3D electronics are one of the current goals in the technology industries. But 3D objects take up a lot of space, especially in transport or storage situations where volume is money. So flatpacking is the answer – and what better way to avoid the need for complex instructions and tools at the assembly end than making circuits that fold themselves together when hot water is poured on them? The current implementation is simple, but it should scale down to nanotech sizes without too much trouble.

There’s a certain jealousy over in Europe – where are our space tourism start-ups? Looks like the ESA is going to look into ways to kickstart an industry in its own backyard. Which is good news for me – I don’t want to have to travel half the circumference of the planet before I can take a jaunt into orbit!

From a blogging Brit to the United States, I wish you a very happy 4th of July – and it looks like you got what I would consider the best celebratory rocket launch you could have wished for. May there be plenty more like it.

Call Steve McQueen; we’ve found an anomolous blob! No need for him to hurry though, as it’s nearly 12 billion lightyears away, and probably means us no harm. The blob in question (like the few others we’ve spotted) is a cosmological mystery, but new theories suggest it might be a galaxy in the early throes of formation, at a stage where gasses fall into a huge lump of dark matter.