Weekly Piece of Future #151
From Thought-Powered Cursors to Neurostimulation Wearables and Plasma-Cooled Laptops
Hey there, fellow future-addicts!
Welcome to this week's edition of Rushing Robotics! 2026—the year AI stepped out of our screens and into our eyelids, brains, and bones. While you were celebrating the new year, labs and factories were quietly birthing technologies that rewrite the rules of what's possible. This issue captures that momentum: from mind-controlled gaming to robots that learn on the job, from quantum chips that solve the unsolvable to nano-magnets that heal while they fight cancer. Let's dive in.
🤯 Mind-Blowing
This week's breakthroughs feel plucked from a sci-fi script, yet they're already performing in real labs and on real patients. We're witnessing the convergence of biological energy harvesting, direct neural interfaces, and autonomous machines that don't just follow orders—they understand context. These innovations don't just push boundaries; they erase them entirely.
🔊 Industry Insights & Updates
The future isn't just being invented—it's being manufactured at scale. This section tracks the momentous shift from prototype to production line, where brain implants become mainstream medical devices, laptops shed their fans for plasma cooling, and industrial giants like Siemens and NVIDIA weave AI into the fabric of global manufacturing. These are the moves that turn breakthroughs into businesses.
🧬 BioTech
We're learning to speak the language of cells themselves. From lungs that breathe on chips to circuits that tame the chaotic noise of cancer, this week's biotech stories reveal a new precision in how we model, understand, and heal the human body. The tools are getting smarter, the interventions more targeted, and the path from lab bench to bedside shorter than ever.
💡 Products/Tools of the Week
Automation is quietly reshaping how we work. Lensmor tracks competitor moves automatically across websites and social media, turning market noise into actionable intelligence. Logic Sheet eliminates repetitive spreadsheet tasks by connecting Google Sheets to your entire tech stack with AI-powered workflows. Devgraph maps your entire codebase into a live knowledge graph so AI agents can truly understand your systems. And Arahi AI launches autonomous teammates that handle multi-step tasks across 2,800+ apps without writing a single line of code.
🎥 Video Section
Seeing is believing. This week's video lineup showcases the robots that will share our workplaces and homes—Atlas demonstrating factory agility, Unitree's daily training routines, and MenteeBot following natural language commands without remote control. Watch these machines move from concept to capability.
The pace of change can feel dizzying, but it's also deeply hopeful. Each breakthrough here represents not just a technical achievement, but a new way to restore mobility, extend health, unlock creativity, and lighten human labor. We're not just building smarter machines—we're building a more capable, more caring world. Stay hungry, stay futurish!
🤯 Mind-Blowing
A new eye‑tracking system that harvests power from the wearer’s eyelid motion was introduced at Qingdao University, enabling paralyzed patients to control devices through blinks and gaze. Developed by a team of biomedical engineers and neuroscientists, the device attains a 99 % accuracy rate, allowing users to type on a computer screen or steer a wheelchair without moving a single limb. By converting the micro‑voltage generated during an eyelid closure into usable energy, the system functions without external batteries, offering a lightweight and discreet alternative to conventional assistive technologies. In pilot studies, participants successfully navigated a graphical user interface and communicated via an integrated speech synthesis module, showcasing the technology’s practical viability. This innovation represents a major advance in assistive technology, merging bio‑electrical harvesting with precise computer vision to deliver an autonomous and intuitive user experience.
A brain‑sensing gaming headset debuted at CES, capable of interpreting neural signals while players engage in first‑person shooters. The headset was developed by Neurable alongside HyperX, embedding non‑invasive EEG sensors into a familiar gaming design to deliver live focus and cognitive performance data. In early trials, casual gamers achieved a 43‑ms reaction‑time improvement and a 0.53‑percent accuracy gain, while collegiate esports athletes saw a 3‑percent accuracy rise and a 38‑ms faster response. HyperX’s gaming solutions VP described the product as a tool for players to fine‑tune mental states, and Neurable’s CEO highlighted the shift toward normalizing brain awareness in everyday play. This announcement comes at a pivotal moment for BCI and brain-tracking technologies as they move from research environments into consumer products.
A new plan to deploy 30,000 humanoid robots each year by 2028 was unveiled, and Hyundai Motor Group said it will use Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robots to automate repetitive factory tasks. The announcement came during CES 2026, where Hyundai also introduced the production‑ready Atlas model, and the company’s Vice Chair, Jaehoon Chang, emphasized that humans will still supervise and train the machines. Hyundai’s strategy, dubbed “human‑centered automation,” aims to reduce physical strain on workers and accelerate production by integrating robots that can lift, assemble, and learn on the fly.
Google’s latest quantum milestone—Willow, a 105‑qubit chip that finished a random‑circuit benchmark five minutes after launch—breaks the barrier to previously “unsolvable” problems. With repeated error‑correction, the chip can accurately model the quantum mechanics of complex molecules, enabling new pharmaceuticals; predict the behavior of advanced materials for next‑generation electronics; design highly efficient, low‑carbon energy systems; and produce climate forecasts with fine spatial and temporal resolution. Each of these domains had been constrained by classical computing limits; Willow lifts those constraints, giving Google a decisive advantage in tackling global challenges.
Nano‑magnets have been found capable of defeating bone cancer and aiding healing, as announced by researchers from Brazil and Portugal. Their team, led by Dr. Angela Andrade of the Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto, synthesized iron‑oxide nanoparticles coated with bioactive glass that, when exposed to an alternating magnetic field, burn cancer cells from the inside while simultaneously encouraging new bone growth. This dual‑action approach not only eradicates tumors but also restores the damaged bone, a significant advance over existing treatments that only target the disease. By combining high magnetization with strong bioactivity in a single material, the researchers hope to move this promising technology toward clinical trials and eventually offer patients a minimally invasive, two‑in‑one solution for bone cancer.
🔊 Industry Insights & Updates
Neuralink announced that it will launch high‑volume production of its brain‑computer interface devices in 2026, moving to an almost entirely automated surgical procedure, a move Elon Musk disclosed on X after months of regulatory review. The implant, designed to help people with spinal cord injuries and other severe neurological conditions, already enabled a first patient to play video games, browse the internet, and control a laptop cursor using thought alone. Musk’s statement highlighted the company’s plan to expand its clinical trials to dozens of patients worldwide, while also securing a $650 million funding round in June that will support mass manufacturing.
YPlasma revealed the world’s first laptop cooled by DBD plasma actuators, a technology that replaces traditional fans with a thin film of cold plasma generating high‑velocity ionic wind; CEO David García Pérez highlighted the system’s noiseless performance and safety advantages, noting that the company’s engineering teams in Madrid and Newark engineered a 200‑µm‑thick actuator that can be integrated directly onto heat sinks, chassis walls, or internal components for ultra‑thin, high‑performance devices.
At CES 2026, Siemens and NVIDIA announced a new Industrial AI Operating System that will integrate artificial intelligence across design, engineering, manufacturing, operations, and supply chains. The partnership, led by Siemens President Roland Busch and NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang, will enable factories to simulate changes virtually, test improvements in real time, and deploy validated insights directly onto production lines. A fully AI‑driven manufacturing site is slated to launch in 2026 at Siemens’s Erlangen electronics factory, while the duo plans to roll out GPU‑accelerated simulation tools, generative physics models, and AI‑powered copilots for workers, scaling the platform to customers such as Foxconn, Hyundai, KION, and PepsiCo.
LG turned a spotlight on its “AI in Action” roadmap at CES 2026, presenting a lineup that turns digital intelligence into physical, helpful solutions. The company’s CEO, Lyu Jae‑cheol, launched the event by asking the industry to imagine AI stepping out of the screen and into real life. He then explained that LG’s strategy relies on three core pillars: superior device technology, a seamless ecosystem, and the expansion of AI solutions beyond the home. It also highlighted the CLOiD humanoid robot, built to learn and adapt to a home environment, capable of folding laundry and adjusting heating and cooling, with a focus on safety and stability. The message wrapped up by envisioning a future where AI quietly improves everyday life, making it more meaningful and human.
🧬 BioTech
A breathing lung‑on‑chip was engineered from a single donor’s cells, allowing researchers to observe tuberculosis (TB) infection in a realistic, human‑like environment. The new model, announced on January 1, was created by scientists at the Francis Crick Institute and the Swiss company AlveoliX, who used induced pluripotent stem cells to build a lung tissue that contracts and expands with simulated breathing. By integrating the donor’s own immune cells (macrophages) and introducing Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the team could track the pathogen’s early progression and the host’s cellular response in real time. This breakthrough, promises to refine personalized treatment plans and reduce reliance on animal models for respiratory disease research.
Researchers from KAIST and POSTECH have unveiled a mathematical device that can tame random fluctuations inside single cells, a development that could halt cancer’s ability to relapse after chemotherapy. The Noise Controller, a feedback circuit that senses the very “noise” in protein levels rather than just their averages, was designed by Professor KIM Jae‑Kyoung. By employing protein dimerization and targeted degradation, the team proved in computer simulations that the controller can reduce failure rates in E. coli DNA‑repair pathways from 20 % to 7 %, demonstrating that outlier cells that resist drugs can be coaxed into normal behavior. The study, signals a shift from population‑wide regulation to single‑cell precision control, offering a promising strategy for smart microbes, synthetic biology, and especially for overcoming drug resistance in cancer therapy.
Spark Biomedical unveiled the OhmBody neurostimulation wearable, a non‑invasive, hormone‑free device that targets nerves around the ear to curb heavy menstrual bleeding. Katherine Reil, the company’s spokesperson, explained how the device uses transcutaneous auricular neurostimulation of the vagus and trigeminal nerves to activate platelets in the spleen, reducing blood loss by more than 50 % and shortening periods by roughly 20 % in a 16‑participant trial. While still seeking FDA clearance, Spark Biomedical plans to scale the product through e‑commerce and sports‑wear partnerships, positioning OhmBody as a pioneering wellness‑to‑medicine solution for women’s health.
💡Products/tools of the week
Competitor moves get tracked automatically with Lensmor, an AI-driven competitive intelligence platform that monitors competitor websites, Reddit, and LinkedIn 24/7. Lensmor uses machine learning to spot website changes, A/B tests, job moves, and sentiment shifts, then prioritizes the highest-impact signals and turns them into concise, role-specific action plans. Product, growth, sales, and investor teams use Lensmor to replace manual monitoring, cut noise, convert competitor activity into clear next steps, and stay ahead of market shifts.
Repetitive spreadsheet work gets automated with Logic Sheet, a Google Sheets add-on that runs workflows through triggers, conditions, and actions like emails, Slack messages, webhooks, sheet updates, and API integrations. Logic Sheet connects Google Sheets to tools including Airtable, Notion, HubSpot, and Mailchimp so data and tasks move automatically between systems. Non-developers also use Logic Sheet’s built-in AI agents powered by OpenAI/Gemini to follow plain-English instructions for multi-step tasks such as scraping, summarizing, generating content, enriching data, and drafting personalized outreach—eliminating manual work, reducing errors, and saving hours without coding.
Devgraph is an AI-powered ontology engine that automatically discovers and maps relationships across your code, infrastructure, tickets, and chats into a live knowledge graph so LLMs and AI agents can understand and act on your real systems in real time; use it to run natural-language queries, perform dependency/impact analysis, surface tribal knowledge, speed onboarding, and automate workflows (create tickets, trigger deploys) while retaining control by bringing any LLM—cloud, self-hosted, or air-gapped—for privacy, cost, and performance.
Autonomous workflows get launched from simple prompts with Arahi AI, an agentic, no-code automation platform that runs AI teammates powered by Agent NEO. Arahi AI connects to 2,800+ apps and operates 24/7, creating and configuring automations that can trigger on events like incoming emails or support tickets. Using large-memory context, template-driven logic, and models tuned for near-zero hallucinations, Arahi AI executes multi-step tasks reliably and surfaces real-time insights so teams can replace repetitive work across customer service, sales, marketing, finance, and HR with predictable, lower-cost automation and faster time-to-value than traditional tools.
Fascinating roundup this week. The YPlasma DBD actuator development for laptop cooling is particularly clever since it replaces mechanical fans with ionic wind from cold plasma, which should eliminate noise and vibration bottlenecks in thin devices. I've been following similiar approaches in aerospace where plasma actuators get used for flow control, but seeing consumer electronics adopt this tech at scale feels like a real tippingpoint for widespread commercial deployment.