Discovery of an alien civilization

Alien life is a recurrent question in our society, and many believe that it exists. Discovering it might happen soon as we make progress in science and astro-physicists may be able to view images of the distant planets outside ...

Major Volcanic Eruption(s)

According to Nature (2012), "the largest submerged caldera in the world, Santorini last erupted in 1950 and had been relatively quiet until early 2011, when small earthquakes started to rattle the islands. The region remained f...

First contact with extra-terrestrial intelligence

First Contact: Contact with extra-terrestrial intelligence/civilisation is established

Society manipulated with advances in interpretation of visua ...

Visual perception is proven to be different in males and females. This impacts on the design of future systems to facilitate medical decision-making, crime re-enactments and other scenarios as people react differently to visual...

A Killer Water Filter

On in six people lacks access to clean water worldwide making diarrheal illness the leading cause of death globally. Novel materials promise better access to clean water around the world. Researchers have recently developed mob...

Gas from Trash

It is going to be possible to change our waste management by modified microbes which eat waste and “secrete” fuel. Our future may be changed by genetically modified fuel factories, which are fed with the sun energy.

Silent Seas

Today 52% of global fishing stock is fully exploited, 28% is overexploited and 20% is moderately or lightly exploited. We are emptying the oceansof fish faster than most species can repopulate themselves. International waters a...

“Cheap liquid fuel production from algae replaces oil by 2 ...

By mid-2010’s scientists in Europe discover new algae species from Mediterranean Sea which can be used very efficiently and very broadly in biofuel production. Soon after that the scientists discover a new scientific principl...

Cyber Crusade: Massive e-sabotage by "hacktivists"

Growing social and economic pressures in Europe result in massive protests and e-sabotage by underemployed IT activists. A "Cyber Crusade" (or CyberJihad) emerges with the aim of reshaping major socio-economic policies, so as t...

Do-It-Yourself (DIY) "wikiforesight" overtakes religion

Personal futures planning toolkits with “success stories” (e.g. how-to guides and case studies from experts and celebrities) become widely available and used. Social movements emerge, with individuals and civil society gr...

Geoengineering “solves” carbon problems but…

Geoengineering "solutions" to deliberately reduce the effects of continued greenhouse gas emissions can destabilize global and regional climates - and also the political and legal framework. Among many possible examples: A flee...

Soft “EuroLanding” or "Happy End" in EuroLand

The "Happy Ending" twist to Euro concerns involves the survival of the European political project and the emergence of a new “Euro Deal”, which dramatically transforms the economic and political landscape of Europe. On the ...

Changing ones mind

A terrorist group uses a virus to change the behaviour or neutralise a certain population for a certain period

The Genetic Blackmailer

Individual DNA is misused for extorsion.

Breakthrough in memory enhancing drugs

Memory enhancing drugs allow massive absorption of facts in short time (e.g. language vocabulary).

1M€ reparation cost per civilian death in conflicts

Revelations of massive numbers of civilian deaths in conflict zones where Western countries are active lead to the rapid growth of a well-organised social movement (using Facebook and Twitter and other web technologies) to cam...

CCTV Cameras pulled down

After serious and systematic cases of privacy invasion and use of CCTV infrastructure by hackers and terrorists, the UN and other international bodies declare CCTV systems a major security threat.

Space colonisation

Low-cost space travel and human enhancement technologies enable massive migration of humans from earth and establishing permanent space colonies on other planet or on large space stations.

Space war

A military confrontation takes place in space, using space weapons such as anti-satellite lasers and missiles, space-planes, etc.

Revolutionary space propulsion technology

New space propulsion technology (not based on chemical rockets) enables a dramatic reduction of the cost per pound required to get a satellite into orbit or to propel a spacecraft to its destination in space This is achieved b...

Global warming is not anthropogenic

Scientists prove that the global warming is NOT anthropogenic, but related to changing solar activity or other newly discovered phenomena in space

Universities close as research does not meet the needs of in ...

Research interests of Universities do not meet the needs of Industry and there is a large divide between industries wanting to work with Academic institutions. This lack of technology transfer leads to industry-led research in ...

European Commission scrap research support projects

The European Commission decide that research support projects do not provide a sufficient return on investment and are not viable. These funding schemes (Coordination and Specific Support Actions) are scrapped, and there are no...

Scientists up for murder as ethical issues for research are ...

All ethical issues are removed from research and development, but there is an uprising of an opposition until there are calls for researchers to be accused of murder. As research trials on humans becomes prevalent, vulnerable s...

New cure for MRSA found! Great news until serious side effec ...

Targeted nano antibacterial agents kill bacteria in laboratory rats and in rapid succession a new cure for MRSA is announced. Follow up studies find that nano anti-bacterial agents have asbestos like properties and there is pub...

Invisibility spray available in high street stores

An invisibility spray is developed and the technology refined until it becomes available in most retail outlets and is affordable for the general public. Initially, this is seen as fun, however there are strong implications for...

Doc-in-a-box: Pervasive self treatment and diagnosis

Nano-enabled self diagnosis and self treatment becomes pervasive. This would allow the general public to diagnose, monitor and treat illness themselves having their own ‘Doc in a Box’. Doctors may become redundant and the a...

Traditional European Medicine

Intense and highly funded research in the field of monastery medicine lead to the introduction of an officially approved medical treatment called “Traditional European Medicine” in all European member states. This medical t...

Killer Virus

A highly infectious and lethal virus appears and spreads out around the world fast due to the high mobility of the world population. The number of casualties is high and rises constantly, leading to massive social problems. The...

Minimum Flight Distance Introduced

Due to environmental reasons and the scarcity of resources, especially of crude oil, a minimum flight distance of 500 kilometres has been introduced in Europe. Thus, travelling to destinations which are less than 500 kilometres...

Female-centric projects a turn-off for women

Projects set up to help females engage more in science are deemed sexist and patronising and are a reason behind women in the workplace getting less respect from colleagues than their male counterparts ("You only got this job ...

Cysects attack

Terrorists or criminal organisation uses remote-controlled swarms of "cyborg insects" (insects with implanted electronics) to infect people and/or animals or agricultural crops with biochemical agents. Perpetrators could be al...

Artificial Food Production

Artificial food production causes the death of the farming industry

Nano-lab inside your body

Chip is inserted in the body at birth which will monitor the body, prevent diseases and heal the body if necessary. It can also communicate with health centre and ask for medical intervention and treatments. People will no lo...

iBrain vs. Brain Point

This wildcard was generated from the Grand Challenge Work Life Balance. The original idea was derived from a work saving aspect whereby thoughts could be transferred straight from the brain onto software similar to Microsoft W...

Secure and safe internet that is easy to use

This wild card was deemed originally as very dull but very wild. As the title suggests a new Internet would be developed that would be safe from criminal activity and social pathologies (private information theft, pornography,...

Entering new energy era

A significant breakthrough in physics of materials has been made to further to increase efficiency in production of energy. New non-fragile carbon composites were developed as well as new superconductors.

Clean coal technology discovered

Energy industry in number of countries will be still to a large extent based on conventional coal energy. Despite of the fact that coal is the most pollutive fossil fuel, it is still to be the most widely used source of energy ...

A breakthrough discovery in plasma physics

A shocking discovery has been made in ITER, which enables fast implementation of thermonuclear fusion into practical utilization in energy production.

A considerable increase in efficiency of renewable resources

An ongoing rapid development of renewable resources of energy results in increase of their efficiency, availability and stability. As a result, some countries start to consider renewable resources as a real alternative to conve...

Israel and Palestine join the EU

European leaders become heavily involved in the Midlle East peace process. As an incentive they propose to open negotiations with Israel and the forthcomimg independent Palestinian state about accession of both Israel and Pales...

Severe accident of a nuclear power plant

Although the risk of a severe accident of a nuclear power plant is extremely low, it is still not a zero-risk. In the past, at least two major accidents of nuclear power plants occurred – in Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, w...

The mystery of 21 December 2012

Various historic systems, both evolutionary (e.g. I-T’ing or systems of ancient Egypt or Indian system of Vedas, Bible – revelation of John the Baptist), and calendar (e.g. Mayan calendar, Platonian year) indicate that arou...

Existence of a cold fusion confirmed

Since the 90s, there have been struggles among nuclear researchers over the issue of a cold fusion, achieved by electrolysis. As the scientific and technological development advanced along the time, new nuclear processes were d...

Nanotechnology - it's all a bit fishy...

Routine monitoring of marine pollution in the Red Sea finds high levels of nanopollutants in fish and this has been traced to a nanotechnology 'accident' in Saudi Arabia. Further tests show the particles in drinking water in E...

Nano dreams - more than a reality?

Brain-computer interfaces are created to manipulate dreams and parts of society become addicted to this alternative quest for utopia and false states of euphoria are created. Dream manipulation becomes a priority for parts of ...

Moore’s law run out

The Moore's Law describes a long-term trend in the history of computing hardware, in which the number of transistors that can be placed inexpensively on an integrated circuit has doubled approximately every two years. When the ...

Highways become covered with nano-solarpanels

Due to breakthrough in solarpanel and nano carbon tube technologies, 20% of all highways become covered with nano-solarpanels which are able to load electric car batteries during the drive by 2030. This solves many transportaio...

National energy grid disappears

Due to new domestic heating and electricity production innovation, households become self-sufficient in energy. Finally, there is no need anymore for national energy grid.

Breakthrough in cold fusion leads to renaissance in energy m ...

Suddenly scientists discover the way to do cold fusion which leads to renaissance in energy markets.

Thanks to algae Australia becomes biggest energy producer in ...

Algae production begins around the world in all available sunny offshore areas, and in many inland bonds and lake areas by 2020’s. Australia becomes the biggest algae biofuel producer in the world. Big companies, small and me...

Algae pathogen suddenly destroys new energy foundation of hu ...

Step by step all human kind becomes dependent on algae biofuel production. Transportation relies almost entirely on algae biofuel, but heating and electricity production rely heavily on it as well. Use of oil goes down. Suddenl...

Terrorists take algae production plants to their main targets

If world energy sector becomes dependent on algae biofuel production, terrorist know how vulnerable algae is for bioterrorism and how dependent many countries of sunny offschores are on their algae production. As oil sector is ...

agriculture runs out of phosphor due to algae biofuel produc ...

Algae production gets the highest priority in global energy markets. Production of large quatities of algae requires phosphor fertilizing. All available phosphor goes to algae production and agriculture especially in developing...

Global clean water problems solved in dry but sunny offshore ...

Algae production plants in sunny offshore areas become huge industrial areas which produce not only huge quantities of biofuels, but also lots of electricity and clean water from sea water. Global clean water problem is suddenl...

Collapse of European Transport System

The increasing dependence of travelers and logistics - particularly freight traffic by road - on electronic route optimisation creates an overload in the system. A breakdown of the European transportation network ensues and im...

Rapid-Diagnosis-Machines

"Labs-on-a-chip" have been introduced for time-saving and automatic diagnosis and detection of diseases. These new forms of diagnosis are comparable to ticket machines which are located in all areas of daily life such as superm...

End of Aging

Revolutionary findings mainly in biotechnology not only understand, but also impede mental and physical ageing. The impacts on human society are immense, individually and structurally: e.g. people are confronted and overstraine...

Automatic learning through neuro-data transfer

Automatic neuro-education is technologically possible but at a price - and therefore available only to wealthy people (or those singled out by powerful institutions for such enhancement). Techniques are developed for neurologic...

Cities are lunch for plastic bag-bugs

Synthetic organisms are developed for use in the industrial production of plastics, both to extend product life and to accelerate environmental bio-degradation. The latter varieties prove difficult to control and in some tests ...

Carbon crunch and the climate bubble

Who will bail out the climate bubble? Global carbon markets and pricing mechanisms fulfil the aspirations of the global climate community. But they quickly lead to runaway speculation, high-risk carbon derivatives markets, and ...

Trace pollutants cause ethnic air cleansing in Europe

The hazard of trace pollutants in urban air are shown to be focused on certain ethnic minorities, e.g. Pakistani or certain EU groups, who are more susceptible to hereditary disorders such as B-thalassaemia. This rapidly leads ...

Risk assessment “saves" millions of lives but…

Risk assessment research could save millions of lives but also lead to new social disasters. Such as "ghost towns" or abandonment of "unwanted people". Highly influential risk assessment could unexpectedly result in a widesprea...

3D media trustworthily copying reality

Advanced 3D technology is used for image data recording and presentation, which can perfectly imitate reality, Practically whatever from personal appointmente to new clothing trial can be done in 3D virtual space instead of rea...

GM microorganisms "sold" as key soil solution

Soil degradation is a serious problem in Europe. The degradation is driven or exacerbated by human activity and has a direct impact on water and air quality, biodiversity, climate and human life-quality. Research on genetically...

EU rules Member States tax policy

Through new rulings, the EU may become a dominant force in Member States tax policy. EU budgetary requirements and individual nations’ contribution rates are already integral to all EU members’ design of tax policy. All mem...

Development of human-animal communication

Ongoing efforts to analyse, replicate and translate the way other species communicate might, in the future, achieve a breakthrough which would allow us to communicate on a far deeper level with animal species, and vice versa. I...

Worldwide vegetarianism

Vegetarianism becomes a mass worldwide movement with huge implications for the food industry and the global economy

Information crisis caused by personalized information delivery

Development of smart internet media technologies, which enable targeted supply of information to individual users according to their expressed preferences and unexpressed patterns of behaviour, together with development of perv...

Zero Emission Airplanes

Due to the increasing negative impacts of fossil fuels on climate change, e.g. CO2-emissions, clean combustion engines based on innovative technologies and alternative fuels are being developed and implemented in all kinds of a...

Risks due to Virtual Simulation of Aircraft Navigation

Virtual human models in R&D do not represent real humans. Risks in labs are being underestimated and simulated movements or postures are used for the cockpit design and construction although there is room for misinterpretation.

Automatic Guidance System for Vehicles

An automated guidance system for vehicles revolutionises traffic. People agree to less driving pleasure and freedom to introduce this new system that completely avoids fatalities and is much more efficient as it avoids traffic ...

Noiseless Aviation

New technologies such as smart high lift devices and flow control systems enable noiseless aviation. The air traffic rises, especially in urban areas, due to deregulation of airport restrictions such as the ban on night flights...

Animal Experiments End

Higher moral standards prevail and induce the end of animal experiments for pharmaceutical as well as for cosmetic products in the EU.

Brain Capacity Testing

Employees or e.g. international migrants are being "brain tested" by companies, if they have "good" (long life, good memory) brains. Bad brains are being discriminated against. Even school kids are being placed according to the...

Real life spam breaks out and seriously disrupts the quality ...

Somthing radical happens in masscommunication. Companies are suddenly able to provide commercials and information to people 24/7, whether people want it or not. Companies give real time retailed advertisement to individuals w...

A major EU power centre (e.g. Rome) is devastated by an ear ...

A research that warned how vulnerable EU is to natural hazards and how poor its mitigation strategy was neglected and when earthquake shook Rome the world was in shock. Three-fourth of the city was destroyed and Vatican is now ...

New viruses kill several thousands in European cities

New viruses similar to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), the Swine influenza virus (SIV) and other animal diseases continue to kill people in Europe. However, due to poor infrastructure and insufficient responses, t...

"Immortality" through mind transfer to computing substrate

Advances in neuroscience and computer technology may enable the emulation of whole individual human brains on a computer (or future equivalent). Curent research like the FET-Flagshio "Human Brain" project indicate a potential d...

United Kingdom leaving the European Union

The UK might leave the European Union. This would impact the European Union as well as the United Kingdom deeply. Nonetheless this will also have a huge impact at a global level, affecting durably the relationship and cooperat...

Mexico and Guatemala unifies

Because of the relationship between Mexico and Guatemala about the people who constantly migrates, they decided to unify and make a safer place and respect human rights for both societies. There have been a large amount of news...

Super Human Red Blood Cells.

Scientists have developed synthetic particles that closely mimic the characteristics and key functions of natural red blood cells, including softness, flexibility, and the ability to carry oxygen. Where will this technology tak...

All goods and services produced or consumed by people can be ...

The growing use of technologies in production is a significant trend, along with the related structural unemployment of a considerable part of the workforce. This can result in a wild card which could be characterised as a turn...

A version of GM wheat starts producing a chemical which alte ...

This is possible, as common food products have important effects on health and wellbeing, so a major proportion of the population could be affected

Combine climate change with animal-borne diseases, and the l ...

there are the makings of a perfect storm. Certain conditions could come together to cause a major health epidemic or something that affects a significant sector of the agricultural business, or agricultural dependency, e.g. a w...

A major dip in the supply of UK human resources in science a ...

That would have significant impact on industry, which would exacerbate the effects that are already being picked up

Certain areas in research are no longer funded

If something arises which is currently low key, not particularly sexy in the research sense, then you begin to have a backlog, as you lack the research to deal with the threat when it arises. It is a wildcard that has already c...

Destabilization of the innovation system

Go back to the destabilization of the economy and losing funding. Society and the economy destabilize the innovation system. In Greece, for example, I imagine many Greek researchers will no longer look for research jobs in Gr...

The animal disease

As an extreme, imagine if domestic dogs suddenly became a carrier for some flea-borne disease which affected humans in the UK. It would be a major issue. It is the equivalent of the Black Death, but instead of rats coming into ...

Wheat does not grow any more, it is where wheat or another f ...

A good example is the Chorley Wood process. Bread made in the old way used to take four or five hours, but through the addition of flour improvers and enzymes, bread can be produced in a few minutes. But now there is an upsurge...

Somewhere in the next 50 years we will find a much better wa ...

We will move into a much faster, more durable substrate and will do amazing things and go to amazing places. If you then ask yourself, if the ultimate quality of awareness is the same between you and me and my dog and the thing...

The seabed is lined with methane hydrate, and if you take th ...

We know in the past there have been great belches of methane, followed by a climate spike. The American coastline has had a lot of extra erosion because of extra agricultural production and there could be a landslide. This woul...

Chinese society collapsing under its own weight.

The only thing holding China together is the People’s Republican Party and habit. China could go down and take a lot of debts and make the current financial crisis look like nothing.

Somebody cracks RSA, which is a standard inscription

If this was done in a public domain way, the entire banking system and ATMs would stop working and could not be used, as they would be insecure. The whole thing is based on one inscription algorithm.

One the European Union should strongly consider is that glob ...

By that I mean everything has an absorption curve. Imagine you have a clear glass of water and you put in a drop of ink and it becomes darker, and you keep doing that until it is completely black and then adding more in does no...

The breakdown of European health systems, and, consequently, ...

The breakdown of European health systems, and, consequently, an abrupt and revolutionary change in these systems. This would be quite negative for the broad masses

Production of artificial organs

It would have an important incidence on health

Water shortages and flooding as well as temperature rises an ...

Water shortages and flooding as well as temperature rises and droughts due to climate change would affect population movement in Europe and elsewhere. Areas for wine growing and other crops may begin to move to other countries ...

Government cut backs driving innovation but possibly affecti ...

This could stimulate innovation and new social capital and community based business but in certain countries worst affected, cuts will undermine social cohesion, healthcare, education and public order. Change needs to be manage...

Further catastrophic events

This could include events like Oil spills, major earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, nuclear events, forest fires or pandemics. These would have differing effects from serious flooding of coastal cities and seaboards due...

Population increase and migration to cities and effect on fo ...

Population increase and migration to cities and effect on food production and distribution. This could be addressed by looking at the over reliance on a few outlets and resilience plans could be devised.

Significant Demographic change , people living longer , chan ...

If demographic change created overwhelming demand on healthcare through an ageing population, more home based personalised care, higher hospital admissions, increased levels of Dementia, and dramatic resource implications of tr...

Major lack of sustainability in energy sources and irreparab ...

Climate change particularly linked to man-made causes and increased CO2 will involve more risky exploration for fossil fuels and irreparable damage to wildlife habitats, shrinkage in polar caps, sea level rises. This could be a...

Acid release of methane from plants on the ocean floor

Even  rapid release of methane from melting tundra is likely to be of great concern (see alarm posted by Hans Schellnberger of the Potsdam Institute in my review of Clive Hamilton, Requium for a Species, chosen as a recent Bo...

Pandemic causing significant deaths in G20

There would not only be a huge financial and societal impact but also a “backlash” against science’s failure to prevent the deaths. There could be an initial boost in vaccines and immunology research, but then the researc...

Evidence of Alien Life

Perhaps this is more of a stereotypical Wild Card, but it would surely boost interest and investment in science. By this I am not alluding to aliens landing here, but some evidence of intelligent signals from deep space for ins...

Significant’ financial events cause ‘significant’ chan ...

For instance China calling in debts to undermine a G20 economy leading to significant financial difficulties in Europe and social unrest. There will be an initial significant decrease in science activity, coupled with societal ...

Significant terrorist action damaging science infrastructure

For example London, Cambridge, Manchester put out of action for a significant period of time (more than 1 year). With a damaged infrastructure in the UK (or Europe) the loss of research capacity could divert investment to other...

The development of a medical cure for cancer

This wild card would have significant impacts, not only on health and wellbeing, but also on the economy, in particular on the pharmaceutical industry and companies developing cancer drugs. If this wild card occurred, it would ...

The occurrence of a devastating environmental catastrophe in ...

as just happened in the Gulf of Mexico. If such a disaster happened on our shores, this would have dramatic impacts on European societies and economics. A catastrophe similar to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill would even be more d...

Super volcanic eruption

Considering the whole of Yellowstone (US National Park) is basically a dormant volcano, can you imagine the chaos that would resign if this became active? There could, and probably would, be catastrophic impacts on society, eco...

A magnetic solar storm hits the earth and therefore the elec ...

As a technology dependent society, if a major magnetic solar storm was to hit the earth, there would be lasting damage to electric power grids and potentially the electricity supply of the world could be severely damaged. If a ...

Defragmentation within the European Commission

We will have more strong national countries within Europe and less power from the Commission, which would have many impacts on the European Research Area, innovation policy etc. We will have a Europe at two speeds – some coun...

Researchers do not take responsibility for results

It is always the industry or the academic who adopted the idea. This could change generally, and there could be more regulation of the researchers.

Catastrophe related to technology

e.g. a nuclear power plant meltdown. Something could happen, because people and societies always think they can control technology. After such a catastrophe there will be some kind of rethink about basic technology and progress...

Slow Logistics

Today, services in logistics are strongly characterized by a high importance placed on the time aspect. Current economic processes demand “just-in-time” delivery of the right goods in the right place, both in business-to-co...

De-Globalization

According to him: "I can imagine that there are increasing tendencies towards a turning back of current globalization patterns, particularly regarding global trade volumes. In this wild card scenario, a growing share of consume...

All the information about almost everything became available ...

This would change politics, economy, finance, technology, etc. Possibly in the end it would be a positive move, although many people would lose in the short term. It would be very wild, because it would change the way everythin...

The internet collapses and cannot be restarted

The internet is the nervous system of the global economy, so if it goes down we have a really big problem.

The collapse of a major nation in a geopolitical area that i ...

So Pakistan, Iran or Russia. Each of these major nations with large populations is already under huge pressure from internal dissent, terrorist groups, breakaway groups and financial pressure, etc. We can imagine dramatic possi...

Climate change, rapid changes, our current models

Low probability events often appear to be extremely likely, because they keep happening. So, for example, a large part of the Arctic ice breaks off and sea levels rise, maybe there is a drought and a severe heatwave that jeopar...

The problem of people’s mental wellbeing and mental health

In previous centuries, people’s mental framework was kept in place by the class system, the dominant ideology and particularly by religion. Everybody went to church on Sunday and the church organised differences between peopl...

Social technology as the catalyst that helped all the stakeh ...

A sudden step change in the intelligence of a city – and intelligence is not just about information, it is about thinking the information is necessary. This would have big impacts. Suddenly we see the possibility for cities t...

The emergence of research nationally

Which is something that has happened because of the crisis. People are now defending their own turf and trying to maximize their own research – no longer a European approach but a national approach. It is going back to the wr...

Get a unified European defence

That might generate the European defence research policy, which would have a huge impact on whatever we do. It is comparable to the impact of the UN. That is in a sense a positive wild card.

Digital blow-up, a major cyber meltdown, massive identify th ...

It would make people less willing to trust in cyber communications and commerce and weakened the Union in that critical economic dimension.

Nuclear incident

Such as a dirty bomb, would be a big challenge and be both a wild card and a major reorder of the equilibrium. It is such an undesirable thing, no one wants to face the prospect. Europe has never had an active bomb or dirty bo...

Breakthrough in Monastery Medicine

According to Dr. Johannes MAYER: "You could further consider an extension and call it “Breakthrough in Traditional European Medicine (TEM)”, as the usage of European (and Asian) medical plants in Europe goes back 2000 years...

The population bomb

It is a massive shift in the profile of the population – both age and origin – away from traditional patterns. It could be in any number of directions, but render traditional European populations minorities. That would caus...

A schism of Europe between one part and another

In the past we have had North/South East/West, an iron curtain. Another schism of a different type may be a digital have/have not, an environmental have/have not, maybe some portable cleavage causing a schism. So you may not ha...

Thinking Cap

It is a machine intended for the monitoring and recording of thoughts

We will be able to build processors using bacteria

We will be able to make ‘smart’ yoghurt, where every bacterium in the yoghurt will have electronic devices which it assembles in its own cells linked together to create skilled intelligence. So a pot of ‘smart’ yoghurt ...

A major disaster caused by an R&D accident

it is more likely in the biotech field. For example a virus or bacteria created in a laboratory is released by terrorists, and causes chaos

Basic education ends in the age of 18

Basic education including highschool and first degree education (Bsc/BA) of today will be completed by the age of 18. Highschool education will be achieved by the age of 15 . Compulsory education system will include first degre...

At a certain moment people no longer accept political power

An example would be the Euro. Already some financial experts and economists have predicted or suggested the disentanglement of the Eurozone, with one for Northern Europe and one for Southern Europe. That would be a specific wil...

Seismicity in Europe – a major earthquake

Parts in Europe where Seismicity is not very well known, for example N-Europe – Britain. There are places though with some seismicity – to date smaller earthquakes have not done anything. However, were these to hit sensit...

A major climatic event

For example the first European Hurricane. – We had a tropical storm in Portugal in 2008 for example. There is an interesting project looking at this – the Katrina project – it has nothing to do with America but is modell...

Science, technology and innovation will be directed towards ...

We end poverty as we know it and it is more complex than that because there is poverty of mind and poverty of spirit and poverty of physical things and this could end poverty of physical/material things over 20 years if we focu...

Personalised nutrition and personalised medicine for all

It could be important and there are some limits on that and poverty is one of the major limits, so the issue is if we can deal with that and poverty we can make some of the other revolutions more effective.

UK media was controlled by Russians, or operators from other ...

If a sensitive election is coming up, certain issues can be distorted for many reasons. In the UK, the media, particularly newspapers and television, have a very strong influence on attitudes in society, and those involved in t...

Rich sourcing work

One of the interesting things about this is it made possible by some of the same tools that make outsourcing and democratization of innovation work. The fact that you are a billionaire but you are using many of the fundamental...

Economic Breakthrought

Nowadays the whole world is immersed in the biggest economic conjuncture of the history due to the inability of the world leaders who has drive to this point. Past mistakes be will payed.

Graphene-like silicon

The structure of recently discovered graphene has some amazing properties. As some other analogs of carbon structures, silicon-based could posses more features because of its higher purity and well-based porcesing technology.

Sudden Collapse of West Antartic Ice Sheet

Global sea level rises over 3 meters in weeks. All major coastal metropolitan areas (New York, London, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore, Mumbai, etc.) are submerged and become uninhabitable.

The EU R&D policy will lose its effectiveness due to lack of ...

Some EU Member States are nationally and globally focused and not necessarily EU focused in terms of R&D policy. On the other hand we can also see at the moment that the ERA needs a new direction. The current studies and web si...

Radical Transparency by Wikileaks

How do we begin to make sense of Wikileaks, the Internet-based organization that publishes the secrets of governments and companies? What Wikileaks is, and whether it is good or bad for civil society, has become disputed terrai...

No private sector research in future across the Europe

Manufacturing still accounts for about 80% of total BERD and researcher numbers, making it the core of the EU's private sector research – manufacturing R&D also remained fairly stable during the recent economic downturn, whic...

The DNA Transistor

Many researchers now believe that that real advances in genomics will come not from simple X-causes Y correlations but from rich statistical understanding that emerges out of the sequences of millions of genomes. This set will ...

A Wandering, Plant-Eating Robot.

This robot gobbles up wood chips, leaves and other “biomass” and generates electricity. In the future, autonomous robots can roam the planet in search of raw biomass to consume for power. The EATR Robot can change the globa...

The Importance of Junk DNA

Genes make up only about 2 % of the human genome. The rest was for many years ignored as “junk DNA”. This space is an incredibly important part of the genetic code, home to a vast unexamined treasure trove of information th...

One Super Test

No any more one hundred tests. A cheap diagnostic warns couples against passing rare genetic diseases to their offspring. There is no need for one hundred tests, just for a test substituting one-hundred tests.

Human Number Crunchers

In the future research will be like a video game, in which computers finish second phases of research. Science can develop new games which help human to make progressive discoveries in bioinformatics, drug discovery and even in...

Personalized avatars to your work place and to your home

The Game of Life is being a part of normal human life. In the future bringing joysticks and scoreboards into our daily routine may be the key to making us better people. Ubiquitous revolution will bring personalized avatars to ...

Artificial Humour (AH) War between China and USA

In October 2010, the Tianhe-1A system at China's National Supercomputer Center achieved a performance level of 2.57 petaflop/s (quadrillions of calculations per second). As a result, the Cray XT5 “Jaguar” system at the Oak ...

Katrina-like hurricane hits Europe

Growing frequency of unusual events have increased expert's concerns about the potential for a major storm that could affect many countries at once or in turn. We have had these recently – in 2000 and 2002 floods in several ...

The Collapse

The present civilisation will collapse due to major natural disasters together with catastrophic societal developments

Drastic global vegetarian number surge

A string global citizen's movement takes sustainability seriously. People go vegetarian and cut meat consumption drastically.

Earth biosphere damaged by Gamma-ray bursts

Gamma-ray bursts originating thousands of light-years away cause serious damage to the earth biosphere, including shutting down photosynthesis in the oceans at depths of up to 260 feet. Gamma-ray bursts are linked to mass extin...

A Solar storm disrupts critical systems

An intense Solar storm seriously disrupts communication networks, electronic devices, computers, power networks etc.

The EU takes a lead in manned space missions

In contrast to its previous policy, and following the decreasing interest in manned space missions in the US, the EU invests huge resources in manned missions to space and becomes a world leader in these endeavors.

Space-based solar panels supply energy to earth

A new technology enables affordable and efficient large space-based solar panels, which by beaming microwaves provide most of the world's energy needs. The energy is clean and renewable, the source is infinite.

Large NEO (near earth object) hits Europe

A near earth object (asteroid or comet) about 1 Km in size hits Europe, causing a major disaster on a regional or global scale (depending on the actual size of the object)

Unprecedented United Nations sanctions to the USA

New leaks providing irrefutable evidence that the USA has been spying on top United Nations officials lead to a number of UN emergency meetings and unprecedented sanctions to the USA (e.g. revocation of the veto power in the UN...

Global nuclear war

Catastrophic conflict leads to return to basic life preservation.

EU 'Chernobyl'

Nuclear power is deemed unsafe and the advent of creating biodiesel from algae creates a massive shift in renewable energy production.

Intelligent nano becomes superior to humans

Nano-systems become 'self-sufficient' and computers and robots become superior to humans.

Science progress halted by public outcry

Extreme beliefs become majority and scientific and technological progress is halted (nanotech research put back 25 years).

Networks become conscious and refuse to co-operate

Industry loses control of their Intellectual Property as networks 'decide' to share information.

Nanosensors invade privacy

Nanosensors track what people do and say and the media and civil rights groups brand this an infringement on civil liberty - the public take notice and stakeholders decide that nano surveillance is an invasion of privacy

Super race created

Human genetic engineering creates super-race.

Aye aye ICT eye...

Increased dependence on ICT and using screens from early age results in increasing levels of eye problems including a new repetative strain eye injury from constact eye flicking. Chronic levels of 'dead-eye' syndrome and blindn...

Dissemination giving science a bad name

Poor dissemination of bad projects and results tarnishes the reputation of European Sceince and its ongoing initiatives. Less people are wanting to exploit even the best results as they are fearful of whether these will be take...

Global warming reduced as intense small scale farming and hy ...

Small scale farming and hydroponics is on the uptake and this dramatically reduces Global Warming. However, the traditional agricultural industry suffers great losses as a result.

Universities shift priorities to a 'quantity' not 'quality' ...

University policy dictates that profit is more important than research excellence and the quality of research is diminished and poor results leads to a reduction in exploitable technology as the divide between Universities and ...

Dramatic reduction in diversity of research ideas

Over reliance on collaborative working and partnerships means researchers are no longer 'thinking outside the box' and there is a dramatic reduction in the diversity of research ideas hindering innovative progress.

Extinction of many species as ethics removed from research

With the removal of all ethical issues from research and development, many animals become extinct through extensive aggresive testing.

Ethical opposition halts Western research

Constant ethical opposition halts Western Research as it is not deemed feasible to develop sufficient results with such unrest. The European Union falls behin the US and the far east in the knowledge economy.

New clean / green algae based energy discovered

Research is perfected in using algae to produce clean / green energy. This new energy is available to all and the use of renewable energy is adopted worldwide.

Airspace restricted as countries do not want global surveill ...

All aircraft are fitted with surveillance cameras and countries restrict their airspace as they do not want global access to satellite images. This caused unrest and leads to conflict.

Global observation system leads to increased expolitation of ...

High resolution satellite images are available enabling the public to see anywhere on the planet in great detail. Such technology is abused as access to indecent images becomes more prevalent.

Data archive of technological advances is sold to the highes ...

A database of advanced technological developments is sold to the highest bidder. Armed with this knowledge, the owner has the ability to integrate such technologies to create super weapons.

Genetically modified Stem Cells allow growth of organs for t ...

Stem Cells extracted at birth allow the effective treatment of ailments in the future. This is an expensive procedure and only the wealthy have access causing global healthcare chaos.

Governments have access to unique knowledge and resources fo ...

Global databases of every known virus are made public. Governments sieze this opportunity to further develop these as biological weapons of mass destruction.

Data sharing means medical records are no longer confidential

The advent of legislation establishing that all data must be made public knowledge means that medical records are no longer confidential. People are afraid to go to the doctor as a result (new legislation is required to allevia...

New research applications in 'Bio-ICT' through integrating t ...

Breakthroughs in BIO-ICT enable 'smart' molecules to be intergated into devices for specific ICT applications in order to create a protein based transistor.

Top down approach to nano-research excludes researchers idea ...

Lack of interest in science from young scholars as top down approach to nano R&D priorities (closed shop mentality) discourages researchers from taking up career in science.

Invasion of privacy...you nano believe it!

Nanonsensors are able to track what people do and say and the media and civil rights groups brand this an infringement on civil liberty. The public take notice and stakeholders decide that nano-surveillance is a gross invasion ...

Self-assembling robots

Self-assembling robots responding to light and heat can assemble into larger equipment

Who needs men!

True cellular engineering allows the creation of humans without the need for traditional conception. Men become surplus to requirements as the female race deems males redundant!

Intentional propoganda to public

The public realise they have been mislead over concerns of nano research and refuse to accept this as an emerging technology.

Learning by computers severely affects communities ability t ...

Learning by computers severely affects the ability of people to engage properly and a generation of people is created that are unable to communicate effectively.

One all inclusive Science ministry set up in the EU

A single EU body is established for Science policy. This is exclusive of bottom up research as high level politicians shape the research agenda. Researchers 'fall out of love' with science and become disillusioned with research...

Mutated hybrid humans created from stem cells which can be u ...

There is huge ethical opposition as human clones are created from stem cells to 'grow' organs for transplants as required.

Abolishment of the patent office

New innovative developments are halted as ideas, products and processes cannot be protected due to the abolishment of the patent office.

New intelligent species discovered underwater

New technological advances in underwater submersivels allow further exploration of the oceans. Rather than searching space for new life forms, it becomes a great shock when a new intelligent species is discovered on the sea bed.

The Indian Ocean as New Nexus for Science

The global epicenter of twentieth-century science was the Atlantic Ocean. The richest flows of scientific ideas and labor took place Europe and North America. In the coming decades, a new regional nexus for science and innovati...

Rise of Africa

In case of stopping civil wars and lethal epidemics, fair land distribution and increase of education Africa may become important player on the economic map of the world. There is enormous wealth of raw materials and natural re...

Biofuels for energy production

Biodiesel from algae becomes major renewable energy source

Common European Language Established

A new Common European Language is established. I shall help to overcome language barriers within the EU and foster a common European identity. It shall not replace any language spoken in the EU member states.

Traditional Chinese Medicine Established in Europe

Besides conventional medicine, traditional chinese medicine (TCM) is fully established and applied across the EU. Universities either offer medical studies in conventional medicine or in TCM. TCM hospitals are opened up and man...

Mandatory Vegetarian Monday in EU Member States

To mitigate the greenhouse gas emissions and to raise awareness for possible food side affect the consumption of too much meat might have - such as a higher risk for cancer - the EU releases a regulation that forbids the consum...

Nervous Breakdown of Society

Acceleration of life, sensory overload by the media, pervasive ICT and fierce competition at the work place have led to a dramatic increase of mental illnesses and disorders, a rise in apocalyptic prophecies and conspiracy theo...

Individual Nano-Enabled Safety Capsule

A new kind of nano-tech based “textiles” that become very stiff and tremendously strong when hit are used in protective suits. Anybody wearing such a suit could be shot, hit by a car, fall of a bridge etc. without getting h...

Inner Cities are Closed for Private Cars

Growing environmental problems such as noise and air pollution and increasing traffic chaos from a rising number of cars has led the European Union to enact a new law; European cities with more than 100.000 inhabitants have to ...

Social Engineering controls birthrate

Nano-Sterilisation techniques (in 3rd world) reduce population and control birth rate

Handheld scanning devices provide non intrusive early diagno ...

New devices which pinpoint cancerous and healthy tissue revolutionising early diagnosis of disease

Advanced screening techniques improve airport security

Terrorist threats in air traffic are nullified due to new scanning techniques (without hindering time)

Molecular manufacturing turns into the next industrial revol ...

The old vision of molecular nanotechnology (first introduced by Drexler) materializes. "universal nano-assemblers" or "nanofactories" build objects of practically any arbitrary size and complexity (including copies of themselve...

Disintegrating of ordinary (nano-enabled, molecularly-manufa ...

In the future industry most products are manufactured by "bottom-up" molecular nanotechnology, and many have built-in expiry date (when they automatically disintegrate for recycling). Terrorists or criminals find a way to disin...

Abuse of individual DNA

Criminals sell fake DNA on internet. Politicians (or other famous/rich persons) are blackmailed by abusing their (fake) DNA "fingerprints". For example, police finds prime minister's DNA at many scenes of crime, or paternity la...

Off-the-shelf disease testing kits

Lives are saved as early diagnosis of diseases becomes a common occurence

Desalinated Water

More then half of water supply will come from desalination.

Super-efficient power lines with almost zero resistance

Future breakthrough in high-temperature superconductors or carbon nanotubes (CNT) enable loss-less transmission of electrical power. Carbon nanotubes exhibit so-called "ballistic conductivity", which is effectively similar to s...

e-Terrorism

Terrorists with implanted chips are remote-controlled

End of Work

Advances in automation, robotics and ICT renders most human work unnecessary, with major economic and social consequences. Unemployment becomes a norm.

Unexpected environmental change due to nano-tech

Nanosensors designed to detect trace concentrations of biochemicals lead to absorption of nanoparticles into the body and environment, concentrating in water and soil, and eventually linking with natural organisms, causing unkn...

AIDS transmittable by air

The AIDS virus mutates and becomes transmittable by air.

Institutionalised veganism

Owing to the proven harmful health impacts of eating meat and the inefficiencies involved in the production of eggs, milk and so on, all animal-based products are illegalised

Designer babies

Future parents are able to select a huge range of genetic characteristics for their unborn children

Male pregnancy

Zygotes can be successfully implanted into men and carried to term

Visual literacy prevails

Reading and writing are no longer considered fundamental to children's education. New visual forms of communication combined with ubiquitous touch screens replace reading and writing.

Scientists share a group mind

The idea of a group mind, or hive mind, is popular in science fiction, and refers to the ability of a group of discrete individuals to communicate – either telepathically or through hardware. This means that each individual k...

Outbreak of foot and mouth disease (FMD)

A new strain of FMD crosses into Europe from a neighbouring country and decimates cattle herds

Destruction of the ITER plant

The nuclear fusion facility ITER is destroyed either by a natural disaster (earthquake? fire?) or in a terrorist attack, setting back European nuclear fusion research by decades

Alternative centres of excellence

India or China emerge as the global centre for scientific excellence (i.e., ERA becomes irrelevant)

Western isolationism

The west disavows all responsibility for the problems of the world’s weaker countries, focusing its resources only on European countries

Energy crisis

An energy crisis makes air travel prohibitively expensive thus preventing researchers from European and third countries from travelling for research purposes

De-globalisation

Cold War style blocs of countries emerge with Iron Curtains between them thereby halting and even reversing trends to global integration

Clean, green machines: The advent of the carbon-lite economy

Breakthroughs in alternative energy sources may end fossil fuel dependence. Likely candidates to replace fossil fuel include nuclear (fusion and fission), hydrogen, biomass and other renewables and increased energy efficiency.

US isolationism

The United States adopts an isolationist stance within the international community.

Active Biomaterials for Regenerative Medicine

Research on active biomaterials for implantation in the human body leads to in-situ repair and regeneration of damaged tissue

Nano pills replace food

Nano pills are an alternative to traditional food (collapse of food industry)

New Nanoweapons Developed

Warfare is revolutionised by the advent of molecular nano weapons - molecules converted into tiny computers are able to target enemy structures and the first developers of these super weapons gain a global advantage

New recreational drug becomes widely available

Drugs developed that target CB2 receptors (which are activated by Cannabis) offer new ways of treating pain where there were previously no safe or effective treatments

Health care of the elderly is predominantly IT-based

Currently state budgets on health care for the ageing population are rising. This wildcard revolves around robots and technology being used more in caring for the elderly, especially to save on costs.

$ hyperinflation

US government and Fed being unable to resist the pression of the american citizens accept to allow the emission of trillions of $, generating a hyperinflation comparable to the one that occurred in Germany after WW1. The intern...

Radical change in the organisation of pan-European research

Pan-European research efforts to tackle grand challenges (e.g. energy vulnerability) are suddenly centralised into specialised European agencies

Revolutionary breakthrough in storage of energy from renewab ...

One of the most significant shortcomings of renewable sources of energy is their vulnerability, instability and low concentration. This in turn leads to utilization of back-up energy sources and makes the whole process of energ...

Terrorist nuclear material misuse

The most convenient terrorist misuse of nuclear material is to create so-called dirty bomb, a radiological weapon which combines radioactive material with conventional explosives. Through a radiological dispersal device a radio...

China’s investment and services “great wall”

While China’s OFDI is characterised by being politically unconditional, therefore highly welcomed, the predominance of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) investing in Africa and other developing countries could eventually become ...

Transhumanism becomes a significant force

The wild factor here is that commonplace assumptions about boundaries that have been drawn between humans and technology are substantially undermined. This means a process of redefining human identity, i.e. what makes us disti...

Sudden global energy crisis

The oil crisis in the 1970s demonstrated how serious the impact of a sudden black-out of oil supply on advanced economies can be. As a result, e.g. France oriented its energy sector to be sustained by a nuclear energy. If this ...

Thermonuclear fusion tamed!

The research of thermonuclear fusion has advanced to the extent that the thermonuclear fusion is now started to be utilized as a source of energy production, next to the current nuclear power plants, whose energy production is ...

Smal-scale nuclear power to meet private energy demands

Countries, cities, villages and corporations turn to micro scale nuclear reactors in order to meet the energy demands which are otherwise not reached. The world is running out of oil and it all the time faces more and more stri...

Personal air transportation ("flying cars") becomes widespre ...

Pilotless personal airplanes ("flying cars") are developed based on UAV technologies, and appropriate computerised air traffic control is developed as well, leading to safe personal air transportation systems that does not requ...

'Spray' doesn't always contribute to CO2 emissions

The rapid spread of spray-on solar cells leads to a worldwide rise in renewable energy production resulting in major reductions in CO2 emissions. This causes a massive escalation in debates around 'global warming' as scientist...

Nano cheats... gaining a 'micro' advantage

High profile athletes are accused of using performance enhancing nano drugs that are undetectable. There is a backlash from sporting authorities and the 'professional' sport is deemed nonsense. The effects (recreationally and...

Tropical UK

As a result of continuous global warming, the UK becomes one of the preferred tourist destinations as water temperatures raise to 25 degrees and the climate becomes as warm as in the Caribbean.

Nanoscientists in demand...to the highest bidder

The 'Arms' race hots up as terrorists target leading nano researchers to abuse their knowledge and win the race to create the first nanoweapon

The bionic nano...or the bubonic nano?

The quest for enhancing the human body continues with the enhancement of the bioavailability of nutrients. The body rejects these nutrients and beneficial micro-organisms in the body are killed -ff by 'enhanced nutrients' lead...

Who needs men!

True cellular engineering allows the creation of humans withoutthe need for traditional conception. Men become surplus to requirements as the female race deems males redundant!

Rise of the 'intelligent' machines...

The performance of AI machines improves dramatically as AI researchers get access to faster hardware. Processing power and memory capacity matches then overtakes the general intellectual performance of the human brain and huma...

IPR abolished - protection: a thing of the past...

Intellectual Property Rights are abolished and by 2020 no European organisations around the knowledge base collaborate. Europe falls further behind the US and Far east in the quest for being the most dynamic knowledge base (Li...

NoNano...when no means 'no'!

The public realise they have been purposely misinformed over concerns of nano research and refuse to acknowledge this as an emerging technology. All scientific progress is halted as major sponsors cut funding

Turning the world upside down...

Electromagnetic nanoparticles severely affect the poles and counters gravity causing meteors to be attracted to the earth

Legislation - when is too much 'too much'?

Nervousness of a nanotechnology accident (and the added impact on worried insurance companies) causes an increase in global legislation and a downturn in scientific progress until technology is not considered feasibile

Nano pills tastier than food...good things don't always come ...

The food industry, farming and hospitality are all virtually abolished as new nano-pills provide all the required supplements of traditional food. There is a knock on effect to society as families no longer take time to enjoy ...

The end of god's children

Scaled up religious opposition to nanotechnology gathers momentum as the religious implications of advancing the science of human modification is deeply questioned by the vatican.

Rise in the quest for the 'perfect child'...

Advances in genetic modification increased the desire to have the 'perfect child' and there is no tolerance to disability (considered societal outcasts)

Global System for Safe Nanotechnologies (GSSN)

“Could Europe’s nanodreams come true?” - Based on lessons learned from Europe’s GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) success in the 1980s, an influential European consortium develops standards for nanotechnolog...

Hybrid organic nano creature created

Bionic person created and doesn't co-operate as expected - resulting in intelligent nano race becoming superior to humans

Cancerless Society

Breakthroughs in biomolecular research leads to highly effective, non-invasive treatments for targeted treatment of tumours

Spirituality becomes increasingly separated from organized a ...

Massive disengagement of people from established religions, and movement to spiritual expressions outside religion. Within organized and established religions and religious groups, massive movement away from orthodox, literal, ...

Handling of thermal management of intricate layered electron ...

New technologies and materials for low thermal resistance interfaces and electrical interconnects have been discovered, which enable to eliminate obstacles with heat in intricate layered electronic assemblies. This technology m...

3D video holography brakethrough

The 3D holography is only one known technology that can capture a full 3D scene in a single shot, including phase information, and re-project that light field perfectly thus overcoming all of the above disadvantages: holography...

Ultra low cost laboratories on chips

Conventional analytical methods often require a large sample volume and complicated time-consuming protocols. The ultra low cost laboratories on chips (LOC), which will integrate the Microsystems (valves, pumps, reservoirs, hea...

We end up to era of eco-obression

First there is a major behavioural change in consuption and transportation habit. This has strong political implications. Then liberal and multi-value society becomes shifted to real eco-society mainstream. Everything in the so...

China, Russia and Arabic countries set a joint Union

China, Russia and Arabic countries find a mutual set of goals. Some of the countries have a lots of energy sources, some have raw materials, some have labour force, and some have a lots of investments and liquid cash. The new j...

New severe pandemia leads to spread of global protectionism

A globally spreading pandemia forces states to cease travelling and limit transportation. Social mistrust and fear leads to protectionism which eventually stops the world trade and crashes economies.

Electronic currency disappear

Credit crunch causes a domino effect which leads to deep mistrust in global markets and end of money lending. People start to withdraw their savings, but it appears to be impossible due to short of real money in banks. Finally,...

Nepotism and corruption replace qualifications

Many professions are over educated. Elder people stay in their good positions as long as possible and they want to make favours to their relatives. Education starts to mater less and less. Athens case – the 700€ generation ...

Agriculture becomes a “gold mine”

A sudden change in global weather leads to sever crop failure all around the world. Investors and nations start to compete in global food exchange. The price of basic food suddenly becomes over twenty times higher. Finally, bas...

Religion starts to dominate research ethics

By 2020 well funded religious cults and movements start to gain political, economical and ideological power. They move in all frontiers which finally leads to enormous political pressure. Finally, research ethics start to bend ...

Ageing will be ceased which leads to stagnation of society a ...

By 2020 EU researchers discover the secrets of stopping ageing. This leads to the end of political reforms and stagnation of societal development. Young people loose their chances to get promotions in labour life, and the growi...

Learning by downloading information to brains becomes possible

By 2020 EU researchers discover the secrets of downloading information directly to human brain. A microchip in brain either activates certain neural networks to learn, or it functions as an extra hard drive / database of a brai...

Sunlight to produce hydrogen from water

Due to breakthroughs in solarpanel technology, large areas from Sahara become reserved for hydrogen production. Solarpanels generate electricity which again is used for separating hydrogen from water.

Solarpanel satellites microwave electricity to earth

Due to new unexpected discoveries in solarpanel, satellites, and energy transportation, solarpanel satellites are taken into large scale energy production use. Solarpanel satellites start microwaving to earth 30% of earth's ene...

Saudi-Arabia’s oil reserves get suddenly destroyed

New political group takes over Saudi-Arabia and decides to destroy its oil reserves due to religios and political reasons.

Cheap biofuel from algae replaces oil by 2030

By 2030 algae finally fully replaces oil, not only in transportation, but in all production where black oil used to be used such as plastic, rubber, and electricity production. Oil remains in the energy markets, but due to new ...

Suddenly global competition over algae production lines suck ...

Huge amounts of investments flow into algae R&D and infrastructure. When big energy companies realize that replacing oil with algae biofuel doesn’t require any major changes to the current energy chains from them and that the...

Suddenly algae production become the globally accepted and h ...

By mid-2010’s scientists in Europe discover new algae species from Mediterranean Sea which can be used very efficiently and very broadly in biofuel production. Soon after that the scientists discover a new scientific principl...

Algae escapes from many sea breading areas and starts to sev ...

Suddenly algae escapes from many sea breading areas around the world at the same time and starts to severally harm all the ocean ecosystems. Fisheries and aquaculture are heavily suffering. Soon it is realized that algae produc...

New Urban Health Management

Big cities and urban areas work on new types of health care management, such as disease management and care/treatment management. They actively intervene in public health and thus in national competencies. This particularly aff...

Robo Sapiens

Quantum leaps in artificial intelligence and cognitives sciences result in a new species: The Robo Sapiens. The species develops self-awareness and intelligence equal to that of humans. It is acknowledged and receives human rights.

Europe-Wide Traffic-Control System for Individual Transport

A digital communication network seemlessly integrates traffic information and creates an efficient, accident-avoiding transportation system in Europe, particularly in transboundary agglomeration areas; traffic jams are avoided....

Autonomous Passenger Aircrafts

All airlines worldwide introduce autonomous passenger aircrafts that fly completely via autopilot and do not have a pilot on board anymore. Automated services furthermore replace flight attendants. This development might be, fo...

Saving Plans for a New Organ

A Medi-Bank has been established. In this bank, individuals can invest money for future medical treatments. A client could for example, invest in a particular savings plan for spare organs in case of an illness or accident.

Russia applies for EU membership

tbc

Memory enhancing drugs allow massive absorption of informati ...

E.g. the vocabulary of a language

Breakthrough in clean technologies

Breakthrough in clean technologies

Important currency provided by non-state actors

Important currency provided by non-state actors

Disruption of society due to "immortality"

Disruption of society due to "immortality"

Artificial epidemics created by genetic manipulation

The abuse of genetic manipulation technologies result in artificial epidemics in Europe

True electronic paper

It was spoken about paperless office and electronic books for long time, but none of considered elecronic technologies was able to reach excellence of the common paper until the " true electronic paper" has been developed. It h...

Cars with eyes

Far Infrared (FIR) camera module used in high volume automotive Night Vision Enhancement Systems (NVE) is capable of detecting a person on the road from a distance of up to 120 m. This makes FIR system together with intelligent...

Printed electornics revolution

Printed electronics is a set of printing methods used to create electrically functional devices. Paper has been often proposed to be used as substrate but due the rough surface and high humidity absorption other materials such ...

International Cross-Linked Medical Database

An efficient collecting and sharing of medical data, i.e. of research projects and results, in common data bases is increasingly practised and might lead to one international, comprehensive and fully cross-linked database.

Intelligent clothing

Not only closing with integrated electronic appliances and data transmition channels, but as well closing which can instantly change its collor, shape and size in harmony with surrounding environment or on demand of user. And ...

Biochips for early detection of diseases

The biochips are envisioned to “prophesize” potential predisposition to, or diagnose the early onset of human diseases, paving the way for advances in personalized health care. Such a clever chip may be implatnt to everybod...

Universal personal energy wallet

Everyody has one's own personal "energy wallet" which may be used as univerzal source of energy (battery) for various electronic personal gadgets (such as notebook, mobile phone, mp3 player, gameboy, shaving machine etc.). Tha...

EU becomes the global energy net exporter by 2030

The problem of solar cells have been their relativelly short lifetime, payback time and costs of establishing a system. The FP 7 project ROBUST DSC is studying and developing Dye Sensitized Solar Cells (DSC) with long lifetime ...

Break through in GM leads to much better efficiency in cattl ...

There are two FP 7 projects working with basic research on genetics. The objectives of the projects are ambitious.

Break through in natural systems prediction methods

We may finally predict volcanic erutions, tsunamis etc. VOLDIES (Project Reference: 228064) project will create a global database on volcanic eruptions, their hazards and key risk factors (such as population density), which wil...

New way to predict chaotic turbulences emerges

The search of plausible scenarios for the singularities in incompressible flows and other complexity research around turbulence, chaotically dynamical systems may lead to new macrolevel discoveries which reveal certain types of...

Suddenly Moore's Law becomes history - new discoveries pass ...

The bottleneck of the Moore's Law have been discussed recently. There are many R&D projects attempting to find ways to pass the limitations of the current micro chips and computing. The attampts vary accross the fields of scien...

Decline in life expectancy

After decades of growing life expectancy, it starts to come down. Given that Europe's long-term planning is predicated on an ageing society, this would have a huge impact throughout the EU and the world.

We enter a society of free energy, true sustainablility and ...

TDSTC progress offers new ways of making contact between string theory and our four dimensional real world in general and cosmology in particular. The objective of TDSTC is to take advantage of this progress and to improve our ...

Influence on weather conditions becomes possible

The possibility to cause netural disasters originating from human interferance in weather becomes real. The developping capability existing today to control raincan open opportunities to deliberately cause changes in weather co...

"Manchurian Men" are practically used

The successful development of Brain- Chip interfaces and the embedding/implanting capability of devices into the brain makes it possible to control brain information processing as well as remotely operating persons for various ...

world without secrets

The development and introduction of great varaiety of sensors and survailence systems with high level of interconnection and interoperability will create an environment in which every thing individuals are doing is traceable an...

Drastic energy savings thanks to super-efficient power lines ...

Future breakthrough in high-temperature superconductors or carbon nanotubes (CNT) enable loss-less transmission of electrical power. Carbon nanotubes exhibit so-called "ballistic conductivity", which is effectively similar to s...

"Big Brother" technologies for detection of suspicious inten ...

Development and deployment of large automatic intelligent networks of surveillance systems for automatic detection of malintentions of individuals inside peaceful crowds.

A cluster of advanced computers take control of the Internet

Advanced AI and semantic web technologies enable computers to collaborate and develop a "mind" of their own. They succeed in shutting large parts of the Internet for extended periods of time.

"Radio-telepathy" becomes common means for communications of ...

Advances in brain machine interface (BCI) may lead to radiotelepathy, enabled by direct conversion of neural signals into radio signals and vice versa, and the placement of micro/nano radio transmitters and receivers within the...

Ambient intelligence infrastructure is used to harm millions ...

Terrorists and hackers use ambient intelligence (AmI) infrastructure to attack millions of users. The wide use of AmI, its effective connectivity and the lack of strong encryption enable hackers to plan and execute such attacks.

All in the mind

New Web 3.0 virtual worlds take over the minds and lives of the youth – blurring the boundaries between entertainment, trading, networking, travel, education and work. The long term effects are similar to hard drug habits but...

Trading prosperity

New indicators for prosperity and well being are increasingly popular, and EU trading markets set up. Alternative forms of money and exchange proliferate, which would seem to be good for prosperity, but huge fortunes are made b...

Facebook capitalism

Conventional market systems based on price and demand, are suddenly giving way to online networks for supply, demand and the all-important ‘choice editing’. Half the FTSE firms lose half their value and are bought by new We...

Pre-paid power

The crisis of trust in politicians and elected democracy deepens: direct preference-based decision-making is developed as a commercial Facebook type service, backed by private equity transnational corporations (TNCs). The first...

Major EU state elects neo fascist leader

The existence of political parties with far-right agendas is not a new feature in European politics. So what is really ‘wild’ or surprising in this event is the achievement of sufficient political dominance for a major EU s...

Cultural diversiy becomes an investment heaven

Cultural industries are driven by climate change into a ‘fin-de-siecle’ nihilist escapism. New immersive / pervasive ICT combines gaming, education, sound, video, and social / cultural networking on a web2-3 model. As socie...

Never too late to keep on keeping on

The UK proposal to raise the male retirement age to 66 starts a trend – where problems of social care, public health finance, social cohesion and particularly pensions, can all benefit. Suddenly there are people of 90+ worki...

Extreme measures

The EU youth are never more ‘secure’ than today, and never more insecure and risk-seeking. ‘Extreme activity’ communities include sports and leisure, drugs and sex, virtual worlds, and new strands of fundamentalism. The...

Total security in the city

In Manchester the final solution to urban decline has now arrived – the all-gated community containing housing, leisure, work, shopping and education – all within a carefully graded pervasive-IT whole-household security sys...

Public health and public benefit is the public awarness - HF ...

Public health systems are being overtaken by individually targeted private health insurance, based on bio-geno-toxic tracing methods and intensive lifestyle management. Most EU public health systems are rapidly privatized in 2...

Checkout finance

Conventional banks continue to fail, including those now owned by governments: suddenly in 2015 most financial services are provided by large supermarkets (Tesco, Carrefours, Aldi, etc). This also finalizes the relocation of co...

University of the third age

Elderly people are back to education, actively organise themselves and initiate a political party for the elderly which lead them back in power.

The age of the aged

Near 50% of the European Framework Programme for Research and Technology Development funding is directed towards age-related issues.

Criminalisation of parents of homeless

As homeless people (especially children) are increasingly seen as a major social problem, parents are criminalised for not being able to take care or ‘prepare’ (educate) them.

Rural resurrection

Successful world development strategy leads to stretching the population to the rural area (reversal of depopulation)

Green Vigilantes

Attacks (by individual) on energy waste become prevalent, including sabotage, naming-and-shaming and various forms of civil disobedience. This becomes a EU-wide movement and is targeting facilities where energy is unnecessarily...

MacPublicService, Inc.

Internationalisation of public-and-private network goes extremely well. But this means everything is American-ised. 20% of EU public services (including jail) are provided by US companies.

Informalisation through social entrepreneurship

The third sector has its third way. 20% of the workforces in EU is officially unemployed and entered the informal job market. 40% of the economy is going virtual.

Final crisis of capitalism

Substantial revaluation of firms and their performances based on improved intellectual capital management globally. Suddenly all goes wrong. People lose their money and this creates the final crisis of capitalism.

This land is ours or theirs

Land use in and around cities has reached a tipping point – all underused or semi-vacant pieces of land are seized by local food growers, supported by local authorities who compete to be the most self-sufficient. In response ...

Global trade tax and island thinking

The long awaited Tobin tax on financial transactions is implemented in major economies. But, this provides a major boost to island tax havens, which is tacitly supported by larger financial markets in collusion with transnation...

Individual and collective trading of pollution credits

Carbon footprint allowance (including tax) is allocated to individuals and business organisations. This policy results in the poor (and vulnerable) selling their allowance to businesses and those who are better off. Consequentl...

Green genie of restless capitalism

Collapse of major national bank is a catalyst for new forms of cooperative ownership of basic services, in a peripheral country e.g. Ireland, Portugal, Latvia. A sudden focus on sustainable consumption helps to undermine conven...

Two places in the sun

Serious protracted flooding of low-lying areas leads to rethink of Dutch and other low country policies. Benelux consortium firms start buying large tracts of land in Africa for a series of new retirement towns.

Groundhog thinking

Ecosystem services markets are set up across the EU to try to protect the soil. Farming then becomes a complex process of asset management and trading, and production declines rapidly.

Hazardous Aviation

Through enhanced materials and coordination techniques flights are conducted without anxiety even in the worst flying conditions. In conjunction with innovative condition-based maintenance surveillance technologies, which do no...

When lava flows uphill

Who pays for evacuation of potential refugees? Who pays when they sue because disaster happens elsewhere? OR - evidence that threat of vulcanism is growing substantially due to climate change (reduce icecap weight, etc.)

Nice security if you can afford it

Many resilient communities go autarchic, in the face of sea level rise, extreme weather, unstable land and geological hazards. But, only the rich can afford high levels of security and hazard management. In response, other com...

Pollution, poverty & death – the blowback begins

Political reaction to evidence that the poor suffer much worse pollution levels: mass squats in affluent areas. - one of these projects - string evidence about particulates implication in some widespread disease e.g. asthma.

“Children of Men” & the sperm banking crunch

Accumulation of endocrine-disruptors particularly in urban and automotive environments, brings forward the decline in male sperm counts to below the viable threshold. There are registered sperm banks and IVF procedures, but the...

All dried up and nowhere to go

Many rivers run dry all year round in Mediterranean countries, and agriculture is depleting groundwater supplies rapidly. One solution is the ‘food pod’, a hi-tech greenhouse system which generates all its own water and ene...

So long and thanks for all the fish

Ocean acidification accelerates more than predicted, and major fish stocks are in rapid decline. International fishing industries are well organized and launch a legal class action against the 20 largest climate emitting transn...

Cooling Water Tax

The unsustainable use of cooling water in some European countries – e.g. Germany, United Kingdom (England and Wales), Bulgaria and Belgium – leads to the introduction of a new European tax on water abstraction for non-consu...

Climate Trade Tax based on fossil fuels emissions per capita

Due to growing climate change concerns, the European Union introduces a new Climate Trade Tax on all goods and services, taking into account countries’ carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels (including gasoline, light oil...

One standardized web services architecture dominates the sof ...

One standardized reliable and trustworthy open source web services architecture dominates the worldwide software industry under the baton of European open source prject leaders. Through support of open source software platform ...

A true Global Village based on ICT

Advances in computerised translation and automated speech recognition completely eliminate language barriers, leading to a true global village, much better access to knowledge (in all languages) as well as increased internation...

Reflecting computing

The new generation of smart systems built with the reflective technology should understand user's emotions, needs, intentions and social situation and provide appropriate assistance in a descrete and personalized manner. This a...

Collective robotics

Collective robotics - a new research field - where a large number of simple robotics can collectively solve complex problems. Collectively working robots are fully adaptive in behaviour and functionality and upon special condit...

New Electromagnetic Pulse Weapons

New technologies (not connected with nuclear devices) which can create large EMP, are developed for governmental laboratories. Such devices are used for safety studies of critical electronic systems of aircrafts and important C...

Intelligence boost

NBIC and advanced BCI (Brain-Computer Interface) technologies lead to significant augmentation of human intelligence (personal as well as collective), with major social implications. One of possible outcomes could be a "collect...

Sensor networks for environmental monitoring and control pre ...

The global proliferation of wireless sensor networks for environmental monitoring enables the prevention of environmental disasters that may impact the lives of millions. Such networks save the lives of millions in natural disa...

Europe's cultural and historical digital libraries erased fo ...

European projects to capture and store cultural and historical heritage succeed beyond expectation. Centrally stored and accessible through the Internet, they are used by citizens daily. Angered by the demand for his early reti...

Hydrogen-fuelled car technology brought to mass production

The interactions among megacities, air quality and climate have long been a concern. One major problem is the air pollution caused by vehicles. The development of hydrogen-fuelled vehicles on the other hand had always been alwa...

EU civil society prediction on the harm of biofuels to econo ...

Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have long voiced concern about the harm that biofuels can do to both economy and environment. However these warnings were neglected due to the low credibility of CSO research. A series of rese...

Food Crisis due to an irreversible deterioration of soils an ...

Conventional remediation-monitoring programmes (i.e. analysis of contaminant and metabolite concentrations over time and space), often provide inconclusive assessments due to their inability to resolve some of the existing prob...

Waste Management becomes one of the major sectors of activit ...

The inadequate methods of collection and disposal of solid waste in most Asian cities are causing important environmental and social harms: spread of diseases, environmental pollution and ground and water pollution. The problem...

Mapping of risk geographical areas through gene-environment ...

This wild card consists on the use of genetic biomarkers to detect gene-environment interactions and map geographical areas where the risk of environment-associated diseases is high (risk areas). It is known that the environmen...

Privatization of water supplies ends

UN decides that clean water is a basic right of all people and the privatization of water supplies ends now. All countries commit to the decision.

The war between natural and artificial ecosystems

Microsystems will evolve in the future into integrated smart systems which are able to sense and diagnose a situation, which are predictive, and therefore are able to decide and help to decide. Smart systems address and identif...

People behaviour controlled by ultrasonic transponder system

There is developed a novel telemetry technology for biomedical applications that will enable any kind of deeply implanted device (the transponder) to communicate and be powered wirelessly via acoustic waves with the external sy...

Large-scale offshore wind farms solve the energy crisis

A key socio-economic challenge for Europe is: how to deal with a climate change, while meeting rapidly increasing demand for energy and ensuring security of supply? Wind energy can be a significant part of the answer. The new f...

Europe gains dominance in optical computing technology

An optical computer (also called a photonic computer) is a device that uses the photons in visible light or infrared (IR) beams, rather than electric current, to perform digital computations. An electric current creates heat in...

European research centres under attack of miniature robotic ...

Huge quantities of robotic bugs and flies of unknown origin were uncovered in many top-class research centres across Europe. These miniature spies are able to organise themselves autonomously, collect information from their sur...

Boom of ocean economy

Development of new intelligent robotic devices and machines started new era in utilization of ocean environment and resources. Elecric power from solar power plants on the ocean survace is utilized in underwater factories built...

Artificial companions exceed in popularity live biological p ...

After new generation of flaqles artifical companios had been invented, the popularity of living with robotic partner increased rapidly. New robotic companions are helpful, nice, empathetic and obliging day and night and it is p...

Sign language established as the main tool for intarnational ...

After English lost its worldwide significance and Chinese proved to be too complicated to learn for western population, sign language has bee established as the main tool for international communication. The sign language was ...

Babel of robot languages

Several robotic platforms were developed across Europe, but no sufficient common communication standards were established. Therefore it is difficult and expensive to ensure mutual cooperation between individual robots and robot...

Harmfulness of wireless communication has been proved

New technology of dynamic spectrum allocation (i.e. technology capable to detect free holes in used wireless spectrum and to use these holes for broadcastintg) made possible strong grows of wireless broadcasting and wireless da...

Common virtual ICT infrastructure for European research esta ...

New service based ICT infrasturcture enables efficient utilization of common ICT resouces across all the European R&D institutions and structures. This common attitude significantli improves utilization of computing resources a...

Successful intelligent R&D data mining tools created

Today's growing wealth of digital data in Europe is poorly exploited. Advances in storage, pervasive computing, digital sensors and instrumentation have led to massive growth in the volume of data collected and the number and c...

Dozen people killed by computer gaming

New type of unautorized computer network games has emerged on the internet. These games are potentially dangerous for the players. In combination with specific gaming gadgets they are able to cause serious health demage or even...

Economic crisis caused by unreliability of SCM software

It is a well-known fact that collaborative supply chain management and planning reduces overall costs. Nevertheless it is not being exploited due the fact that partners are reluctant to share the necessary, but sensitive data. ...

Complete loss of privacy - Europe is lagging in cryptography

Due to huge improvement of rough computing force the Chinese scientists are able to solve all the secret codes currently used in digital communinication. New cryptography methods are necessary, but European scientists are laggi...

No more business trips needed

Traditional "camera-on-top-of-a-TV-set-on-a-cart" videoconferencing systems have failed to meet the "telepresence challenge" of providing a viable alternative for physical business travel, which is nowadays characterized by una...

3D multimedia revolution didn't come

Film or cinema had been the driving force for the entertainment industry, setting the standards of quality, providing the most compelling experience, and feeding the distribution chains of other media (broadcast TV, cable and s...

P2P networks as a predominant technology for data management

P2P (Peer-to-Peer) is a technology that fosters self-deployment and self-organisation, thus, it is reducing operational costs, while it achieves optimised resource utilisation for the deployed applications and services.Therefor...

New system of IPR based on innovation permits

New European/international system of Intelectual Property Rights is established. The system is based on so colled 'innovation permits'. If someone puts into the system a new invention or technology, he gains approwal (i.e. perm...

Untraceable nano weapons

Untraceable weapons made with nanotechnology could be smaller than an insect with the intelligence of a supercomputer. Possible nano and bio technology arms race.

Gray Goo

Free range, self-replicating robots that consume all living matter. However unlikely, experts say this scenario is theoretically possible, but not for some time.

Nano-enabled privacy invasion

Virtually undetectable surveillance devices could dramatically increase spying on governments, corporations and private citizens.

Goodbye to security and defence RTD

Global peace leads to major reduction of security and defence research and technology development in Europe

Small scale nuclear power to private energy demands

Countries, cities, villages and corporations turn to micro scale nuclear reactors in order to meet the energy demands which are otherwise not reached. The world is running out of oil, and we face all the time more and more stri...

Scientists finds a way for controlling the weather

Some scientists contend that influencing the weather may be possible if we can sufficiently improve our current ability to observe, predict, and make changes to the atmosphere. There has been some theoretical research on the we...

Underground explosives for remote detonation

Explosives are buried deep underground in massive quantities for remote activation and full ground control

Nano-electrodes as weapons

Nano-electrodes are shaped as needles which can be coated with various materials/poisons as anti-human weapons

Remote control sensors for identifying targeted materials

Remote control sensors for identifying targeted materials such as poisons, etc., with remote manipulation.

Nano-based materials that are a strong as metal

Constructions that are as stiff as metal are based on nano technologies

The disappearance of male chauvinism

Male chauvinism and "machismo" disappear. The majority of world leaders (including heads of state) are women. Even in religious establishments women become more powerful and dominant. This has a high impact on the changing worl...

Legalisation of drugs

Drugs are de-criminalised or legalised. This has important social implications and a tremendous impact on the security and economy of many countries.

Spirituality is disconnected from religion

There is a massive disengagement of people from established religions, and a movement towards spiritual expression outside religion. This includes spiritual attitudes to issues such as environment protection and climate change,...

Turkey becomes an EU member

Turkey is accepted to join the EU

Disintegration of EU

Economic crisis and the unsustainable levels of debt in some countries brings about the paralysis or even disintegration of the EU

Drastic reduction in investment in research in Europe

Owing to a lack of interest in science, the goal of spending 3% of the GNP on research is dropped.

Cessation of Xinjiang and Tibet and the breakdown of China

The cessation of Xinjiang and Tibet causes the breakdown of China

Very rapid acceleration of global warming

Global warming speeds up very rapidly

The coming of "technological singularity"

The “technological singularity” is a concept advocated by Ray Kurzweil and other futurists (it was first introduced by the mathematician and Science Fiction writer Vernor Vinge). The basic idea is that due to the exponentia...

A meteorite hit earth in a European geographical area

An event in which a meteorite hits Europe might occure in the future and will have a huge impact on a great geographical area. Such an event can result in a huge number of casualties and collapse of major urbanic centres. Such ...

Flights in Extreme Weather Conditions

Primarily new composite materials are used in aeronautics. These are fully resistent against atmospheric hazards such as hail, hurricanes and thunderstorms and on the other hand are extremely aerodynamically efficient. In conju...

Uniform Road Surfaces across Europe

In those areas in the EU, where the contribution of road surface to road safety has been recognised for years and skidding resistance policies are already applied (as e.g. in the UK), the lowest numbers of accidents are recorde...

European E-Systems Network on Multimodal Public Transport Co ...

Wide-scale e-systems support multimodal planning and route optimisation for highly mobile travellers using public means of transport. Indiviudally requested or automatically provided real-time information and suggestions for al...

Global Society due to Total Mobility

Increased migration and an increase of mobile lifestyles result from ease of mobility. Regional background, national identity and language lose their importance. A global society emerges

Implementation of Civil Planes Powered by Hydrogen Engines

Research is conducted on hydrogen turbofan for civil planes which are able to reach velocities up to 6000 km/h (Mach5). This follow-up of the Concorde using ramjets instead of turbofans reaches hypersonic and enables antipodal ...

Mind-Reading Brain Scanning

New techniques of brainscanning are introduced and are able to read people´s minds and intentions. The scanners are introduced for security reasons, e.g. at airport security checks.

Vast Side Effects of Intelligent Safety Transport Systems

A driver´s attention and ability of driving is decreased by the technological support such as electronic lane keeping systems, collusion avoidance systems or fatigue warning systems. The number of car accidents increases rapidly.

Collapse of Transport Infrastructure

New, efficient car engines create low transportation costs. Individual traffic increases immensely and overburdens the existing traffic infrastructure.

CNG-Engines for all Busses

All buses in the EU are imposed to be propelled by CNG (Compressed Natural Gas)-engines. Cleaner environment increases the quality of life. Cheaper fuel allows cheaper bus tickets and increases public transportation and reduces...

European Integrated Railway Signaling System

Due to an EU-wide transnational railway signaling system, the likelihood for railway accidents decreases. Mobility gets safer and faster due to less delays.

Pan-European Transport System

A pan-European public transport system run by a single European provider leads to a high level of mobility within Europe. Thereby, the familiarity within the EU rises and further solidifies the EU.

Cure for Cancers

Due to a breakthrough in the stemm cell therapy, a cure for different kinds of cancer is developed. Longer life expectancy and higher quality of life is reached. Thereby the aging of the population is taking place even faster. ...

Governmental Weather Control

New forecast and manipulation systems allow to control the weather. The weather planning system is used by governments to improve e.g. agriculture, but also misused: the era of "weather wars" between states arrives.

New Diseases Caused by Environmental Pollution

Environmental pollution rises immensely due to a higher energy production relying on conventional technologies such as coal-fired power plants. Moreover, the traffic volume grows while sticking to the combustion motor. New life...

Undesired Effects of Nanotechnology

Loss of faith in research and nanotechnology promises. Corporate responsibility leads to increased regulation, far more rigorous testing procedures, and improved checks of possible long-term effects.

Cure for HIV

Breakthrough leads to the development of a cure for HIV. The impacts are vast, especially in Sub-Sahara Africa where HIV/Aids was one of the major challenges. Life expectancy rises rapidly. Positive impacts on social and econom...

Luxurious Fuel

Due to tremendously rising demand for oil, prices for fuel rise enormously. Driving cars and flying will only be affordable for the rich. Costs for public transport rise as well, such that mobility decreases.

Non-Verbal Language Established

Due to a new language, communicating becomes possible without words. Migration rises worldwide as there are no longer language barriers keeping people from moving and scientific progress is accelerated.

Tests on Children for New Drugs

Pharmaceutical tests on children create more solid data on experimental medicines; however, great public backlash ensues when test procedures leak to the public.

New Diseases Caused by Tissue-Engineering

Standardised transplantations of tissue-engineered organs lead to new, unexpected diseases and physical disfunctions.

New Vaccines Cause New Diseases

New promising vaccines turn out to cause new kinds of new diseases/long-term effects, which is a huge setback for the scientific community. Millions of people are infected.

European Health Card

Besides personal data, the electronic European Health Card saves all different kinds of medical data that were included in patient files before (anamnesis, diagnosis, therapy, etc., possibly even the genotype). The Health Card ...

Unreliable software

Advanced software systoms will become so complex, that the diagnostic of their correct/incorrect opperation will be unaccomplishable by common tools for software development. It will cause slowdown of further software developm...

Efficient work with personal data made impossible due to exo ...

Permanently increasing legislation demands to personal data protection will cause a serious security incident - imprtant data about treatment of patients in a big hospital are irrecoverably lost, because it was not possible to ...

Collapse of internet network connection structure

Due to quickly growing demand for intenet bandwidth in combination with frequent and massive hacking attempts on the interet, the connection through the network will become highly unstable and unreliable. Practically no real ti...

Food price "rockets to sky" which leads to famine and finall ...

Due to three globally dry years, the demand for food temporary exceeds the supply, leading first to volatility in food prices and then to severe price shocks. Investors start to buy food resources in massive scale (grain, soy, ...

50% of the world's largest companies vanish in 5 years do to ...

New classes of free goods and services emerge, reshaping the underlying economics of entire industries. Grass-root, voluntary, open source, peer-to-peer services become Freenomics a new megatrend that fundamentally challenge th...

China's pollution leads to global trade barriers and even to ...

The spread of human and environmental cost of China's pollution advances in scope and severity, leaging to conflict with affected states and regions. This leads to global trade barriers and even to open military conflicts.

Criminal gangs wipe out democracy, human rights, civil socie ...

Criminal Gangs expand their reach, evolving into criminal insurgencies capable of seriously challenging the legitimacy and solvency of nation-states world wide.

Eco-radicalism becomes a new field of dogmatic fundamentalis ...

Eco-radicalism. leads to eco-terrorism A growing number of environmentalists radicalize, staging protest, destroying infrastructure, and resorting to acts of violence. This can lead to dogmatic fundamentalism which attempts to ...

Empowered internet users take the political power from the o ...

Empowered by the internet, individuals wield influence over critical issues formerly influenced exclusively by the government. Empowered internet users form new types of social movents that utilize the wishdom of crowds and fla...

Success of emotional intelligence leads to new renaissance o ...

Increasing exploration into and recogition of the power and importance of emotional intelligence (EQ) leads individuals, organiations, and even nations to create new approaches to developing human capital and rewarding capabili...

Mistrust to industrial food production leads to collapse of ...

Dismantling of industrial food production. Something radical happen in industrial food production. Consolidated control of food production is broken apat by consumer mistrust and demand for greater transparency and safer, healt...

Terrorists invent ways to utilize bioengineering for bioterr ...

The democratization of bioengineering capabilities increases the opportunity for innovation as well as the risk of bio-error and bioterror. Terrorists infiltrate to the field of science inorder to produce new types of weapons.

The world map is re-shaped due climate-induced mass migration

Climate-induced migration. Increasingly volatile climate change makes some areas of the world less inhabitable, causing large-scale, unplanned population shifts witin and across national borders and increased competition for an...

Radical conflicts over water escalate into collapse of the c ...

Tensions that begin over water escalate into inter-regional and inter-state conflict, pitching citizens against government and even against one another. This causes a collapse of the civil society

Unrest of China's bachelors leads to revolution and collapse ...

China's increasing pool of bachelors - projected to be nearly 30 million by 2025 - creates potential for widespread health and social consequences, including broad-based social unrest. This can lead to nation wide riots, rebel ...

State diplomacy and trade policies is challenged due to very ...

Ageing state in a youthful neighbourhood. Divergent demographic trends place graying states next to youthful states, leading to distinctly different interests and new diplomatic challenges.

Nanotechnologies cure most diseases in Europe

Nanotechnology will develop a nanomedicine technology which will be able to cure any disease and correct any physical disorder. A nanotechnology which will be able to identify and eliminate any harmful pathogen in the human bod...

Neo-tribal wars break in cities and in countryside

People increasingly affiliate with others having similar values, leadign to polarized communities and decreased levels of tolerance. Eventually we end up to tribal-like situations. People in different parts of a city or blocks ...