NASA

Neuromorphic Processors Deliver Reflex-Like Responses for Robots, Drones and Edge Sensors

Neuromorphic chips are optimized for sparse, event-driven data rather than dense matrix operations, making them ideal for always-on peripheral devices that must react instantly while conserving power. The technology pairs naturally with event cameras and temporal sensors in robotics, drones, automotive systems, medical wearables, industrial monitoring and space applications. Platforms such as Intel Loihi 2, BrainChip Akida, SynSense Speck and SpiNNaker2 already demonstrate working prototypes that activate only on meaningful changes in the input stream. Researchers at TU Delft have flown autonomous drones using spiking networks on Loihi, while NASA has tested radiation-tolerant neuromorphic designs for onboard decision making. The approach complements rather than replaces GPUs and NPUs, creating hybrid systems where the neuromorphic layer handles fast reflexes and conventional accelerators manage complex models.

Can the Moon Be DDoSed? Exploring Future Cybersecurity Challenges for Lunar Bases

A speculative analysis examines whether DDoS attacks could target a lunar base in 2036, highlighting how Earth-based internet protocols would fail over the 384,000 km distance. The piece details NASA’s LunaNet architecture and Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) that uses store-and-forward mechanisms to handle long delays and link disruptions. It explains why traditional volumetric attacks would be limited by narrow space communication channels while resource-exhaustion attacks on orbital relays and DTN nodes could prove more effective. The analysis contrasts Earth’s redundant routing with the Moon’s few irreplaceable links and emphasizes that attacking ground control centers might be more practical than flooding lunar hardware. It concludes that any real lunar network will inherit familiar terrestrial bottlenecks despite its exotic setting.