Hrkn to .. Gadgets & Gizmos

Steve Caplin, Share Radio's technology editor, tells Simon Rose of the Texas scientists who have worked out how to combine cellulose and konjac to make water from thin air while, in New South Wales, they've found a way to get solar panels to generate power at night! There's also a $2m jigsaw, though the puzzle itself is a QR code, Rolls Royce have a new $28m car while the Genesis GV60 comes with f...

Share Radio's tech expert Steve Caplin tells Simon Rose about the Royal Mail's drone delivery to the Isles of Scilly, Shetlands, Orkneys and Hebrides. Mastercard have a new payment system requiring you to smile, there are teeth-cleaning nanobots on the way, underwater robots are killing jellyfish, drugs will have chocolate sprinkles to defeat counterfeiters, there's a battery that produces electri...

Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about the latest tech news. After 21 years, Apple are discontinuing the iPod, the UK is to launch a satellite from Newquay, Mercedes' new electric car will go 1,000km on one charge, the Italians are producing a hydrofoil which will dive down 50 metres, smart screws will detect if they're coming loose in bridges, wind turbines and the like, the Dutch are making crac...

Share Radio's technology editor Steve Caplin tells Simon Rose about how Space X is using helicopters to catch its booster rockets - and then drop them! Also the e-buses catching fire in Paris, faster charging for lithium batteries, how to map the moon, a robot that can jump 100 feet, street lights powered by passing cars, AR glasses for the deaf, making better chocolate and how to avoid leaving yo...

Technology buff Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, about a robotic rat, a luxury yacht that can take to the air, a YouTuber who faked a plane crash, masking cows to control methane, what happened when solar-powered ram-equipped rubbish bins went wrong, a table-tennis robot and an autonomous bus operating on the Forth Road Bridge. Learn more about your ad choice...

Share Radio's tech whizz Steve Caplin discusses trying – unsuccessfully – to sell the Non-Fungible Token of the first ever tweet. Anish Kapoor has upset other artists by cornering the market in Vantablack, you'll be able to watch movies in driverless cars, but not use your phone, there's an appealing small hand-held game console – sold out until next year, electric chopsticks to make food taste sa...

Share Radio's technology editor Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about the San Francisco police's surprise to stop a car without headlights – or a driver! There's also a way to trap smoke-stack CO2, a Rubens painting with accompanying smells, a solution to cat allergy, cloning dead pets, the most popular social media app that aims to get real, wearable air conditioning and crowd-funded illuminated...

Tech expert Steve Caplin tells us of BA sourcing jet fuel from chip fat, of the flying taxi firm that wants to expand into the UK, of how driverless cars might be controlled if things go wrong and how having no street lights might actually reduce crime. He also discusses e-ink chalk boards, Dyson's headphone with an air-filtering visor, whether mobile phones really do cause brain tumours, how the...

Tech maven Steve Caplin loves LEDs but even he is aghast at plans to build the world's biggest LED screen in East London. He's alarmed by a sleep app that dispenses CO2 to help you nod off. The largest scooter factory in the world is to be built in India, but will the batteries be as good as promised? There's also a "pedestrian shield" for electric scooters, Historic England's (hard to use) online...

Share Radio's technology editor, in discussion with Simon Rose, talks about the cuts in employee benefits at Facebook. MyHeritage have progressed from animating old photos to adding synthesised voices, the world's longest car has been extended, there's a DIY virtual rollercoaster, Audi are introducing a "holoride" for bored passengers, there's a plan to bring the dodo back from extinction and the...

Share Radio's tech genius Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about Amazon's new radio app and Apple's new phone and computer. Danish scientists have worked out how to tell if pigs are happy, hydroelectric dams could be replaced by electric trucks, the Belgians have come up with a way of cleaning solar panels while the FlossElf is a flosser with a camera so you can see if you're doing it properly. Le...

Share Radio's tech whizz Steve Caplin tells Simon Rose why Amazon is closing 68 of its stores. For skiers going off-piste there's an autonomous ski lift on tracks or, more scarily, a portable tow rope with a winch. There's a car that can climb gradients greater than 50%, an infinity electric train at an Australian mine, we hear why planes are being covered with shark skin, about the company contra...

Share Radio's tech whizz Steve Caplin waxes lyrical to Simon Rose about Netflix's interactive Cat Burglar cartoon. He also discusses Ben Gurion Uni's line-of-sight bugging device that can detect speech from objects like coffee cans and Venetian blinds, Sony's new ear buds that allow you to hear ambient noise, a way of stopping glasses fogging up, some of the bizarre online shopping substitutions,...

Gadget guru Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about tickets going on sale for Virgin Galactic's space trips, a snip at £333,000. He discusses National Grid's plan for plundering e-car batteries, Alfa Romeo's NFT plug-in hybrid and the iEV X expanding car. Tinder is experimenting with blind dates, there's a tech necklace that can read chin movements, a crowdfunded camera dolly and Simon chips in wit...

After waxing lyrical about progress made in nuclear fusion, tech guru Steve Caplin discusses smart windows and smart pens, how to repel mosquitoes, the world's biggest walk-through kaleidoscope, a new ultra-strong material developed at MIT, adding touch to the VR experience, a Covid breathalyser, sugar cane traffic bollards and an electric car that can power your house for three days if there's a...

Share Radio's technology editor Steve Caplin discusses the success of the online game Wordle, just bought by the New York Times. The Royal Mail will be adding QR codes to stamps to show videos, rendering all existing stamps obsolete. Horse riders will soon be able to learn to ride using a smart saddle while there are proposals to make electric scooters safer by getting them to emit the noise of a...

Share Radio's tech expert Steve Caplin on the not-so-great escape - of a robot vaccum cleaner from a Cambridge Travelodge. He also discusses a robot surgeon performing keyhole surgery, some new derivatives of the popular online game Wordle, the problems gamers fear from Microsoft's takeover of Activision, why disappointed film fans are suing Universal, Julian Lennon's Beatles-related NFTs, an app...

You may have read of the stalling of 5G installation around airports: such precautions are not new! In May 2019 Steve Caplin explained why 5G has been stalled by lamppost problems - this is the episode raising the issue. He also went automotive, looking at Dyson's plans for an electric off-road car, the Honda e with swift recharge, the electric Jaguar E-type with optional original engine and Hydro...

Steve Caplin and Simon Rose savour the latest great - and not so great - ideas on display at the annual Consumer Electronics Show, including colour-changing cars, a lightbulb that monitors health, a self-driving tractor, invisible headphones, an autonomous trolley, a camera for identification that attaches to glasses for those with poor eyesight and a self-cleaning cat litter tray that also assess...

Steve Caplin talks to Simon Rose about the latest tech as Apple becomes the first $3tn company. Blackberry says "goodbye", Tesla recalls half a million cars, Waymo make a taxi with no steering wheel, the world goes mad for the online game Wordle, a water cooler can make water from thin air, there's a lickable TV, goldfish are being trained to drive cars, a Mafia fugitive is caught through Google S...

Steve Caplin, Share Radio's technology editor, looks back over some of the best and weirdest tech from 2021. Listen again to tales of a Tesla hearse, pigs playing computer games, the first-ever Tweet selling for $2.5m, transparent wood, fluorescent potatoes, the Tesla bot (or not), cosmic concrete, latrine-trained cows, Dog TV, a face mask using Ostrich extract to detect Covid and a ribald Polish-...

Share Radio's tech whizz Steve Caplin looks at the virtual property boom where an online plot of land sold for $2.4m at non-fungible token trainers, eye drops to improve vision, biodegradable single-use batteries, a space factory, facial recognition software in the Co-op, reviving wooly mammoths by gene-editing Asian elephants and a rather unlikely Which? Product of the Year. Visit www.shareradio....

Steve Caplin and Simon Rose look at the latest in high- (and low-) tech. Kyoto University have produced a face mask that can detect Covid, while Amazon are now selling PCR tests. Scientists have developed a phone security system that relies on how you walk, commercial-sized planes using liquid hydrogen and a yacht that makes its own hydrogen from seawater. With wearable electronics becoming more p...

Share Radio's tech guru Steve Caplin takes us through a selection of possible Christmas gifts, from the sublime to the ridiculous. Among them are gin that lights up, a Lego typewriter, a James Bond Scalextric set, a CO2 bike tyre inflator, a wooden DIY projector, LED candles, a Casio keyboard, the champion of Swiss Army knives, a Dyson that tells you about the dust it's gathered and a couple of te...

Steve Caplin looks into the latest tech, with Sainsbury's opening a checkout-free store – again, this time in competition with Tesco. South Korea is introducing dancing, singing and farting robots in 300 nursery schools, there's a singing cactus that's ruder than expected, an air taxi that will make you feel you're Superman, a camera the size of a grain of salt, the oldest iron and fridge that are...