Post it's YAY

Do you like sticky notes? Well, be careful, because they just might attack you someday in the hallway…

cheerusup.com

bot+iphone=cool

Adding a new wrinkle to the 'droid versus iPhone debate, a project at Keio University in Tokyo have created iPhone software specifically designed to control androids. More specifically, they've created an interface that puts control of a humanoid robot right at your fingertips.

"Walky" takes advantage of an iPhone or iPod's touchscreen to create an intuitive interface that requires virtually no learning. Your fingers simulate the robot's legs: a walking motion using the index and middle fingers makes the robot walk, tapping the screen makes it jump up and down, and a flicking motion with one finger elicits a kicking motion.

Popout

The idea is to make the robot's motion as intuitive as possible. Most controller commands, like joysticks, paddles and buttons, don't have any natural relation to each other. That's why you keep getting fragged in Modern Warfare; until you become very familiar with the controls, your knee-jerk reactions aren't necessarily the ones programmed into the game. By making the robot respond to commands that the user already knows, they've created a sort of universal remote that anyone can pick up and start using.

On that note, the team at Keio thinks their software could also be employed in controlling digital characters -- think on-screen avatars in video games -- but for now it's best suited to bipedal robots. While it won't be integrated into gadgets this holiday season, it will debut officially in December at SIGGRAPH Asia in Yokohama.

[DesignBoom via Fast Company]

awsome photos

Each issue of Popular Science opens with Megapixels--two of the most amazing images from the world of science and technology that month. Here, we've compiled them all from 2009 for your viewing pleasure, with some additional images from years past and present added to the mix.

Click here to launch the gallery

New RC helecoptor

University of Maryland Monocopter via Bot Junkie

Last year, after untold millions of dollars, DARPA failed to renew a Lockheed program to design a UAV based on a maple tree seed. While that program, backed by tons of cash and one of the world's largest aerospace companies, amounted to bupkis, a University of Maryland project to create a maple seed UAV has finally accomplished what DARPA and Lockheed couldn't.

Over the course of about a year, the U of M students constructed a maple-seed-mimicking UAV, camera and all, from $500 worth of parts. The UAV can take off and land safely by itself, but the camera still needs a little work. It uses a battery to power a little propeller and a camera, and is piloted with a radio controller.

I think it's safe to say that the Lockheed version, a video of which can be seen here, cost a great deal more than $500. To see the University of Maryland UAV in action, along with a history of the project from conception, through testing, to completion, check out the video below. But ignore the music, it's a little over the top for a science project (what, no Carmina Burana?)

[via Bot Junkie]

Car Motorcycle

A French builder attaches the body of a sports car to a motorcycle

In 1989, François Knorreck took a long ride in the sidecar of a friend’s motorcycle and enjoyed it so much that he decided to build a rig of his own. Now, 20 years, 63 bodywork molds and innumerable headaches later, he has it: a handcrafted masterpiece that’s part motorcycle, part Lamborghini.

Knorreck, a 45-year-old French medical technician, started by sketching pencil designs and then built a full-size wooden model. He had worked on motorcycles in the past, but figuring out how to distribute the sidecar’s weight and where to position its single wheel were wholly new challenges. After determining the dimensions, he machined an aluminum chassis and moved the sidecar’s wheel forward to keep the vehicle stable and prevent it from veering. He also had to beef up the motorcycle’s headstock bearing—a piece of the steering column that bears most of the sidecar’s weight.

At the motorcycle’s controls, Knorreck has pushed the vehicle to 125 miles an hour, near its estimated top speed, but never intends to fully open it up. After all, he says, despite the sidecar’s looks, it’s only along for the ride.

Hop In: The sole door opens Lamborghini-style, driven by an electric motor. Philippe Rony Photography

How the Real Life Lunar Lander Recplica Works

Time: Ten years
Cost: $22,000

An Artistic Masterpiece : “The part that I’m most proud of is the bodywork,” Knorreck says. “Not the design, but the high level of finishing.” Philippe Rony Photography

BODY
The sidecar isn’t merely welded to the motorcycle—the two are seamlessly linked, from the chassis to the wiring to the carbon-fiber, hand-crafted body. Getting the two pieces to work in concert was no easy feat. With the sidecar’s wheel positioned too far forward or back, the off-kilter weight distribution could cause the bike and sidecar to roll forward and to the right. (Errors distributing the vehicle’s 877 pounds could also put excess strain on the frame, leading to structural cracks.) To remedy these problems, Knorreck built an adjustable aluminum chassis so he could tinker with the wheelbase and other elements to see what worked best before adding interior parts. He found that moving the sidecar’s wheel forward just enough, relative to the motorcycle’s rear one, provided additional stability and ensured a straight ride.

FUEL
The original motorcycle had a gravity-fed system in which the fuel ran down to the carburetors from above. But Knorreck found that he had to relocate the tank and place it underneath the body of the sidecar. Then he added an electrical pump to route the fuel to the engine.

COMFORT
Knorreck built the entire frame and body of the sidecar (he had to make 63 different molds by hand to create its various carbon-fiber panels), but he’s no upholsterer, so he had a friend custom-manufacture the seats. Just in case tooling around in a freakishly cool sidecar wasn’t enough for his passengers (it can seat two at a time), he installed a stereo system. For that, however, he kept costs to a minimum, using an old radio from his father.

The Luxury Sidecar: Philippe Rony Photography

The H2Whoa Credo: DIY Can Be Dangerous
We review all our projects before publishing them, but ultimately your safety is your responsibility. Always wear protective gear, take proper safety precautions, and follow all laws and regulations.

[From Popular Science]

trauminumbulb

Why limit your mini-terrarium output to plain old jars? You can reuse a burned out light bulb to create a smaller, desk-friendly nature space.

Earlier this year we shared a technique for turning a wine bottle into a terrarium and we followed it up by building moss terrariums in glass jars and dishes. Now an industrious Instructables user has taken the humble light bulb and turned it into a tiny terrarium.

For the project you'll need an old incandescent light bulb, some pliers, a screw driver, and safety goggles and gloves. Once you prep the light bulb you'll need some soil and some small plants like moss or clover that you want to plant inside. From there, the only care your terrarium will need is a few drops of water down inside.

Check out the tutorial at the link below for information about preparing the light bulbs and positioning the plants inside. If you have a clever plant-related project of your own, let's hear about it in the comments.

Reusing Lightbulbs as Planters or Mini-Terrariums [Instructables]

New Glovs for Moonwalkers

Two teams claimed $250,000 and $100,000 prizes for besting NASA's current top glove design

Glove designers walked away with a total of $400,000 in prize money at NASA's second Astronaut Glove Challenge yesterday. The U.S. space agency awarded the money because the private glove designs beat the in-house version, and NASA may incorporate the designs into the Constellation spacesuit intended for next-gen astronauts returning to the moon.

Peter Homer of Maine took the first place prize of $250,000, based on a souped-up version of his glove design that won the 2007 challenge. Ted Southern of New York City won the second place prize of $100,000.

Both winners had to use their gloves within a sealed testing environment, and perform half an hour of exercises such as pinching, gripping, and other finger-flexing tests. Judges scored the results during the live tests at the Astronaut Hall of Fame in Titusville, Florida, Technology Review reports.

Each glove also passed a burst test inside the water-filled box. Homer's glove managed to reach a max of 20 psi, and Southern's glove successfully resisted 17 psi.

The Astronaut Glove Challenge comes as part of NASA's Centennial Challenges, which include the space elevator games and a competition for lunar robot diggers.

[NASA]

New Camo

As if we didn’t already have enough to consider with Marpat, UCP, UCP-D, MultiCam and Desert Brush, in comes another pattern making inroads in the milgear blogosphere.

I’ve been trolling over at our friends Soldier Systems’ site over the past couple days, and the editor over there is obsessed with the development of this new pattern. Not one day after I scoped his post, our partners at Tactical-Life forwarded me an article (that looked more like a press release to me) unveiling the new, multi-environment pattern.

Companies participating in this unprecedented launch include Remington, Bushmaster, DPMS Panther Arms, Danner, EOTAC, Tactical Assault Gear, Blue Force Gear and Emerson Knives.

The the so-called A-TACS pattern departs from today’s “pixel” obsession and goes more along the blended lines, making it easy to slip between environments and still conceal movement.

Many who have seen the pattern comment on how it is unlike any camouflage pattern they have encountered as its chameleon-like qualities cause it to blend into the surrounding environment. This unique “pattern within a pattern” concept allows it to break up the outline of the human body relying on a palette of inter-mingled natural colors over a neutral tan base for use in open, rocky, or arid environments.

And here’s the conglomerate’s explanation for their design:

Many of the modern digital camouflage patterns currently in use by the tactical community have flaws. The square pixels used to create the distortion effect do not replicate the shapes, forms and shadows of the environment they are deployed in-especially when viewed through optics. The ninety-degree angles and limited use of natural colors can in many cases, make detection easier.

Additionally, the “visual noise” in these same patterns tends to make them close-up into a solid color, producing a “blobbing” effect when viewed from a distance. A-TACS addresses and improves these critical issues in three ways.

1. — Replace un-natural square pixels with organic pixels. Utilizing our patented process, we created a palette of natural colors digitally sampled from real-world elements in carefully controlled lighting. The pattern is then created using a mathematical algorithm that writes “organically-shaped” pixels using the specific color information given. The resulting pattern while still digital, is far more organic in appearance.

2. — Use small patterns to create larger more distinct shapes designed to work at a distance. Small shapes create larger shapes and larger shapes are organized into a distinct pattern with no horizontal or vertical orientation. This unique “pattern within a pattern” concept allows A-TACS® to effectively break the human outline at great distances thereby, minimizing the “blobbing” effect of other patterns when viewed from a distance.

3. — More effective use of color-range produces a better concealment system. A-TACS® is created using a far greater range of inter-mingled natural colors than was previously possible. The overall base color for the cast is a neutral tan which is designed for use in open, rocky or arid environments.

Furthermore, the abstract and intricate nature of this pattern gives it a unique “fingerprint”which is not only adaptable to various service branches, but also makes it difficult to copy.

I dunno, another desert/urban pattern? Aren’t we debating the flaws of the UCP because of the forested environments of Afghanistan? Doesn’t this one look as if it would stick out on a green background?

On the other hand, it’s interesting to see someone make a play against the ever-popular MultiCam and to tinker with the science of concealment. Let’s not forget, the Army is in the midst of a comprehensive look at its camouflage effectiveness and A-TACS is surely poised to play a role in pushing the argument and science.

Another Electric Car, Not an Audi

Italian looks, German engineering and American electrics. Zero to 60 in five seconds, scissor doors, and you'll even get some change back from a $100,000 bill

For around 13 grand, Electric Cars of Springfield (ECOS) will turn your old beater into an all-electric commuter car. But for a few bucks (around $77,000) more, they'll build you an entire, turn-key sports car. It's called the Harbinger. It hits an electronically limited 117 miles per hour, gets to 60 mph in five seconds and undercuts the Tesla roadster on price. Did I mention it comes with Lamborghini-style scissor doors?

ECOS says it's taking orders on the Harbinger, which also comes with a new, touchscreen EV monitoring system providing real-time info on power consumption as well as GPS navigation, stereo and wireless internet. The Italian-supercar look comes by way of a carbon-kevlar composite body over a German-engineered aluminum frame. Power comes from an 11" diameter Netgain DC motor and 30kW battery pack, which enables a 150-mile range, if you can refrain from racing tuned Civics between stoplights.

The company says it's taking reservations on a limited run of Harbinger models at a base price is $89,995. Production is scheduled to start in February 2010, and you can even follow ECOS's progress from aftermarket supplier to full-on sports-car builder on Twitter.

[via Autoblog Green]

Zap a plane from a truck

It took more than six months, but the Air Force coughed up some details yesterday on a laser program it’s developing to plink drones and other flying objects from the sky.

Out at China Lake in May, a joint team sponsored by the Air Force Research Lab that included the engineers from the Naval Air Warfare Center fired a 2 Kilowatt class laser at a series of five UAVs, tracking them and shooting them down “at long ranges and using relatively low laser power,” according to a release from the laser maker Boeing. The so-called Mobile Active Targeting Resource for Integrated eXperiments beam rides on a trailer and is tethered to a fire control radar that helps it zero in on the drone and track the intruder before zapping it with laser precision.

The Mobile Active Targeting Resource for Integrated eXperiments (MATRIX), which was developed by Boeing under contract to the Air Force Research Laboratory, used a single, high-brightness laser beam to shoot down five UAVs at various ranges. Laser Avenger, a Boeing-funded initiative, also shot down a UAV.

During the same test, the AFRL fired their Laser Avenger prototype at another drone, downing it and giving the engineers a chance to blast the 25 mike-mike the Avenger wields as a “hybrid directed energy/kinetic energy” air defense system.

We’re still looking to get more information on how high these lasers were able to deal their lethal energy. But this, combined with other news coming out about directed energy weapons quietly making strides, goes to show that lasers may be a lethal addition to modern platforms sooner than we think.

Nasa planets, Knowledge

NASA Science News for November 19, 2009
Imagine cutting retractable doors in the side of a 747 airliner, installing a 17-ton telescope, and flying to the stratosphere to solve one of astronomy's greatest puzzles. That's what NASA and the German Aerospace Center plan to do with a cutting-edge airborne observatory named SOFIA.

FULL STORY at

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/19nov_sofia.htm?list1083245

Another bot, weird one

Chembot iRobot

iRobot, who brought us the Roomba and friends, have now devised a ball-shaped, undulating "chembot" under the auspices of -- who else -- DARPA. The lovable machine resembles something you might find on a surreal dim sum platter: a pale, doughy blob that changes shape, inflates, deflates, and will ultimately be able to squeeze through tiny cracks in pursuit of its target.

Last year, DARPA gave iRobot $3.3 million to work on the morphing chembot, saying "We believe that a new class of soft, flexible, meso-scale mobile objects that can identify and maneuver through openings smaller than their dimensions to perform various tasks will be quite valuable in many missions."

The bot, which was shown off at the EEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems this week, has a silicone skin, and moves by selectively inflating and deflating parts of its spherical body. But the locomotion system entails more than simple puffing and rolling: The video explains the "particle jamming" system of locomotion, "a mechanism by which material can transition from a liquid-like to a solid-like state."

These things are going to be little horrors once they achieve autonomy and start oozing up uninvited between the floorboards into your house.

[via IEEE Spectrum]

Long fiight

Ion Tiger courtesy of the Naval Research Laboratory

While most research directed at improving UAVs focuses on upgrading their weapons or sensor packages, the Naval Research Laboratory is also working to ensure that the next generation of killer drones are as fuel-efficient as they are deadly. And a recent test of their hydrogen-fuel-cell-powered Ion Tiger UAV proves how successful they have been: it staid aloft for just shy of 24 hours on a single fuel load.

Flying out of the Aberdeen Proving Ground, the Ion Tiger UAV set a new record for hydrogen-powered flight by staying aloft for 23 hours and 17 minutes. This places close to the 30-36 hour endurance of the Tiger's gas guzzling Predator and Reaper cousins.

Unlike its larger relatives, Ion Tiger only weighs 37 pounds, thus requiring only .75 horsepower to fly around for the better part of a day. However, the hydrogen powered motor did prove four times more efficient than similarly powerful combustion engines and seven times more powerful than a comparably sized battery.

So far, the Ion Tiger exists only as a proof of concept, and has not been deployed on land or at sea.

[via Science Daily] Popular Science

Wikipedia pics.

Ok, this is not a from an RSS feed.

Yet if you want good pictures go to Wikipedia.

My favorite are of the birds of prey.

Get searching.

Writer of this blog

Stop, I don't want to

A personal watercraft puts on the brakes

Rocketing along the water at 60 mph in a personal watercraft (PWC) is a lot of fun, but it’s not traditionally the safest pastime. PWCs make up less than 10 percent of recreational boats yet account for 24 percent of all accidents, in large part because they have no brakes and cannot be steered when the throttle is released. After eight years of research and development aimed at reversing those gloomy statistics, Sea-Doo finally unveiled the GTX Limited iS 255, the first PWC with on-water braking.

Conventional PWCs merely slow to a stop after you let go of the throttle, but when a rider squeezes the Sea-Doo’s bicycle-like hand brake, a computer cuts the power so the forward jet quickly stops thrusting. Calculating the precise amount of thrust needed to counter the forward momentum, the computer also drops an aluminum gate up to two inches below the hull, creating drag and reversing the thrust to slow the craft down.

This complex orchestration can bring a Sea-Doo traveling at 50 mph to a dead stop in about 100 feet—half the distance of a brakeless PWC. But this isn’t just the safest PWC on the water; it may also be the most comfortable. A unique gas-shock-equipped full suspension—another PWC first—swallows choppy water and can be adjusted on the fly for either a stiffer, performance-oriented ride or a cushy cruise. Look for the braking system and full suspension in three additional Sea-Doo models for 2010, including the newly upgraded 260-horsepower GTX Limited iS 260, and for the braking system alone in four other models.

$16,500; sea-doo.com

Popular Science

Space

A Visual History of Space Exploration: National Geographic

Well, here it is. National Geographic has plotted the route of every space mission carried out over the last 50 years onto a map of the solar system, giving a nice visual look at the history of space travel.

Each line represents a different space mission, highlighting notable missions, including those from different countries, those of historical significance, and those which have failed. (The map doesn't seem to make note of the recent LCROSS mission, where a rocket plowed into the moon to probe for water.)

Did you know there have been three more missions to Venus more than Mars (43 to 40)? Check out the whole thing for yourself here.

[via National Geographic via Fast Company]

Stealth fighter + Chopper + Bombs= No enemy

In February, the Ministry of Defense (MOD) in Great Britain unveiled its plans for modernizing its military. Curiously similar to the US Army's recently killed Future Combat System, the British program looks to bring a new generation of unmanned vehicles, advanced sensors and energy weapons to the battlefield.

However, unlike its American counterpart, it looks like this project is a go.

The MOD has opened bidding for the chance to produce one of the centerpiece projects of their modernization program, the Novel Air Concept. The Novel Air Concept is a proposed UAV that can transition between plane-like forward flight and helicopter-like hovering, utilize energy weapons, and work in an urban environment. Additionally, the MOD wants a flying prototype ready for testing by 2012, with an operational model ready by 2015.

The costs of the project remain classified, but UK Defense companies BAE Systems, MBDA, and Cranfield Aerospace have already submitted proposals.

The US has recently tried to shift its acquisitions away from Cold War-era projects designed to fight the Soviet Army, and towards technology useful in the current conflicts, and the emphasis on the urban applications of this UAV indicate the British have made a similar change. Hopefully, if this UAV gets operational sooner rather than later, they'll let us borrow a few of them.

[Aviation Week, via The Register]

Please visit the rest of the site

will be updaed daily.

Another Audi that is crazy, "NO HANDS"

Racing autonomous cars through the desert is one thing. Racing a driver-less car up the steep, winding paths of the Rocky Mountains at race speeds is quite another, but that’s the goal a team of Stanford graduate students has set for itself, outfitting an Audi TTS named “Shelly” to navigate the Pikes Peak race course wit no one behind the wheel.

Named for French driver Michele Mouton, the first female rally driver to win the Pikes Peak rally in 1985, Shelly’s trunk is loaded with computer gadgetry and a $100,000 GPS system that will help direct the piloting software through the course’s 12.4-mile, 156-turn ascent to more than 14,000 feet above sea level. With the exception of a couple of exterior fixtures on the roof, Shelley looks and acts like a normal Audi TTS, running on gasoline and handling via standard braking and steering systems. But unlike the average roadster, a software package designed by Stanford’s Dynamic Design Lab will execute the actual driving maneuvers, which are designed to closely mimic those of an actual racecar driver.

Other autonomous cars have run the Pikes Peak course before, but those vehicles topped out at around 25 miles per hour; Shelly, whose top speed in the desert is 130 miles per hour, will navigate the course at close to race speeds, a first for a driver-less vehicle.

The students hope Shelley will be the first step toward creating autonomous driving systems that will one day be integrated into all vehicles as a safety measure. "If we can design a car that can autonomously go up Pikes Peak, we can design a car that can take over when a driver falls asleep," Kirstin Talvala, one of the students working on Shelley, told the AFP.

Funded partially by Volkswagen, Shelley will take her first runs to the peak early next year with a driver at the wheel so the software can monitor human reactions to the course, incorporating them into the software. Shelley’s first autonomous race to the peak should follow shortly thereafter.

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[PhysOrg]

Electric? Audi?

Audi shows off an all-electric sports car with four motors and enough torque to move a tugboat. Don't get excited, it's just a study

A major auto show without concept cars is just a heated parking garage with shrimp cocktail. So with the Frankfurt show's press days underway, Audi revealed a technical study that examines what its R8 sports car might be like if powered by four electric motors. The answer is the E-Tron. Those four motors together produce a modest 313 horsepower, but an astronomical 3,319 pound-feet of torque.

Not all that torque comes on at once, of course. Such a quantity of twisting force -- as much as an M47 Patton tank -- would turn all four tires into rubber vapor at the first throttle stab. The E-Tron has an electronic version of the torque-vectoring system found in some of Audi's road cars, which distributes torque to each wheel as needed to maximize traction and cornering ability.

Audi says the E-Tron can get from zero to 100 km/h (62 mph) in 4.8 seconds -- not spectacular in supercar terms. Given a rolling start, though, the plot quickens: 37 mph to 75 mph takes just 4.1 seconds, the extra torque stepping in to defeat mounting forces of friction and wind resistance. Top speed is 127 miles per hour, and the concept won't be of much service on long trips, considering its range of 154 miles. The liquid-cooled battery has a total energy content of roughly 53 kilowatt hours, with a usable portion restricted to 42.4 kWh to maximize service life.

As for weight distribution, Audi mounted the heavy battery pack behind the passenger cabin, which it says was done for optimal center of gravity and axle load distribution, giving the car a front/rear weight loading of 42/58, close to that of the gasoline-powered R8. A specialized thermal management system controls the temperature of the drive system, power electronics and the battery, as well as interior climate control. A heat pump is used to warm the interior if there's not enough waste heat available from the electrical system.

The E-Tron is also a showcase of something Audi calls "car-to-x-communication." That is, it's a prototype for an information-processing system that networks the E-Tron to other cars and its surroundings by way of transmitting devices. Such a system could reduce accidents, mimimize roadway congestion, and open up new convenience functions, like finding the one available parking space in a crowded supermarket lot.

Like most concepts, Audi has no plans to build the E-Tron as, say, a competitor to the Tesla roadster, though expect to see some of the technologies and design cues show up in other vehicles. That parking system would be hot.

Geek Gifts

Fill your favorite nerd's stocking with Make's holiday gift guide

Make magazine has just put up its $20 and under holiday gift guide, chock full of starter electronics kits like abarebones Arduino and tools for your favorite tinkerer. Or if you're the only one who solders in your circle, pick up a few kits now and give away the finished product.

I've built a number of kits from Make and they're a great way to learn and hone your DIY electronics skills, with super-clear instructions. After the jump, I add my five additions to their list, with an eye toward encouraging the young hijinks-prone Makers-in-training on your list.

1. Super TV-B-Gone kit
$21.99
Okay, it's $2 over an Andrew Jackson, but if there's any way to get kids interested in electronics, it's with guaranteed mischief, like secretly turning off any TV in the area just before The Biggest Loser is revealed. But maybe give it to him after

the big Xmas-day NFL game.

2. Fire Piston kit
$20
I was just talking with our resident mad scientist Theo Gray about doing a column on fire pistons, a very cool way to start a fire with basically nothing but pressure.

3. MAKE: Warranty Voider - Leatherman "Squirt" E4 (electronics version)
$39.95
I just traded a Swiss Army Knife for one of these for my keychain (I got the non-branded pliers version, but a laser-etched Make logo is easily worth the extra dough) and already I want to void a warranty with it. And yes, I'm advocating giving a pocket knife to a kid—just teach him or her not to stab living things with it and they'll be fine. Pocket knives, like fire, are a crucial tool for encouraging tinkering.

4. Barrage Garage Vo1. 1 DVD"
$19.99
You can't go wrong with anything from DIY crazy man Bill Gurstelle, whose other projects feature titles likeBackyard Balistics and Absinthe & Flamethrowers.

Throwey bot

Through the years I've seen a good deal of ground bots being developed for troops in the zone. But I've never seen one as seemingly resilient and simply functional as the Recon Robotics Recon Scout XT.

Weighing in at 1.2lbs and able to withstand a drop from three stories up, the Recon Scout XT can shoot real time video day or night. Its signal goes through walls no problem and the controller is no bigger than a standard company command radio.

Popout

So far Army Special Forces and SEALs have some, as well as some civilian law enforcement agencies. Looks like a good piece of gear for Joes and grunts too.

-- Christian

Excalibur

Just to show that I am random

Excalibur Prepping for Test Flight

from Defense Tech

A prototype for an unmanned aerial vehicle that may one day insert special operators, kill bad guys or fly a wounded Soldier from the battlefield to a base hospital gets a try-out sometime over the next several weeks.
The Excalibur will be tested in a proof of principal flight at Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland under contract from the Army's Aviation Applied Technology Directorate at Fort Eustis, Va. Don't expect the robot plane to be carrying anyone -- at just around 700 pounds the prototype is intended only to give the Army a demonstration of its vertical take-off and landing capabilities.
Patti Woodside, a spokeswoman for the company, told Military.com that Excalibur-maker Aurora Flight Sciences of Manassas, Va., "will be looking for customers and funding" to continue the UAV's development.
She believes the test flight probably will happen in early July, but after July Fourth.
The test version will only be about 13 feet long, have a wingspan of 10 feet and weigh in at just about 700 pounds. The company envisions an operational Excalibur to be 23 feet long, with a wingspan of 21 feet and weigh 2,900 pounds. Though Excalibur's dimension's would be shorter than the RQ-1 Predator, it would weigh more than twice as much.
Aurora says Excalibur would fill a gap between weapon-toting UAVs such as the Predator, which can carry Hellfire missiles, and manned strike aircraft used for tactical air support. The Excalibur would be able to carry any of several types of ordnance, including Hellfire, Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System missiles, Viper Strike laser-guided glide weapons and other small, precision-guided munitions developed or under development by the Pentagon, according to Aurora's Web site.
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Company officials at the Air Force Association's symposium in Washington last fall said the UAV also could be used to insert special operators into an area, as well as carry wounded troops out of a combat zone. In addition to its VTOL capabilities, the UAV would be able to take off and land using short runways.
Unlike other UAVs, the Excalibur will not be remotely piloted by someone manning a computer, the company says. The plane will have a high level of autonomy, it says, which means officials can concentrate on mission planning, including finding and designating targets.
The company says Excalibur will reach speeds in excess of 400 knots, but with the ability to loiter at 100 knots.
Bryant Jordan

Robot + Iphone = Common sense

Adding a new wrinkle to the 'droid versus iPhone debate, a project at Keio University in Tokyo have created iPhone software specifically designed to control androids. More specifically, they've created an interface that puts control of a humanoid robot right at your fingertips.
"Walky" takes advantage of an iPhone or iPod's touchscreen to create an intuitive interface that requires virtually no learning. Your fingers simulate the robot's legs: a walking motion using the index and middle fingers makes the robot walk, tapping the screen makes it jump up and down, and a flicking motion with one finger elicits a kicking motion.
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The idea is to make the robot's motion as intuitive as possible. Most controller commands, like joysticks, paddles and buttons, don't have any natural relation to each other. That's why you keep getting fragged inModern Warfare; until you become very familiar with the controls, your knee-jerk reactions aren't necessarily the ones programmed into the game. By making the robot respond to commands that the user already knows, they've created a sort of universal remote that anyone can pick up and start using.
On that note, the team at Keio thinks their software could also be employed in controlling digital characters -- think on-screen avatars in video games -- but for now it's best suited to bipedal robots. While it won't be integrated into gadgets this holiday season, it will debut officially in December at SIGGRAPH Asia in Yokohama.
[DesignBoom via Fast Company]

First Post

Hello all. This might not be frequently posted.

Yet everything will be cool.