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'Reverse Solar Panel' Generates Electricity at Night

Slashdot.org - Sat, 01/31/2026 - 02:00
Researchers at the University of New South Wales are developing a "reverse solar panel" that generates small amounts of electricity at night by harvesting infrared heat radiated from Earth. "In the past, scientists have demonstrated that a 'thermoradiative diode' can convert infrared radiation directly into electricity; when used to convert heat from Earth, they exploit the temperature difference between Earth and the night sky, generating a current directly from heat," notes ExtremeTech. "This approach completely eliminates the need for heat to generate steam, though the resulting capacity is fairly low." From the report: The researchers estimate they could generate only about a watt per square meter, which isn't much. One reason for the low output is that the Earth's atmosphere lessens the heat differential that drives the generative process; in space, though, that's not an issue. Now, researchers believe that the ability to generate power in the moments between direct sunlight could help power satellites. That could be especially true in deep space, where periods without sunlight can be longer, and sunlight is often weaker; in these situations, losing electricity to heat loss is unacceptable. Many satellites already use heat to generate electricity, though with a much more rarified "thermoelectric generator" that uses rare, expensive materials like plutonium to create heat. With thermoradiative diodes, the heat source can be the Sun-warmed body of the satellite itself.

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UK's First Rapid-Charging Battery Train Ready For Boarding

Slashdot.org - Fri, 01/30/2026 - 22:30
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Guardian: The UK's first superfast-charging train running only on battery power will come into passenger service this weekend -- operating a five-mile return route in west London. Great Western Railway (GWR) will send the converted London Underground train out from 5.30am to cover the full Saturday timetable on the West Ealing to Greenford branch line, four stops and 12 minutes each way, and now carrying up to 273 passengers, should its celebrity stoke up the demand. The battery will recharge in just three and a half minutes back at West Ealing station between trips, using a 2,000kW charger connected to a few meters of rail that only becomes live when the train stops directly overhead. There are hopes within government and industry that this technology could one day replace diesel trains on routes that have proved difficult or expensive to electrify with overhead wires, as the decarbonization of rail continues. The train has proved itself capable of going more than 200 miles on a single charge -- last year setting a world record for the farthest travelled by a battery-electric train, smashing a German record set in 2021. The GWR train and the fast-charge technology has been trialled on the 2.5-mile line since early 2024, but has not yet carried paying passengers.

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Linux Gaming Developers Join Forces To Form the Open Gaming Collective

Linux.Slashdot.org - Thu, 01/29/2026 - 19:45
A group of Linux gaming-focused distros and developers have formed the Open Gaming Collective to pool work on shared components like kernels, input systems, and Valve tooling. The Verge reports: Universal Blue, developer of the gaming-focused Linux distribution Bazzite, announced on Wednesday that its helping to form the OGC with several other groups, which will collaborate on improvements to the Linux gaming ecosystem and âoecentralize efforts around critical components like kernel patches, input tooling, and essential gaming packages such as gamescope." The other founding members of the OGC include Nobara, ChimeraOS, Playtron, Fyra Labs, PikaOS, ShadowBlip, and Asus Linux. [...] It's worth noting that this will mean some changes to Bazzite, which is switching to the OGC kernel, replacing HHD with InputPlumber as its input framework, and integrating features like RGB and fan control into the Steam UI. Bazzite also added that, "We'll be sharing patches we've made to various Valve packages with the OGC and attempting to upstream everything we can."

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Categories: Linux

Nvidia GeForce NOW Is Now Available Natively On Linux

Linux.Slashdot.org - Thu, 01/29/2026 - 17:40
NVIDIA has officially launched a native GeForce NOW client for Linux as a Flatpak, giving Linux gamers access to cloud-rendered RTX gaming. Phoronix reports: While confined to a Flatpak, for now NVIDIA is just "officially" supporting it on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS and later. Granted, thanks to Flatpak it should run on other non-Ubuntu distributions too but in terms of the official support and where they are qualifying their builds they are limiting it just to Ubuntu 24.04 LTS and later. [...] At launch the Flatpak build is also just for x86_64 Linux with no AArch64 Linux builds or similar at this time. Running GeForce NOW on Linux while games are rendered in NVIDIA's cloud with Blackwell GPUs, you still need to be using a modern GPU with H.264 or H.265 Vulkan Video support NVIDIA isn't yet supporting Vulkan Video AV1 with GeForce NOW on Linux but just H.264/H.265. If you are using NVIDIA graphics the NVIDIA R580 series or newer is recommended while using the X.Org session. If you are using Intel or AMD Radeon graphics, Mesa 24.2+ is recommended and using the Wayland session. When you are up and running with GeForce NOW on Linux, you have access to over 4,500 games. The free tier of GeForce NOW provides standard access to the gaming servers and limited session caps for an introductory-level experience. It's with the performance tier where you can enjoy RTX ray-tracing and 1440p @ 60 FPS performance and up to six hour sessions. With GeForce NOW's Ultimate tier is where you are running on GeForce RTX 5080 GPU servers with support for up to 5K @ 120 FPS gaming or 1080p @ 360 FPS with up to eight hour gaming sessions in length.

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Categories: Linux

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