The current world has experienced a significant scientific growth in the last few decades. Technologies have become an important part of lives of many people, mainly the westerners. Therefore, this trend is expected to continue. Thus, we present TOP 5 technologies that will change the world.
Constant innovating is happening basically in all scientific fields you can think of. While some of the inventions will only make our everyday life easier and more convenient, other can potentially even save lives or help the already damaged environment. Nonetheless, it is highly recommended to focus on following terms, which will be described in this article.
TOP 5 technologies that will change the world – Hydrogen
The lightest element has the potential to significantly help the world on it’s way to lower the carbon emissions. It is therefore said to be “the fuel of the future”. The reason for that is it’s non-existent CO2 production. The possibility of hydrogen-powered cars is often talked about, whether when meaning trucks or passenger cars.
When compared to electric cars, hydrogen-powered ones can offer faster filling of it’s fuel tank as well as bigger mileage. The biggest problem when it comes to passenger cars is the required fuel tank size. That is because it reduces the usable trunk space. In general, the lacking infrastructure is the most notable problem of hydrogen-powered vehicles at the moment. Therefore, a lot of organizations, including the European Union are about to financially support the building of “gas stations” both for electric and hydrogen-powered vehicles.
More potential for hydrogen and it’s problems
Hydrogen can also serve as a fuel to heating households. It might find another use in heavy industry as well, especially regarding metals. To be exact, talks about hydrogen usages are taking place in the steel industry, because it uses a lot of fossil fuels currently, which leads to more CO2 production. There also exist some projects which aim at the construction of hydrogen-powered airplanes Those should ideally replace the current ones in the future.
It is, however, needed to mention, that hydrogen on it’s own does not necessarily mean “environmentally friendly”. That is caused by the fact, that it needs to be gathered from compounds and for that, energy is required. This led to the creation of the term “green hydrogen”. That is used as a name for hydrogen, gathered only by the use of renewable energy.
The usage of green hydrogen is supposed to rise sharply in the future, however, it still could be considered a controversial topic. Some people point out, that the energy requirements for gathering hydrogen are very high. Thus, in case of increasing hydrogen popularity, there is not enough renewable energy available to fulfil the demand for green hydrogen. Anyway, hydrogen usage in general is expected to sky-rocket thanks to it’s already mentioned non-existent emissions.
Metaverse
Almost taken straight from a science-fiction book, the Metaverse can be described as a connection between the real world and the virtual one. The project of Metaverse has the potential to change the modern society as a whole. Many people think that the project belongs to the company Meta (which used to be called Facebook not too long ago). However, the opposite is the truth. The founder of the company, Mark Zuckerberg, has renamed Facebook to Meta because he believes, that Metaverse is going to have an enormous impact on the society in the future.
There is one big difference between the current version of the Internet and the Metaverse. The Metaverse is three-dimensional, mainly thanks to the invention of VR glasses. The reality could be the following – you put your VR glasses on, and as your created character, you teleport to a virtual shop. There, you can try on for example clothes and see, how would you look in them in reality, or you can for example see, how would a certain piece of furniture fit into your living room.
Inspired by computer games
Afterwards you can order whatever you picked and pay. Soon after, the desired goods will be delivered to your real address. There is also a possibility of buying only clothing for your created virtual character, which will only exist in the Metaverse. Many popular computer games implemented a similar concept already, known as “skins”.
Furthermore, you will also be able to work remotely and yet meet and interact with your colleagues, as if you were in the office physically. The importance of this project for the future is immenste. The fact, that a lot of corporations have invested in it significantly, speaks for itself. According to some experts a Metaverse, similar to the one described, can exist within a timespan of five to ten years.
TOP 5 technologies that will change the world – 3D printing
In it’s beginning, 3D printing did not seem promising in terms of real-life usage. However, the last years’ development has promised some sort of effectiveness. The technological advance as well as reduction in costs of 3D printing currently allow to create many different products.
Among those are for example different clothing or accessories. For example, a dress, pair of glasses, shoes, or whatever you can think of can be printed. A products of a much bigger importance, however, can be created for medical purposes.
It can, for example, be used for stem cell therapy. Such a procedure basically creates new cells that repair damage within the body. Furthermore, many medical products to be used by the doctors can also be 3D printed. Last but not least, a new opportunity of 3D printing bones has risen. These bones are made of a special material, which is very similar to original bones. The replacement bone should, according to the scientist, then function as reliably, as the on that is being replaced used to before it was broken.
Gene therapy
Having mentioned the topic of health, it would almost be a sin to omit gene therapy from this list. It is a result of incredible advance in medicine and promises to cure diseases, caused by genetic conditions. Until now, these have been cured by medicine, which only eliminated or lowered the severity of symptoms. The issue causing said disease can not be solved. Not even in times, when the doctors knew exactly what gene was it caused by.
Gene therapy as a whole is based on passing a certain genetic information straight into the cells. Currently, it is a great hope for the medical world. It brings a possibility of curing genetic or tumor diseases, which could not really be cured by the current medicine. Among those diseases are for example cancer, diabetes, cystic fibrosis or various heart diseases. Furthermore, also two very severe diseases mainly of the elderly population, the Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, could theoretically be cured.
At the moment, gene therapy is for sure imperfect and it is not effective in all cases. It also requires usage of a lot of new technologies as well as finances. The ethics of such a procedure is also being questioned, since modifying human genes is a very controversial topic. Some people see gene therapy for solving medical issues as a dangerous precedent. Critics say, that it could lead to a mass spread of human genes modification. An example of it is a situation, where a parents could for example pay some money so that their unborn child would have improved academic or athletic skills.
TOP 5 technologies that will change the world – Industry 4.0
Often referred to as historically the fourth industrial revolution, this term means a development rather than an outright revolution. Although according to some figures it will increase labour productivity by nearly a third, it also brings certain issues.
The whole point of Industry 4.0 is to connect all the equipment in use via the internet and to establish data flows both within a single company and between multiple companies. All machines will thus be able to be centrally controlled remotely and will be able to communicate with each other. Another key point is the increasing automation of work.
The whole of Industry 4.0 is basically guided by the motto: “The work that machines can do, machines should do.” While this will certainly bring more efficient use of resources and increased production capacity, it will also make many workers redundant. According to some estimates, up to 40% of people will have to undergo retraining courses to take up the newly created positions that will replace their former machine-occupied ones.
Overall, however, Industry 4.0 should have a positive effect on employment, as it is estimated that the jobs created will be more than those replaced by robots or machines. It is also expected that the aforementioned productivity growth would result in shorter working hours, with six hours instead of the current eight.
