Back to the Future, Presented by Xerox

It's the 21st Century, and — as you know — we all have flying cars! I got a ticket form the sky police the other day for not wearing my cloud belt.

Actually, no. I didn't. No flying cars. No food pills. No baby vending machines. But, a recent exposition at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) unveiled a few cool inventions to keep you bemused until the airborne autos arrive.

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Since Xerox owns the place, it's fair to start out with a printing, copying advance. PARC came up with printable paper that wipes itself clean in 24 hours. It does not use ink, so the specially coated paper produces dark tones when exposed to the light the laser printer produces. The tones fade away in 24 hours, allowing the paper to be reused up to 100 times.

A Solar Concentrator sounds like a cool planet-destroying weapon, but it's actually a PARC-perfected miniaturized solar panel that concentrates sunlight 500 times. The invention means improving solar panels, making them a more reliable energy source.

Finally, PARC is looking to upgrade the speed and efficiency of water purification by using simple centrifugal force to separate solids from large amounts of water. The energy-efficient technology could bring cleaner water to both developing areas and large cities of the future — where you'll drive the flying cars.

by John Scott Lewinski for Wired.com

Artwork by Dawid Michalczyk

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