Technologies

How Mark Rober’s DNA Nerf Guns Could Lead to Medical Breakthroughs

Mark Rober explains his yearlong odyssey to break the record for world’s smallest Nerf gun five times, culminating in ones made out of DNA.

When Mark Rober set out to break the record for world’s smallest Nerf gun, he never expected he’d end up making more mini Nerf guns than the total number of actual Nerf guns ever to exist.

In his yearlong mission, Rober ended up breaking the record five times by collaborating with leading experts and employing different engineering techniques.

His first few batches of mini Nerf blasters were made possible by drastically simplifying the design of the Nerf gun. «All materials are springs, even glass,» Rober told CNET in an interview. «You just take advantage of that springiness [to] build all the hinges and the springs into one part.»

This one-part design broke the record a few times but eventually reached its limits. At 1,000 times smaller than a standard Nerf gun, about the perfect size for an ant, the mini Nerf guns were still able to fire. They had to be fired with a micro-manipulator, however, since human hands and tweezers would not be precise enough to do the job.

Beyond that, Rober says a fireable Nerf gun «could be done,» but that the tools required were so expensive as to put it beyond the scope of his video.

Despite no longer being fireable, Rober kept going smaller, in part to protect this particular record from his friend and rival in world-record breaking shenanigans, YouTuber Jimmy Donaldson, aka Mr. Beast.

Before wrapping up his video, Rober learned of a technique called DNA origami being studied at the Salk Institute and decided to make one last batch of nano Nerf guns.

This technique takes advantage of the fact that DNA naturally binds up when complementary strands are placed in solution together to build out specific shapes. In this case, the right DNA strands placed in the right temperature solution for the right length of time produced trillions of nano Nerf guns.

At 100 nanometers in length, they’re smaller than the wavelength of visible light, so «light can’t even bounce off them to get back to your eye.» Rober explained that in order to view their creations, they needed the help of an atomic force microscope.

The technology behind these record-shattering mini Nerf guns could also be applied to medical breakthroughs. Rober explains that DNA origami techniques might be used someday to hack the human body’s biological mechanisms. For example, he says, «if you had 1.2 trillion mini Nerf guns that instead of firing darts were firing something … to kill a bad cell, cancer or fortify a good cell.»

To see our full interview with Rober about his record-breaking nano Nerf guns, check out the video in this article.

Technologies

Google’s Pixel 10A Is Coming to Japan With an Exclusive Blue Edition and Special Wallpaper

This model comes with creatively designed stickers and a special look for Pixel’s 10th anniversary.

Don’t be blue: Google is releasing an Isai blue edition of the Pixel 10A to celebrate the Android phone line’s 10th anniversary, setting it apart with its own sticker set, specialized wallpaper and custom icons. But it’ll only be available in Japan.

Announced Tuesday on the Google Japan blog, the Isai blue Pixel 10A has a dark blue look and includes bonus decorations designed in collaboration with Japan’s Heralbony art company. These include an exclusive bumper case and stickers for customization.

This edition of the Pixel 10A will arrive in Japan on May 20, following the April 14 release of the Pixel 10A in its original colors of lavender, berry, fog and obsidian. The Isai blue model costs 94,900 yen, which roughly translates to $595, and includes 256GB of storage.

This makes it slightly less expensive than the US model’s 256GB edition, but it comes with a number of fun extras at no additional cost.

Google’s creation of a country-specific model for Japan may also reflect strong sales in that market. In 2023, the IDC analytics firm (via 9to5Google) reported that the Pixel 7 series accounted for 10.7% of the country’s market share, a 527% increase from 2022.

Technologies

Can’t Wait for New Emoji? Here’s How to Create Your Own on iPhone

Apple Intelligence-enabled iPhones can create custom emoji in a few easy steps.

Apple brought new emoji to all iPhones when the company released iOS 26.4 on March 24. The new emoji include «🫍» orca, «🫪» distorted face and «🫈» hairy creature — or as we might normally call it, Sasquatch. According to Emojipedia, there are 3,953 emoji with more on the way, including a pickle. But there’s no emoji for a dog wearing pajamas, a plate with burgers and fries and many other things. But if you have Genmoji on your iPhone you can create these emoji and many more.

Apple released iOS 18.2 in 2024 and the company introduced its own emoji generator, called Genmoji, to Apple Intelligence-capable iPhones at that time. The Unicode Standard, a universal character encoding standard, is responsible for creating new emoji, and approved emoji are added to all devices once a year. With Genmoji, you don’t have to wait for new emoji to appear on your iPhone each year. You can just create them as you need them.

Read on to learn how to use Genmoji on iPhone to create your own custom emoji. Just note that only iPhones with Apple Intelligence, like the iPhone 17 lineup, can use Genmoji at this time.

Note: The new emoji may not display correctly for Apple users whose devices aren’t on a 26.4 software version.

How to make custom emoji

1. Open Messages and go into a chat.
2. Tap the plus (+) button next to your text box.
3. Tap Genmoji.

You can then type a description of an emoji into the text box near the bottom of your screen and tap the check mark on your keyboard to enter that description into Genmoji. You can also tap different suggestions and themes that are right above the text box. And with iOS 26 or later, you can also combine and use emoji to create others rather than describing a new emoji or using suggestions.

Your iPhone will generate a series of new emoji for you to pick from according to your description, and you can swipe through these new emoji. When you find the one you want, tap Add in the top right corner of your screen and the new emoji will be available to use as an emoji, tapback or a sticker. Now you don’t have to wait for the Unicode Standard to propose, create and bring new emoji to devices.

For more iOS news, here’s what to know about iOS 26.4 and iOS 26.3. You can also check out our iOS 26 cheat sheet for other tips and tricks.

Technologies

Save Over 20% on This Handy 10,000-mAh Anker Nano Power Bank

Keep your devices charged on the go with this Anker Nano power bank, now down to just $46.

We’ve just spotted the Anker Nano 45-watt portable power bank for just $46 at Amazon right now. This saves you $14 — a 23% discount on its list price. Though it’s $6 more than the lowest-ever price we saw during Black Friday, it’s still a solid discount when you take the rising cost of tech accessories into account. It also matches the lowest price we’ve seen in 2026. It comes in four colors: black, green, pink and white. They’re all on sale for the same price.

This Anker Nano portable charger weighs approximately 8.2 ounces and measures a compact 3.21×1.99×1.42 inches. Despite its small size, it has a retractable cable and supports fast charging in compatible Apple, Samsung, Google Pixel and other smartphones. It also has a large 10,000-mAh capacity and a smart display so you always know how much juice is left in your power bank.

The Nano can charge an iPhone 17 to up to 50% battery in an estimated 20 minutes, and is powerful enough to charge tablets and laptops. Need to charge your devices while charging your power bank? You can do so safely thanks to pass-through charging so you’ll never have to go without battery life.

We’ve also compiled a list of the best power banks for iPhones and for Android, in case this deal isn’t quite a fit for you.

Why this deal matters

If you travel, have a long commute time or are otherwise always on the go, a portable charger can help you keep your devices fully powered. This 45-watt Anker Nano power bank is compact, includes a loop that lets you keep track of it easily and has a built-in cable so you don’t have to keep up with extra cords. Amazon’s $14 discount makes this a solid deal for anyone looking for a compact power bank.