The company Anovos used 3D Systems scanners and printers to bring to life the classic villain of the Star Wars universe. “We’re the Star Wars 3D-printing company of choice,” Karl Meyer tells us, Vice President of Entertainment with 3D Systems. “We’re the first group to take 3D scanning and 3D printing on set to create visual effects, models and consumer products.” Meyer goes on further to say they’re involvement with Star Wars latest film, The Force Awakens, “There’s a lot that goes into making the stormtrooper outfits seen in the movie....

Popular Science tracked down ground-breaking startups at the Kairos Global Summit. Check out our complete coverage here. You can hear more from Katie on her podcast.

In Rock, Paper, Scissors: Game Theory in Everyday Life, physicist Len Fisher points out that putting yourself in your opponent’s mindset is a key to success in the game. It’s all part of game theory, which has to do with everyday strategies and commonplace interactions — and not just those designed for winning at Monopoly or trapping wild elk, as it may sound. Fisher, a visiting research fellow in physics at the University of Bristol and author of several science books for lay audiences, argues that a teaspoon of this sort of thinking can illuminate a range of human behaviors....

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters on Thursday that there were no plans to shoot the rocket down, which would result in even more debris, according to CBS News. What is this debris from? The massive piece of space junk is a part of China’s Long March 5B rocket—the country’s largest—which was launched last week to carry the core module of China’s new space station, named Tianhe. According to The New York Times, most space launches like this one have these giant leftover pieces fall back to Earth immediately after launch, and are equipped with extra fuel to help guide them on their planned trajectory back to the ground....

The handheld blower weighs only 8.6 pounds, is 17.3-inches long, and can blow speeds up to 170 mph with the included taper nozzle. The tool uses a 1.13-horsepower, low-emission engine. You’ll produce fewer fumes without losing much engine power. The blower has a larger, finger-controlled throttle that makes it easier to use with one hand. It comes with a seven-year warranty so you can be sure you can stick it to those pesky leaves for a couple seasons....

Although the FAA states the software glitch occurred early Wednesday, travelers have said that the problems began sometime Tuesday evening. “We were told that there was an outage that happened at 7 p.m. yesterday and they were trying to fix it then. It apparently worsened this morning,” one passenger told NBC News today. As of writing, the aviation tracking website FlightAware lists over 6,700 delays within, into, and out of the US, alongside around another 2,400 cancellations....

When their autopsies came back negative for any known underlying cause of death, the local Medical Examiner’s office reached out to the Windland Smith Rice Sudden Death Genomics Laboratory, a specialized lab at the Mayo Clinic that investigates exactly these types of unexpected deaths. Even they couldn’t figure out what exactly happened. But in the intervening 15-odd years, a lot has changed technologically. So when two other siblings died more recently, the Mayo Clinic had better tools at their disposal....

And that’s not the only place where creativity is trending. A 2018 McKinsey Global Institute study found that by 2030, the demand for creativity and other higher cognitive skills in the American workforce will rise by 19 percent. But can such an abstract concept be quantified in a workforce, let alone in an individual? According to behavioral science, it can. Jay Olson, a postdoctoral scholar of psychology at McGill University in Canada, helped create a simple creativity test that asks participants to name 10 unrelated nouns....

Vaccines have been crucial to quelling the COVID-19 pandemic—and that’s an understatement. The billions of dollars put into Operation Warp Speed, along with other investments made by private pharmaceutical companies, to develop the vaccines will continue to save lives as cases of COVID-19 lower. But the crux of vaccines’ effectiveness is that the innoculations prevent people from getting a bad infection to begin with. There are far fewer viable medications available that successfully treat COVID-19 once the disease develops....

This article was originally published in the July/August 2016 issue of Popular Science, under the title “A Theme Park For Disaster Junkies.”

Although monkeypox can be a potentially fatal illness—up to a tenth of monkeypox cases in humans are fatal, according to the World Health Organization—the Maryland Department of Health says the infected individual has mild symptoms. The agency also says that “no special precautions are recommended at this time for the general public.” The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is working with international health agencies, the airline that carried the traveler, and state and local health officials to track anyone who may have been exposed to the virus....

Both half-meter resolution images were snapped from space by the GeoEye-1 satellite, which also took those fantastic pics of the National Mall on Inauguration Day. First, the Great Pyramid in Giza, Egypt, the tomb constructed around 1560 BC for the Fourth dynasty King Khufu. Sitting just in front of the Great Pyramid is the Great Sphinx of Giza. Built a few decades later, it is the world’s oldest known monumental sculpture....

Now, researchers from the Future Interfaces Group at Carnegie Mellon University have developed an add-on mouth haptics device that can be attached to the bottom of a VR headset. Their paper on the tech is being presented at the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in New Orleans this week. Their system can allow users wearing VR goggles to experience what it might feel like to drink water from a fountain, or have a spider running on their face....

The HyperDrift keyboard debuted on the previous Predator Helios model, which got some considerable hardware updates today. In its standard position, the keyboard looks as you’d expect. Sliding it toward you, however, moves the wrist rests and touchpad into an angled position and reveals a glass panel under which the cooling system resides. The whole computer is built with gamers in mind, so it’s laden with RGB lighting and the WASD keys (which gamers used to move their characters around on-screen) employ a different kind of switch underneath....

Let’s take a look at a three of these more hardcore mapping services, from the US Geological Survey’s LandSat, a commercial outfit called Planet Labs, and Google too. You might be surprised at what they offer, and what you didn’t even realize you needed from a map. Perhaps you’re in a boundary dispute with a neighbor or your local government. Maybe you want to know exactly how much of a nearby forest has been cleared this year....

In 1911, USDA botanist Albert Spear Hitchcock approached his funders with a petition. He asked to send his female assistant and fellow botanist, Agnes Chase, on a field expedition to the Panama Canal Zone. After three male decision-makers at the agency and the Smithsonian Institution corresponded on the then-uncommon matter—and despite Hitchcock’s superior at the USDA vouching for her, as well—the answer was a definitive no. “I doubt whether the sum mentioned by Professor Hitchcock would be sufficient for her expenses and because I doubt the advisability of engaging the services of a woman for the purpose,” one of them wrote....

Still, these nude sunbathers may be seeing some positive effects—yes, really—so here are a few ways you can follow their lead without exposing your most sensitive bits to the elements. If you do want to strip down, just make sure everyone who might spot you in your birthday suit has consented to do so, apply sun protection where you can (read: not in your vagina, but probably on your butt), and check yourself for dirt, debris, and ticks when you’re back inside....

1. Practice first. The PuttOut is a serious training tool. A well-struck ball, with the force and trajectory to go in the hole, will roll up the plastic ramp, then back toward you. Hit too hard and the ball will launch off the back; wayward shots will fall off the side. 2. Picture success Markings on the Wellputt Pro mat help you visualize every element of a perfect hit. Guidelines on the 10-​foot-​long turf show the right backswing distance and ideal ball paths....

Toyota is attempting to entice buyers of the full-size truck with a bold new design. Hard body lines, an oversized grille, and a completely reworked interior bring the truck into the 21st century. They’ve even made the off-road capable performance trim, the TRD Pro, alluring thanks to a factory-installed lightbar integrated into its front end. It’s not all about looks, though. One of the biggest changes is under the hood, and it’s perhaps the most enticing thing that buyers will find in the updated Tundra....

Dental plaque, which hardens into tartar, or calculus, is especially important when it comes to our dental health—and luckily for archaeologists, it’s the only part of your body that fossilizes while you’re still alive, says Warinner. Because of this, it can lend fascinating glimpses into our past. “It builds up like rings of a tree,” she says, establishing a permanent record of the bacteria that have lived in your mouth, as well as some environmental exposures (in artists, for example, “we sometimes find pigments that they were using”)....