Via limitlessboredom
As a final machine design project here at SUNY Canton my roommate and I have decided to begin the construction of a jet engine. The Engine will be based on a turbo like many other DIY Jet engines, but ours will be special in that it is a direct through air design similar to commercial engines. It will most likely run off propane and as for what we’ll actually do with it, we have yet to come up with a good/safe idea.
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Via sciencedaily.com
“It is still a mystery, really,” says UBC computer science professor Prof. Dinesh Pai. “No one has ever completely mapped out the processes at the level of specific neurons, muscles and tendons.”
Pai is part of a UBC team leading an international initiative to do just that. “Essentially, we are reverse engineering the brain to produce the first working computational model of the complex interplay between our minds and our bodies.”
The project could produce great leaps forward in many areas, including medicine, industry and robotics. Although the project is just ramping up, the team’s mapping and modeling expedition is already producing some of the world’s most realistic computer simulations of the human body.
“Current robots have as much in common with human movements as helicopters do with seagulls,” Pai adds. “The challenges are similar, but they use completely different solutions.”
→ No CommentsTags: brain·interplay·System Analysis
Via technovelgy.com
Avatars United is a new community website that brings virtual characters together from all online worlds. Users can blog, send messages and upload pictures and movies. Users can talk about their next adventure in the games being played or boast of their past exploits; avatars can even talk about daily life in the real world. I was able to get an interview with one of the principals, Swedish developer Thor Olof Philogene.
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Via sciam.com
If you leave your camera at home on a long vacation, you can buy a disposable one. But that’s not an option if you have traveled 422 million miles (679 million kilometers) to another planet—especially if that world’s extreme conditions present a challenge for the average camera.
So to chronicle Phoenix’s trip to the Red Planet, NASA had to come up with a special device, based on the experiences they’ve had with other Mars landers and rovers: the Surface Stereo Imager (SSI), which acts as Phoenix’s main set of “eyes.” Built out of titanium to withstand the daily Martian temperature swings from –22 degrees Fahrenheit (–30 degrees Celsius) to –112 degrees F (–80 degrees C), the imager is also designed to perform in low atmospheric pressure.
This $7-million, football-size instrument pivots on a trellis that extends about six and a half feet (two meters) above the Martian terrain. (For those who appreciate science fiction, the SSI looks like a cross between ’80s cinematic robot icon Johnny 5 and the new Star Wars prequels’ nemesis General Grievous.) It features two openings set about the same distance apart as our own eyes, and detects colors in a manner similar to human vision. The imager even has eyelashlike brushes to clean Martian dust off its lenses each day.
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Via extendlimits.nl
Holograms are a topic of which we spoke about on Extend Limits for several times. And when you have read those posts you allready know that I believe that holograms will become a thing of our everyday lifes in the very near future. First we will see them on our streets in shopping windows as new interactive adds and new ways to interact with consumers. And after a few years they will represent our online networks in ‘real life’ in our bedrooms. Holograms will become common to be present at meetings and to travel around the world in just a second! The company Airstrike makes it possible to interact with real time holograms by just using your finger! Very cool and absolute a thing of the near future!
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Via likecool.com
BMW revealed the GINA Light Visionary Model sports car concept features with fabric body panels that bends into different shapes! Built on the discontinued BMW Z8 platform - complete with its 5.0-liter V8 - the GINA Light Visionary shares design. BMW’s design chief, Chris Bangle, hopes the car is a showcase of what could be possible in 10 years’ time, when drivers could choose a shape for their vehicle at the touch of a button.
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Via reprap.org
Look at your computer setup and imagine that you hooked up a 3D printer. Instead of printing on bits of paper this 3D printer makes real, robust, mechanical parts. To give you an idea of how robust, think Lego bricks and you’re in the right area. You could make lots of useful stuff, but interestingly you could also make most of the parts to make another 3D printer. That would be a machine that could copy itself.
→ No CommentsTags: robot·Technology
Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, with support from IBM and other outside parties, are experimenting with using avatars to test cognitive theory inside of Second Life. It’s not about an NPC simply following a behavior script; instead RPI wants avatars that can “predict and manipulate the behavior of even human players, with whom they will directly interact in the real, physical world [...] by coupling logic-based artificial intelligence and computational cognitive modeling techniques with the processing power of a supercomputer.” Even without AI, crude avatars can already be pretty good at manipulating people, and Gartner is looking ahead to the time when avatars are even more persuasive. RPI is starting small (literally), but looking ahead.
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Via arstechnica.com
Last Thursday, Microsoft filed patent application 2008/134,132, which describes a method of “Developing Software Components Based on Brain Lateralization.” At first glance, this sounds quite impressive; direct neural programming interfaces, after all, is the stuff science fiction is made of. Closer examination, however, indicates that our dreams of writing C++ code without that pesky keyboard getting in the way remain elusive. Fancy wording or not, Microsoft is essentially attempting to patent something far more basic: the software Quality Assurance (Q&A) process.
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Via pinktentacle.com
This remote-control fire-fighting robot goes where its human comrades cannot, and its relatively compact size makes it ideal for combating blazes in urban environments. An array of 8 high-resolution wide-angle cameras provides a panoramic view of the surroundings, and a multi-channel control system allows 10 fire-fighting robots to be deployed simultaneously. Special nozzles that are 10 times more powerful than those on conventional fire hoses allow the robot to blast flames with 5,000 liters of water per minute.
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