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December 6, 2020 5 mins

Lidar technology, which uses a laser to measure the distance to a target, was first developed to help track spacecraft, and to help them autonomously rendezvous; a lot of spin-off technologies from human spaceflight, due to the challenges of trying to live in space; knowhow gained from wearable sensors developed to study astronauts has been applied to baby-monitors that can alert to the risk of sudden infant death syndrome; technology developed to land a spacecraft has been applied to the packaging of potato crisps to increase packing speed.

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