Group items tagged

Festo - a rather conservative engineering company - tries to be advanced. Some cool ideas though.

A good reason to work on advanced ideas!!!

does not sound overly advanced to me - but am not a roboticist ...

This is a bit advanced version of our bionics2space.com database. Seems nicely done. Still no opinion about the content, though.

not very advanced and maybe non practical but...

I mainly see neural networks in this... maybe some evolutionary stuff :))

Scientists have discovered how algae that survive in very low levels of light are able to switch on and off a weird quantum phenomenon that occurs during photosynthesis. The function in the algae of this quantum effect, known as coherence, remains a mystery, but it is thought it could help them harvest energy from the sun much more efficiently. Working out its role in a living organism could lead to advances such as better organic solar cells.

very very nice! we tried already a few years back to find an angle to see how we could study quantum phenomena occuring in plants and photosynthsis is one of the great examples since somehow plants manage to make the phenomena work for them at elevated temperatures, a feat in itself ... any good idea most welcome!!!

Anna maybe? Joe?

While the powerful solvents known as ionic liquids show great promise for liberating fermentable sugars from lignocellulose and improving the economics of advanced biofuels, an even more promising candidate is on the horizon - bionic liquids. Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2014-08-bionic-liquids-lignin-results-pave.html#jCp

+1 for team photon!

" The goal of the APT program is to control and direct plant physiology to detect chemical, biological, radiological, and/or nuclear threats, as well as electromagnetic signals. " Now that is an advanced concept...

and look at this exceptional insight: "plants are easily deployed, self-powering, and ubiquitous in the environment, and the combination of these native abilities with specifically engineered sense-and-report traits will produce sensors occupying new and unique operational spaces" :-)

beautiful research, and fascinating how fast these polymers seem to self assemble at exit ...

Funny ...

Doesn't really sound sexy, but this is of utmost importance for next generation grids for renewable energy.

I agree on the significance indeed - a small boost also for my favourite Desertec project ... Though their language is a bit too "grandiose": "ABB has successfully designed and developed a hybrid DC breaker after years of research, functional testing and simulation in the R&D laboratories. This breaker is a breakthrough that solves a technical challenge that has been unresolved for over a hundred years and was perhaps one the main influencers in the 'war of currents' outcome. The 'hybrid' breaker combines mechanical and power electronics switching that enables it to interrupt power flows equivalent to the output of a nuclear power station within 5 milliseconds - that's as fast as a honey bee takes per flap of its wing - and more than 30 times faster than the reaction time of an Olympic 100-meter medalist to react to the starter's gun! But its not just about speed. The challenge was to do it 'ultra-fast' with minimal operational losses and this has been achieved by combining advanced ultrafast mechanical actuators with our inhouse semiconductor IGBT valve technologies or power electronics (watch video: Hybrid HVDC Breaker - How does it work). In terms of significance, this breaker is a 'game changer'. It removes a significant stumbling block in the development of HVDC transmission grids where planning can start now. These grids will enable interconnection and load balancing between HVDC power superhighways integrating renewables and transporting bulk power across long distances with minimal losses. DC grids will enable sharing of resources like lines and converter stations that provides reliability and redundancy in a power network in an economically viable manner with minimal losses. ABB's new Hybrid HVDC breaker, in simple terms will enable the transmission system to maintain power flow even if there is a fault on one of the lines. This is a major achievement for the global R&D team in ABB who have worked for years on the challeng

does any of you know the value/standing of this association?

quite well-reputed, they were founded as the American Association for AI (and only recently cahnged it to be more international). They are partly organizing IJCAI and the AAAI conferences (mostly in the US), which are quite good. Symposia around specific topics are also done and at those mostly professors and researchers with high impact are going.

Thanks Juxi. was contacted by one of the organisers for the Berlin edition of it in 2 years. looking at your answer, it seems having the ACT associated to it is not a bad idea. will check with the team. Would you yourself be interested?

Bartolomé call's workshop paper ... with some nice words also for the ACT "I want to congratulate the Advanced Concepts Team of the ESA and the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Ljubljana for this initiative." congrats Sante and Pacome again!

The next advance in weather forecasting may not come from a new satellite or supercomputer, but from a device in your pocket. University of Washington atmospheric scientists are using pressure sensors included in the newest smartphones to develop better weather forecasting techniques.

Collaborative technology transfer.. sounds like something the Advanced Concepts Generator should have come up with..

Know his book but did not know his blog .... Tough I am sure Luis does :-)

No, actually I only know him from several documentaries. von Neumann probes, those I know quite well from sci-fi :). Alastair Reynolds' Revelation Space is a good example btw. Here's a relevant link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-replicating_machine#NIAC_studies_on_self-replicating_systems

Hard work in functional materials is driving the development of new wearable electronics that could be advantageous for communications and sensing is being pursued in the Advanced Functional Fabrics of America Institute. Through embroidering circuits into fabric with 0.1 mm precision full integration of electronic components such as sensors and computer memory devices into clothing is now possible.

The best robot prototype videos in ICRA conference. Nice whiskered robots and "self-supervised" self learning robot hands using CNNs.