To date, 12 astronauts have walked on the lunar surface. While nobody has set foot on its surface since 1972, plans are in place to return people to the Moon soon. In order to increase our knowledge of the Moon and carry out experiments on its surface, people and machinery first need to be delivered there by lunar landers. One of these currently under development is the Blue Moon lander, created by privately funded aerospace producer Blue Origin. The company, which also focuses on space tourism, is owned by Jeff Bezos. Blue Moon wasn’t selected for NASA’s Artemis Moon missions, but Blue Origin hopes to use the lunar lander in future missions to achieve a sustained human presence in space.

The Blue Moon lander, which entered development in 2016, uses autonomous technology to land with high precision. Equipped with LIDAR (light detection and ranging) sensors, Blue Origin claims that its craft is guaranteed to land within 23 metres of the preplanned landing site. It scans the Moon by firing laser beams (激光束) at the surface to create a computerised image of the terrain (地形), which can prevent the lander from falling into danger and allows the flattest nearby surface to be chosen.

When in lunar orbit, the lander can release microsatellites into space. Once on the Moon, the lander will release other devices, such as rovers, from its top deck. The equipment that’s attached to the lander can be changed based on specific mission requirements. For Blue Moon landers with a human crew — and those returning equipment and lunar samples to Earth — a mounting capsule can be added. This launches from the Moon to travel back to Earth.

Faced with greater competition, movie theaters have tried various experiments to upgrade the cinematic experience, including bigger and brighter screens and shaking seats. But a major challenge for exhibitors is to make the experience more attractive without depending on tricks.

One local theater, Regal L. A. Live, is experimenting with an idea that managers say strikes the right balance between so-called upgrade and sensory overload. The downtown L. A. theater plans to introduce Immersive Cinema Experience known as ICE technology in one of its auditoriums (礼堂) this fall.

The 190-seat auditorium will feature a traditional screen at the front, like any other theater. But the audience will also have five LED screens on both sides that will flood moviegoers’ peripheral (周边的) vision with lights and colors based on what’s playing on the main screen. For example, if you’re watching a scene that takes place in the African desert, the LED might shower the audience with enveloping colors of sky-blue, sun-like yellow sand. But importantly, viewers won’t have to turn their necks to catch any additional onscreen action. “When you’re watching the movie, you actually feel very absorbed in the film,” said Shelby Russell, a manager at L. A. Live. “It strengthens the mood of each of the scenes.”

Regal L. A. Live will be the first U.S theater to employ the technology. Managers did not say how much tickets would cost, but like other previous formats such as Imax, they will be more expensive than standard admission.

Other cinemas have tried to introduce some other formats as theaters face growing threats from popular media. Results have been mixed, though. 4DX, which uses seat movements, water and scent effects, operates in more than 620 theaters around the world. On the other hand, Barco Escape, a once promising idea for a three-screen theatrical design, failed to catch on. Shelby said the success of ICE theaters in France, where it competes with Imax, indicated well for its U.S. expansion. “The problem with other formats is that they distract the moviegoer from the film,” Shelby said. “ICE appeals to a very large audience.”

If you’re short of money and don’t mind selling the rights to your face, you can make £100,000 by licensing (准许) your face to a robotics company.

According to a blog post by a London-based engineering company Geomiq, a robotics company is looking for a “kind and friendly” face to put on a human-like robot once it goes into production. This will probably need using this person’s face on thousands of robots around the world, so the company is willing to pay no less than £100,000 in licensing fees. The robot in question is designed to be a “friend” for elderly people, and is scheduled to go into production this year.

Geomiq is not free to give too much information about the robotics company or its project, because of a non-disclosure agreement they’ve signed with the designer and his financial backers. “We know that this is an extremely special request, and signing over the licenses to your face is probably an extremely big decision,” Geomiq said, adding that interested people can send a photo of themselves by email.

The robotics company has reportedly been working on this human-like robot for five years, and because of the secretive nature of the project, anonymity (匿名) is of great importance. However, interested people with the right kind of face chosen for the “next stage” will be given full details on the project.

The search for a suitable face to be used has met with mixed responses from the public. Some of them say that the company should create a false face using information from data sets (数据集) that have over 100,000 realistic but not actually real faces, much like the famous human-like robot, Sophia. However, others think here is a chance of seeing robots as an important source of income.