Our cities are changing and technology is playing a big part in that change. The sci-fi vision of people commuting using jetpacks may not be that far off.
In his project Signs from the Near Future, blogger Fernando Barbella takes a wry look at how our street signs may also have to change to take account of driverless cars, internet-connected contact lenses and solar roads.
He spoke to us for our Tomorrow's Cities series - and showed us some snapshots from the near future:
All images subject to copyright. Music by Nu Shooz and Lonestar. Audio interview by Jane Wakefield. Photofilm production by Paul Kerley.
The UK's chief scientist says the oceans face a serious and growing risk from man-made carbon emissions.
The oceans absorb about a third of the CO2 that’s being produced by industrial society, and this is changing the chemistry of seawater.
Sir Mark Walport warns that the acidity of the oceans has increased by about 25%since the industrial revolution, mainly thanks to manmade emissions.
CO2 reacts with the sea water to form carbonic acid.
He told BBC News: “If we carry on emitting CO2 at the same rate, ocean acidification will create substantial risks to complex marine food webs and ecosystems.”
He said the current rate of acidification isbelieved to be unprecedented within the last 65 million years – and may threaten fisheries in future.
The consequences of acidification are likely to be made worse by the warming of the ocean expected with climate change, a process which is also driven by CO2.
Sir Mark’s comments come as recent British research suggests the effects of acidification may be even more pervasive than previously estimated.
Until now studies have identified species with calcium-based shells as most in danger from changing chemistry.
But researchers in Exeter have found that other creatures will also be affected because as acidity increases it creates conditions for animals to take up more coastal pollutants like copper.
Shock result
The angler’s favourite bait – the humble lugworm – suffers DNA damage as a result of the extra copper. The pollutant harms their sperm, and their offspring don’t develop properly.
“It’s a bit of a shock, frankly,” said biologist Ceri Lewis from Exeter University, one of the report’s authors. “It means the effects of ocean acidification may be even more serious than we previously thought. We need to look with new eyes at things which we thought were not vulnerable.”
The lugworm study was published inEnvironmental Science and Technology. Another study from Dr Lewis not yet peer-reviewed suggests that sea urchins are also harmed by uptake of copper. This adds to the damage they will suffer from increasing acidity as it takes them more and more energy to calcify their shells and spines.
This is significant because sea urchins, which can live up to 100 years, are a keystone species - grazing algae off rocks that would otherwise be covered in green slime.
Ceri Lewis from Exeter University studies the effects of acidification on marine life
Dr Lewis found that at the pH expected by the end of the century, sea urchins will face damage from copper to 10% of their DNA.
Urchins are in an unfortunate group of creatures that look most likely to suffer from changing ocean chemistry.
At the bottom end of the marine animal chain, tiny creatures like plankton and coccolithophores reproduce so fast that their future offspring are likely to evolve to cope with lower pH.
At the other end of the scale are fish and crustaceans which are able to control their internal chemistry (even though some fish are affected in unexpected ways by acidification).
But the long-lived urchins are too simple to control their own body chemistry and will find it harder to adapt. They’re likely to be in trouble, along with molluscs like mussels - which provide food for predators and also perform vital services to the eco-system.
Tough, boulder corals may survive the changes, but many of the branching and table corals which provide shelter for tropical fisheries are judged unlikely to last out the century.
Slow recovery
The recent meeting of the UN’s convention on biodiversity warned that it can take many thousands of years for marine life to recover from acidification.
Dr Lewis said that it was straightforward to forecast future chemical changes to the ocean. She said predictions of future pH had drawn few of the criticisms levelled at the much more complex models of climate change.
But she warns that the biological effects of the chemical change in the oceans are harder to predict.
In her Exeter lab she is currently subjecting ill-tempered crabs to the end-of-century challenge. She plunges her hand into a seawater tank to seize the shell of one feisty specimen that does not want to be moved. It grips the water feedpipe with a vicious-looking claw.
“We think crabs should fare better with low pH than urchins do,” she tells me.
“We don't know yet how they will respond to extra availability of copper.
“Our work means we are under-estimating effects of acidification for coastal invertebrates. We are now realizing there are many indirect impacts of ocean acidification on other processes. It could be that we are facing a lot more surprises ahead.”
Dr Lewis has set herself a mission toexplain the science of ocean acidification to children. Along with other ocean experts she wrote to the government urging the education department to guarantee a place for the oceans in the school science.
“It’s unacceptable that pupils can go through their entire school science career learning nothing about the oceans which cover 70% of the planet,” she says. “Ocean acidification is a fact – children should know that.”
Europe's space agency (Esa) has finally released a proper model for the shape of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.
The organisation's Rosetta mission will try to put a small robot on the surface of this "ice mountain" on 12 November.
The model provides some further details on the comet's size, and also allows enthusiasts to print their own 3D version of the duck-shaped object.
Rosetta has been flying around 67P since August, and could get as close as 10km, if it is deemed safe to do so.
Esa Flight Director Andrea Accomazzo told the International Astronautical Congress in Toronto on Friday that a final decision on this matter would be made next week.
The daring landing manoeuvre is planned for the afternoon (European time) of Wednesday 12 November.
Rosetta will attempt to deploy its piggybacked Philae lander to the surface in a procedure that is likely to last roughly seven hours.
The 100kg robot will be aimed at the "head" of the "duck".
If it gets down successfully - and that is a big "if" because of the difficulties involved - it would be a historic first for space exploration.
The shape model just released provides some more definitive physical parameters for 67P.
Previously, mission scientists have used the vague phrase of "about 4km wide" to describe the object's size.
Now, we have measurements to two significant figures.
Closely guarded
The head, or smaller lobe of the comet, is 2.5km by 2.5km by 2.0km. The "body" is described as being 4.1km by 3.2km by 1.3km.
With the previously released mass of 10 billion tonnes and a density of 400kg per cubic metre, which I published last month, this makes for an object that has a volume of 25 cubic km.
Its rotation rate is also now known to at least six significant figures - at 12.4043 hours.
Mission scientists have taken almost two months to release Friday's very simple data-set.
In part, this is because they were trying to make very careful measurements of a highly irregular object. And, it should be said, not all of the comet is visible - parts are permanently in darkness.
But it also speaks to their desire to hold back information that has enormous intellectual primacy.
No-one has ever been this close to a comet before, and there are major discoveries to be made.
To follow a completely open approach to the mission could allow anyone to claim a breakthrough.
Blacker than black
To date, very few pictures have been released that have been acquired by the high-resolution Osiris cameras on the Rosetta probe.
The public has had to make do with the much lower resolution images produced by the satellite's navigation cameras.
And even the shape model released on Friday presents only a very coarse view of 67P. The mission team is currently working with far more precise data-sets.
One very interesting parameter for which we still await a report is the comet's albedo - the degree to which it reflects light
Although it may look quite bright in pictures, the object is actually very black. Quite how black it is, though, is still being kept back.
All this said, those with access to the necessary software and a 3D printer can now turn out a desktop depiction of the most famous comet in the Solar System.
The relevant files are available in .wrl and .obj formats.
'Thousands' of new ocean mountains