Salty exchange

Sodium-ion batteries are making their way into small personal vehicles. Chinese electric vehicle producer CATL plans to replace lithium-ion batteries in its Oshan SUVs with sodium-ion ones starting later this year.

Lithium has been the mainstream storage tech for phones, laptops, and electric vehicles for decades. But sodium-ion batteries are gaining popularity as they offer a potentially more resilient and cheaper alternative to lithium-ion. Sodium is over 1,000 times more common in the Earth’s crust than lithium and is more easily accessible for mining. It charges faster and is also less likely to explode than its counterpart. But because lithium batteries generally have longer-lasting charges and longer life­spans, they have been the status quo.

New research and Chinese companies like CATL and BYD have invested heavily in developing sodium-ion batteries that can compete with lithium-­ion ones.

In America, the San Diego–based startup, Unigrid, produces sodium batteries for everything from snow­mobiles to pickups.

Another American company, Peak Energy, based in California and Colorado, has created the first large sodium-ion battery system that connects to the power grid and stays cool without fans or air conditioning.

Exoskeletons for personal use

Personal exoskeletons were the hot trend at CES 2026, the world’s largest consumer electronics event. The exoskeletons showcased at the Las Vegas convention featured lightweight designs, AI-powered tech, and within-reach prices.

Exoskeletons are wearable devices that enhance human movement, strength, posture, or physical activity. Manufacturers, who originally sold the wearable tech to rehab patients and warehouse workers, are now targeting everyone from hikers to active seniors.

Hypershell sells a product enabling hikers to “go farther, climb easier, and take on tougher trails” from a starting price of $1,100. It weighs less than 5 pounds and uses artificial intelligence to adapt its assistance to terrain and walking pace. Ascentiz’s exoskeletons go around either the hips or knees to support and train muscles. Dnsys claims its products can get users up to a maximum speed of nearly 17 miles per hour for less than $1,000.

Unreached app update

Joshua Project’s Unreached of the Day app revitalized its statistics focus this year. The app has shifted from looking at a people group in one country to looking at that group across all the countries it is in. The app highlights a different unreached people group each day to mobilize people globally to pray for the group. Previously, users saw a group like the Bambara listed as 12 different groups, as the people live across 12 West African countries. It now displays the same Bambara population as one people group, regardless of borders. The new statistics strategy aligns more closely with how frontier missions typically work, according to Joshua Project.