This week’s breakthroughs
Tech
Optical computing: Large-scale programmable logic array achieves complex computations by using parallel spectrum modulation to achieve an 8-input system, significantly expanding the capabilities of optical logic operations– the first time such a complex model has been executed on an optical platform without relying on electronic components for nonlinear computing.
Health Tech:
Shanghai doctors implanted a deep brain stimulator to control the symptoms of Meige syndrome. The patient, whose eyes, closed due to the disease for years, opened and her jaw, which had been spasming uncontrollably, returned to normal. DBS can treat epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, significant depression, and other disorders by electrically activating or inhibiting neuron signals.
Spinal Cord Injuries: a new device helps paralyzed patients walk again. The inventors have open-sourced the data and 3D models of spinal nerve roots and will conduct the first clinical test by year-end. The study was published in the journal Scientific Data.
Autoimmune Diseases: the world’s first remission in patients with autoimmune disorders ( severe myositis and systemic sclerosis) using bioengineered donor-derived immune cells, raising hopes for mass production of cutting-edge CAR-T therapies.
AIDS: Scientists have found a highly potent HIV-1 antibody, originally isolated from an immunized alpaca; the engineered nanobodies can achieve 100% inhibition against live HIV-1 and have a low risk of drug resistance.
Monogenic Diseases: The world’s first IVF baby screened through a whole genome amplification method turned 10 years old in September. The method, MALBAC, has given about 6,000 families healthy newborns by accurately screening for 1,200 kinds of monogenic diseases.
The reusable Haolong cargo droneship can be launched by a carrier rocket, dock with the space station, then automatically de-orbit and re-enter the atmosphere before landing horizontally on an airport runway.
More uses for last week’s Geiger counter-on-a-chip:
Smartphones could detect radiation levels.
Drones for environmental monitoring, particularly in areas with radiation risks.
Healthcare Devices to monitor radiation exposure during X-rays or cancer therapies.
Smart Home Systems to detect radiation from appliances or building materials.
Industrial Applications to ensure compliance with safety regulations.
The Biden chip war solved an internal coordination problem for PRC semiconductor process companies and stimulated rapid progress under the assumption that the PRC had to indigenize the entire supply chain – i.e., eliminate risk from firms subject to US sanctions.
The only serious competition for PRC leading edge fabrication is from TSMC. No US or EU players in this space. Intel struggles to stay relevant. A flood of Chinese legacy chips threatens to run Western competitors out of business.
China has no issues securing power infrastructure or datacenter capacity. There are numerous multi-gigawatt substations that can be converted from aluminum mills to data centers in 6 months.
Huawei has been relying on SMIC to produce their domestic AI chip and they have run tens of thousands of N+2 (~7nm) and N+3 (~6nm) wafers on their domestic SMIC process nodes. Huawei will spend $7.3B on foreign wafer fab equipment in 2024. Including SMIC and CXMT (which work closely with Huawei), makes them the 2nd largest purchaser in the world behind TSMC, and far ahead of any US firm. More than half of this equipment currently comes from US companies.
Chinese systems took the top five places, with Huawei’s Wenjie M9 first and Tesla’s FSD tenth. China is leading in AI cars and America is leading in useless Generative AI.
Chinese scientists presented a design blueprint to help the world fend off potential attacks from quantum computers that could break traditional communication encryption methods. The design, presented at a major international conference on telecoms standards in Sweden, was unanimously approved.
Largest U.S. Drone Manufacturer Says It Will Need To Ration Batteries For
The content below was originally paywalled.
Customers After Sanctions By China. The sanctions specifically prevent Chinese companies from providing critical components to Skydio, including crucial battery supplies. The company has previously delivered over 1,000 drones to Ukraine.“This is an attempt to eliminate the leading American drone company and deepen the world’s dependence on Chinese drone suppliers,” CEO Adam Bry lamented.
Geologists found a huge manganese deposit in central China, with its overall potential reserve estimated to exceed 200 million tonnes after finding 84 million tonnes of manganese ore in Hunan Province. China imports millions of tonnes of manganese annually.
Economy
Above: instead of customs value, examine actual fund flows, which is the ultimate objective of measuring trade. China switches from being a net exporter of $31 billion worth of iPhones to an importer of $22 billion of parts and iPhones–a $53 billion distortion for a single product from just one company. Glenn Luk.
The economy of the West hinges on the illusion of USD paper promises and buttressing monopolistic corporate giants. China’s economy emphasizes the ability to make tangible things inexpensively to improve people’s lives. American dollar-denominated GDP is excellent for measuring the former, not necessarily the latter.
China’s State-led Economic Development:
What is absolutely clear today is that the capitalist market economy and free-market ideology, which dominated the past 40 years, have lost much of their former appeal. Even the United States has undergone significant self-reflection. The future economic model will be entirely determined by the level of productivity.
This new wave of productivity growth and technological progress could potentially replace many jobs, so the ultimate economic question may become one of distribution: as more people find themselves without work, they may need to rely on the government’s universal basic income (UBI) for survival. This future may arrive sooner than expected. Concepts like UBI, once regarded with disbelief when first introduced in the 1980s, have gained serious attention from many countries in recent years. Lan Xiaohuan
The first freight train left Nantong, China, for Afghanistan with 50 containers loaded with electrical goods and equipment, and is expected to reach Hairatan Port, Afghanistan in 20 days.
In 2011, 15% of Chinese said they would prefer Chinese over foreign brands; in 2020, 85% said they would prefer Chinese products. Since 2016, the U.S. has imposed thousands of sanctions and other “penalties” against China and 70 Chinese technology companies, entire regions and hundreds of government officials.
