years? For decades, these men have been found out, they were positively relied on a unique blossom seed glowing and happy to share their “secret.” extract to enhance their bedroom The man pulled out a small pack from his power and performance. satchel, gave it to my husband and said Milled on the fertile northern plains, ‘’These tablets come from a small town and sold under the brand name up north and are made from naturally pure extracts, packed with densely Provarin, these pure plant extracts rich sexual nutrients. They will give you have a legendary reputation throughout powerful erections and you will perform Europe for naturally fueling extremely in the bedroom even better than you did hard erections. As Giovanni from Milan as a young man. Then he laughed and put it, “It’s like bedroom rocket fuel said, “You will become an Italian Stallion, especially for us older guys!” like me!”

All-natural and safe to take, Provarin is a well-kept secret for those in the know.

An old-school, family business, they still harvest product by hand and don’t do any advertising. Long-time customers and word of mouth ensures their limited stock is sold out every year.

They do have a distributor here in the U.S. and Provarin is surprisingly inexpensive. A spokesman told me they were proud to produce the highest quality product for men and couples.

He went on to say that if any of my readers call and mention this article, they’ll get a special one time doublediscount, plus free shipping and a bonus pack of 30 tablets free!

Wow, so there you go, Tina - and the rest of you readers! The offer is only good while supplies last so give them a call today. The number is 1-800-585-8503.

Aren’t you glad you asked?

Karen

These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Dramatic portrayal. Results atypical. Your results may vary. In order to assure confidentiality, identifying details, scenarios have been changed, modified or fictionalized. Always consult your health care provider before taking any supplement. Offer not available to Iowa residents.

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Home // BY BR A D FOR D //

PopMech’s Guide to Garbage Disposals

T

Mounting plates/clamp—The plates slip over the drainpipe from under the sink and are held in place with a snap ring. Once installed, the screws are tightened, applying pressure against the bottom of the sink.

Disposal union/ connector— Half of this union is attached to the disposal, the other half is attached to the mounting plates.

When joined, they pull the disposal tightly against the drainpipe, creating a watertight seal.

HE TERM “GARBAGE

disposal” is in fact a bit of a misnomer. If you’ve ever had one, you already know that you can’t run random trash through it. It’s really designed to grind up and dispose of food waste—leftovers that would be otherwise compostable, with the exception of bones. What makes a good disposal, which features should you look for, and how much should you spend? We’ve put together this explainer to share what we’ve learned through our years of testing disposals to help answer these questions about this sometimes overlooked (but extremely handy) appliance.

Grind ring— A stationary metal ring around the inside circumference of the grind chamber.

The surface of the ring has grooves, ridges, serrations, or perforations so that waste pushed against it gets torn apart.

Impeller arm— An articulated metal paddle attached to the impeller plate that swings outward, forcing waste against the grind ring.

A LOOK AT THE GUTS

While there are some variations from manufacturer to manufacturer, these are the basic parts and functions of a garbage disposal.

Discharge—Where water and waste exit the disposal and enter a home’s wastewater pipes.

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Electric motor—Spins the impeller.

Impeller plate— A metal disc within the grind ring that spins, throwing waste into the path of the impeller arms.

THINGS TO CONSIDER WHEN BUYING Continuous vs. Batch Feed ▶ The former kind of disposal can take food waste passing through the drain and into the grinding chamber continuously, as the name says. Their operation is controlled solely by a remote switch.

Batch-feed disposals will operate only with the drain cover in place. You can’t put additional waste in unless the drain cover is removed and the disposal is off.

While these may be less convenient and slower, the safety advantages of not being able to reach in while the disposal is running are clear.

CO U R T E S Y I N S I N K E R ATO R (C U TAWAY ) ; L A KOTA G A M B I L L

Horsepower ▶ Disposals are typically available with 1⁄4 -, ½-, ¾-, and 1-horsepower motors. More horsepower generally indicates more robust grinding. Some manufacturers suggest power that corresponds to the number of people in the family and how much action the disposal will see. Smaller families (one to three people) and infrequent use would need something in the lower range, and larger families that use a disposal more often should opt for something on the higher end. Regard-

less of family size, the number is also worth keeping in mind because disposals with more horsepower have stronger components and may last longer.

Noise ▶ Grinding noise and vibration are some of the biggest concerns people have with garbage disposals. The appliances usually connect to the sink with a heavy rubber gasket or union that helps reduce vibration. More expensive units may be enclosed in a cover filled with sound-deadening insulation.

GET RID OF THAT STINK IN THE SINK All kinds of things can pass through a typical disposal, from scraps fresh from the dinner table to unidentifiable leftovers that have escaped detection for weeks— months?—in the back of the fridge. It should be no surprise, then, if you occasionally smell a persistent,

Electrical Connections ▶ New disposals may come pre-wired with a power cord and a plug, with a cord and a plug you have to wire, or with no cord at all— the latter two being options to replace an older, hardwired unit. The remote switch that controls the disposal will need to be within reach of the sink. If you’re installing a disposal where there wasn’t one previously, you’ll need to run power to both that switch and an outlet installed in the sink cabinet for the disposal’s plug.

unpleasant odor emanating from the sink drain.

There are numerous solutions for this problem, but here’s the one we’ve found to be most reliable: equal parts baking soda and distilled vinegar.

With the water and the disposal off, take about half a cup of baking soda and dump it into the disposal. Then pour about a half a cup of vinegar in on top of it. Let the mixture sit for about five minutes, turn the water on, then

turn the disposal on for a few seconds, and turn everything off as you normally would.

Why it works: When vinegar (which contains acetic acid) and baking soda (also known as sodium bicarbonate) are combined, a reaction starts, creating carbonic acid—this reaction is what does the cleaning. Once the reaction stops, it leaves behind water containing sodium acetate, a type of salt.

July/August 2021

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Home

GAUGING SOUND LEVELS How loud (or not) disposals are can impact their appeal. If you’re grinding up scraps from a large dinner, having one whirring on and off for a long time can be a pain. So we recorded the sound levels of each model we tested while disposing of half ears of raw corn. We aimed a meter, which logged one sound level reading per second, at the drain, about six inches from the rim of our test sink. And we started recording sound levels with the water turned on to get a stable level, then flipped the disposal on until the sound returned to a steady level again, indicating it had finished grinding up the corncob.

For the graph below, we clipped the beginning and end of the data to just show the time spent with the disposals grinding down the corn. Finally, we took note of the peak sound level for each model.

Waste King L-8000TC

Whirlaway 291PC

InSinkErator Evolution Pro 750

InSinkErator Evolution Excel

DECIBELS

100

75

50

25

10

20

30

40

50

1:00

1:10

1:18

SOME NOTEWORTHY RESULTS AND INSIGHTS

Waste King L-8000TC: You can see where we had to cycle the disposal on and off to dislodge the corncob that was caught up on the impeller. At the 30-second mark, the steady sound level is where we removed the batch-feed drain cover to look and see if the corn was done. / Whirlaway 291PC: The Whirlaway dispatched the corn in 26 seconds, but not without its half a horsepower working hard for it; the sound level was consistently above 90 decibels for the first 15 seconds. / InSinkErator Evolution Pro 750: This graph represents as close to optimal performance as you’ll find in a garbage disposal, with a peak in noise at five seconds followed by a lower, relatively steady level around 80 decibels. / InSinkErator Evolution Excel: The quietest model here peaked after five seconds, at a relatively low 85.7 decibels. Dips at 8, 12, 17, 22, and 28 seconds show where we cycled the Excel on and off to keep grinding up the corncob.

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L A KOTA G A M B I L L (S O U N D)

TIME

CO U R T E S Y I N S I N K E R ATO R (P R O 7 5 0 , E XC E L ) ; CO U R T E S Y WA S T E K I N G ; CO U R T E S Y W H I R L AWAY

FROM OUR TESTING

We installed each disposal under the same sink. We then fed carrots, celery, baked beans, chicken bones, and corn on the cob through them and diverted the waste onto a screen for inspection.

EDITORS’ CHOICE

QUIETEST

SAFEST

BEST VALUE

I N S I N K E R ATO R E VO LU T I O N PR O 75 0

I N S I N K E R ATO R E VO LU T I O N E XC E L

WA ST E K I N G L- 8 0 0 0 TC

W H I R L AWAY 2 91 P C

Price: $275 / Horsepower: ¾ / RPM: 1,725 / Feed: Continuous / Sink flange: Stainless steel / Grind components: Stainless steel / Peak decibels: 91.9

Price: $400 / Horsepower: 1 / RPM: 1,725 / Feed: Continuous / Sink flange: Stainless steel / Grind components: Stainless steel / Peak decibels: 85.7

Price: $217 / Horsepower: 1 / RPM: 2,800 / Feed: Batch / Sink flange: Stainless-steel over glass-filled nylon / Grind components: Stainless steel / Peak decibels: 91.9

Price: $124 / Horsepower: ½ / RPM: 2,600 / Feed: Continuous / Sink flange: Stainless steel over glass-filled nylon / Grind components: Galvanized steel / Peak decibels: 96

The Evolution Pro 750 is a compact model, and the shortest of all we tested, meaning there will be plenty of room under it for spray bottles and cleaners.

Despite its smaller size, it boasts many quality features, like stainless-steel grinding components and sound-dampening insulation.

All told, this disposal took about 15 minutes for us to install. The stainless-steel sink drain mounted fairly easily, as its Quick-Lock name implied.

The Evolution Pro took everything in our food waste medley in stride and ground the baked beans, raw carrots, and celery to an average particle size. Chicken bones seemed to grind a little coarser than with some of the other models. Still, the Evolution Pro does a good job balancing speed, noise, capability, and build quality.

The Evolution Excel produced the least noise by far, lending credence to InSinkErator’s claim that it’s the “quietest on the market.” This is due in part to the rubber-sheathed discharge pipe and top mount that prevent vibrations from rippling through to the sink or plumbing. Additionally, the stainless-steel cover houses sound insulation between it and the grind chamber.

Baked beans, raw carrots, celery, and chicken bones came out very fine and passed through the disposal and P-trap easily. At one point, we had a corncob get caught on the impeller and then just spin with it—we had to pulse the disposal on and off a couple of times to dislodge it.

The Evolution Excel is expensive, to be sure, but the quality materials and relatively quiet operation mean you’re getting what you pay for.

With one horsepower, Waste King’s L-8000TC is one of the larger disposals available, in both power and size. It also differs from the majority in that it is batch-feed; the drain cover, when pushed down, activates the disposal.

The L-8000TC eviscerated the beans, carrots, and celery.

The larger raw corncobs took longer than with other disposals, sometimes hanging up on the impeller without grinding. Dislodging a cob was made more difficult by having to press down on the drain cover to activate the processing switch. But we’ll reiterate the safety aspect of this—it’s awfully tempting to reach in and grab the stubby cob. And to do that with the L-8000TC, the drain cover—and therefore the disposal—has to be off. So in the end, you’re sacrificing some convenience for safety.

The 291PC is the least expensive unit we tested. It also has the smallest motor. But that’s not bad, as the trade-offs are what make it a great value.

This Whirlaway shares the same EZ-mount as the Waste King, making it straightforward to install without tools, and it also comes with a corded plug. Installation took us only about 10 minutes.

Carrots, baked beans, and celery went right through the Whirlaway, and the food particles were reasonably fine and uniform. The corncobs were surprising, as this unit ground them up in about 30 seconds, on par with the more powerful disposals. And bones were diced up finely. Grinding was a bit louder, though.

While it’s inexpensive, the 291PC can handle many of the same foods as the more powerful garbage disposals at a mere third of the price.

July/August 2021

83

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16 // ALE X CA RLETON, CHIEF CRE ATI VE OFFICER AT FILSON, 51, SE ATTLE, WASHINGTON //

Watch the complete MADE HERE video series on YouTube.

F

MADE HERE

I L S O N I S , A N D A LWAY S

has been, a workwear brand.

It outfitted folks seeking treasure in the Klondike Gold Rush, and we continue to equip loggers, hunters, explorers, and others today.

We prioritize function and purpose.

Style is the byproduct of gear that’s really made for the outdoors.

Our signature products include the rugged twill duffel bags and Mackinaw Cruiser wool jacket. Our rugged twill is 100 percent cotton and constructed from 2- and 3-ply yarn sewn in a diagonal weave that enhances the yarn’s density and tear strength. Our Cruiser jacket is 100 percent virgin wool, which is fleece shorn directly from sheep and spun into sturdy yarn.

We manufacture in our headquarters, so we have eyes on the entire production process. I’m very committed to preserving the heritage and tradition of American manufacturing here in Seattle.

So many people have a Filson story—our wool coat helped one customer survive hypothermia after a severe plane crash in Alaska. Over 124 years, we’ve maintained a core sense of quality. Filson blows in the face of trend and has every possibility of being around for another century.

The Cruiser jacket is cut from 24-ounce Mackinaw wool, the ideal fabric weight for warmth and weather protection. The Filson label, pockets, and pocket flaps are sewn onto the body of the garment. Next, the sleeves, front, and back pieces are attached. The collar, cuffs, hem, buttons, and buttonholes are stitched on—most parts are affixed with double-needle stitching, which optimizes fabric’s flexibility and durability.

Snaps are set, then it’s pressed and inspected.—Jaron Danioth, Plant Manager for Apparel

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July/August 2021

C U R R A N F E R R E Y/ P O P M E C H V I D E O

HOW IT’S DONE

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