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Wall crawling gecko robots also work in space #ESA - 2 views

www.esa.int/..._robots_can_stick_in_space_too
shared by Thijs Versloot on 13 Jan 14 - No Cached
Juxi Leitner liked it
  • Thijs Versloot on 13 Jan 14
     
    The cooperation took place through ESA's Networking/Partnering Initiative, which supports work carried out by universities and research institutes on advanced technologies with potential space applications.
  • LeopoldS on 15 Jan 14
     
    really nice, especially since it is an idea that started in the team, led to an Ariadna study by Carlo Menon, RF in biomimetics who then got a research position at simon fraser univ, where he created his own biomimetics group menvra (http://menrva.ensc.sfu.ca) there, struggling as an italian in a canadian university doing space and not having access to the US space market ... the NPI was the first contract he got for a space resaerch project ... its fantastic to see his student now making headlines with this idea
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Air pollution weakens hurricanes - 3 views

tamutimes.tamu.edu/...ls-appear-to-weaken-hurricanes science weather climate?
shared by johannessimon81 on 11 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • johannessimon81 on 11 Mar 14
     
    Problem solved.
  • ...1 more comment...
  • johannessimon81 on 11 Mar 14
     
    Also, tornados could be stopped from forming by building 300 m tall, 100 km long walls across the USA: http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-03/08/tornado-walls
  • Thijs Versloot on 11 Mar 14
     
    Those would also work very well to keep the Kaiju's out..
  • johannessimon81 on 12 Mar 14
     
    Good point!
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Researchers Use Radio Waves to "See" Through Walls -- Berardelli 2009 (1015): 2 -- Scie... - 0 views

sciencenow.sciencemag.org/...2 technology radio tracking
shared by pacome delva on 19 Oct 09 - Cached
  • Researchers have discovered that an array of radio transceivers--devices that send and receive signals--can track people's movements behind walls. Possible uses include detecting people trapped in burning buildings, controlling lighting or heating and cooling systems as people enter or exit rooms, and spotting burglars or enemy soldiers.
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How Michael Osinski Helped Build the Bomb That Blew Up Wall Street -- New York Magazine - 0 views

nymag.com/55687 crisis software wall street bubble mortgage computational
shared by nikolas smyrlakis on 15 May 09 - Cached
  • You needed models to create the intricate network of bonds based on the homeowners’ payments, models to predict prepayment rates, and models to predict defaults. You needed the Internet to sail these bonds back and forth across the world, massaging their content to fit an investor’s needs at a moment’s notice. Add to all this the complacency, greed, entitlement, and callous stupidity that characterized banks in post-2001 America, and you have a recipe for disaster.
  • nikolas smyrlakis on 15 May 09
     
    CMS !
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SIGBOVIK - Colin McMillen - 0 views

colinm.org/sigbovik fun INF
shared by Marcus Maertens on 05 Apr 19 - No Cached
  • Marcus Maertens on 05 Apr 19
     
    This paper, answers a long-standing open problem in the programming languages community: is it possible to smear paint on the wall without creating valid Perl?
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CubeSat Ambipolar Thruster - 2 views

www.kickstarter.com/...er-for-interplanetary-cubesats space technology
shared by Daniel Hennes on 04 Jul 13 - No Cached
LeopoldS liked it
  • Daniel Hennes on 04 Jul 13
     
    "Cast your name into deep space in style!"
  • dejanpetkow on 04 Jul 13
     
    Interesting approach, but with 99.9% probability they will miserably fail (at least in terms of their time schedule) simply because the technology is untested. I haven't read the refs (which miss by the way important works of E. Ahedo et al. on magnetic nozzle acceleration by ambipolar effects), but 1. using water means that you produce oxygen radicals which will erode chamber walls (ionisation efficiency is not 100% and experimental tests haven't been performed yet). 2. Electronic excitation (and radiation), rotational excitation, vibrational excitation, and dissociation are all processes which consume energy and reduce ionisation efficiency drastically. 3. It is a miniaturised Helicon thruster. Theoretical analysis probably does not consider near field effects. Far field models are probably not applicable due to the size of the thruster. I expect some surprises during thruster testing. In any case - good luck!
  • dejanpetkow on 05 Jul 13
     
    Apparently, there is only one qualification constraint regarding CubeSat propulsion which is related to volatile propellant. Since they use water as propellant and are also the owner of the CubeSat it is actually up to them how they qualify their thruster. Given that it is also possible to qualify the thruster within 18 months - since they define what "qualification" means.
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Nice sea and ocean depths diagram - 2 views

xkcd.com/large fun
shared by Nicholas Lan on 10 Apr 12 - No Cached
Ma Ru liked it
  • Ma Ru on 10 Apr 12
     
    What stroke me especially was the shape of the Marianas Trench (much wider than deep) [edit] This reminds me I used to have a printout of a similar, but more space-related, comic http://xkcd.com/482/ hanging on the wall next to my desk in estec... good ol' times...
  • Luís F. Simões on 10 Apr 12
     
    and in case you missed it, check also the excellent Money infographic that guy created last year: http://xkcd.com/980/huge/
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MIT researchers create camera that can see around corners - 1 views

www.gizmag.com/...21892 technology
shared by Lionel Jacques on 21 Mar 12 - No Cached
  • Lionel Jacques on 21 Mar 12
     
    "It works by emitting a burst of light from a femtosecond laser that reflects off visible surfaces - such as an opaque wall - onto objects that are hidden from the camera's direct view. The light then bounces off the object before ultimately making its way back to a detector. This process is repeated a number of times with the laser targeted at different areas of the reflecting surface." nice video
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Artificial Braneworlds Made to Collide In Lab - Technology Review - 4 views

www.technologyreview.com/...27537 metamaterials cosmology PHY
shared by santecarloni on 31 Jan 12 - No Cached
pacome delva liked it
  • santecarloni on 31 Jan 12
     
    Physicists have simulated two universes colliding inside a metamaterial--  Now, this is cool (if it is true...)
  • ...1 more comment...
  • LeopoldS on 01 Feb 12
     
    we... the article is a bit overblown in my view ... except maybe the last paragraphs: "The collision between universe's is a variation on this theme. "The "colliding universe" scenario can be realized as a simple extension of our earlier experiments simulating the spacetime geometry in the vicinity of big bang," he says. He simulates an expanding universe using concetric rings of gold separated by a dielectric. "When the two concentric ring ("universe") patterns touch each other ("collide"), a Minkowski domain wall is created, in which the metallic stripes touch each other at a small angle," he says. Being able to recreate these exotic events in the lab is certainly interesting but it is beginning to lose its novelty. The problem is that this work is not telling us anything we didn't know--the universe behaves the same way inside a metamaterial as it does outside. What Smolyaninov needs is a way of using his exotic materials to do something interesting. In other words, he needs a killer app. Any ideas? "
  • Luzi Bergamin on 05 Feb 12
     
    Hm, they use more or less everything I don't especially like. They are nonmagnetic, so the relation materialGR is already rather weak. Usually, experimentalists prefer nonmagnetic media, since they are cheaper and broadband. At least the broadband is no argument here, since the frequency defines the "mass", which I find a rather strange point of view. And finally, they use strong anisotropy as a model of "time", which is rather problematic. Of course, the spatial direction with eps<0 appears in the wave equation with the same sign as time. But this does not mean that it behaves like time. But to teach material physicists that time is more than just a different sign in the wave equation seems to be as hopeless as to teach them that a black hole is more than something that absorbs all light... SIGHHH
  • LeopoldS on 10 Feb 12
     
    Luzi I miss you ...
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Stochastic Pattern Recognition Dramatically Outperforms Conventional Techniques - Techn... - 2 views

www.technologyreview.com/...27598 stochastic probabilistic computing pattern_recognition robotics navigation
shared by Luís F. Simões on 23 Feb 12 - No Cached
  • A stochastic computer, designed to help an autonomous vehicle navigate, outperforms a conventional computer by three orders of magnitude, say computer scientists
  • These guys have applied stochastic computing to the process of pattern recognition. The problem here is to compare an input signal with a reference signal to determine whether they match. &nbsp; In the real world, of course, input signals are always noisy so a system that can cope with noise has an obvious advantage.&nbsp; Canals and co use their technique to help an autonomous vehicle navigate its way through a simple environment for which it has an internal map. For this task, it has to measure the distance to the walls around it and work out where it is on the map. It then computes a trajectory taking it to its destination.
  • Although the idea of stochastic computing has been around for half a century, attempts to exploit have only just begun. Clearly there's much work to be done. And since one line of thought is that the brain might be a stochastic computer, at least in part, there could be exciting times ahead.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Ref:&nbsp;arxiv.org/abs/1202.4495: Stochastic-Based Pattern Recognition Analysis
  • Luís F. Simões on 23 Feb 12
     
    hey! This is essentially the Probabilistic Computing Ariadna
  • LeopoldS on 25 Feb 12
     
    The link is there but my understanding of our purpose is different than what I understood from the abstract. In any case,the authors are from Palma de Mallorca, Balears, Spain "somebody" should somehow make them aware of the Ariadna study ... E.g somebody no longer in the team :-)
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Testing shows using microwaves to propel a craft into space might work - 4 views

phys.org/...owaves-propel-craft-space.html technology propulsion microwaves science
shared by Nina Nadine Ridder on 23 Jul 15 - No Cached
Thijs Versloot and jcunha liked it
  • Nina Nadine Ridder on 23 Jul 15
     
    A team of researchers at Colorado based Escape Dynamics is reporting that initial tests indicate that it might really be possible to launch space-planes into space using microwaves sent from the ground, to allow for a single stage spacecraft. If the idea pans out, the cost savings for sending satellites (or perhaps humans) into orbit could be considerable.
  • Thijs Versloot on 27 Jul 15
     
    Not very new, but a very slick video nonetheless! Will it work? I am not so sure whether "just engineering" applies in this case. The array of antenna's required is quite significant to compensate for beam losses. Wall plug efficiency is not that high therefore, then again.. solar energy is for free almost in the future so who cares.. let's go for it! :)
1More

iRobot Brings Visual Mapping and Navigation to the Roomba 980 - 1 views

spectrum.ieee.org/...d-navigation-to-the-roomba-980
shared by Alexander Wittig on 18 Sep 15 - No Cached
  • Alexander Wittig on 18 Sep 15
     
    Finally the thing will have a little more artificial intelligence than just "bump into wall, turn a bit, repeat". We've known for a while now that iRobot has been developing robots with wireless integration along with intelligent navigation capability based on VSLAM (Vision Simultaneous Localization and Mapping). We've know this for enough of a while that it's been a little bit frustrating to see iRobot's most recent Roomba upgrades come out without those neat features.
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The Coolest Antiprotons - 2 views

focus.aps.org/st1 phy antiprotons antihydrogen
shared by pacome delva on 05 Jul 10 - Cached
  • Researchers cooled a cloud of about 4,000 antiprotons down to 9&nbsp;kelvin using a standard approach for cooling atoms that has never been used with charged particles or ions. The technique could provide a new way to create and trap antihydrogen, which could help researchers probe a basic symmetry of nature.
  • hydrogen and antihydrogen should share many basic traits, like mass, magnetic moment, and emission spectrum. If antihydrogen and hydrogen have even slightly different spectra, it indicates some new physics principles beyond the standard model, a very big deal.
  • pacome delva on 05 Jul 10
     
    antihydrogen propulsion...?
  • ...1 more comment...
  • LeopoldS on 05 Jul 10
     
    how to efficiently direct it?
  • Nicholas Lan on 06 Jul 10
     
    didn't roger write an assessment of antimatter propulsion when he was in the ACT?
  • pacome delva on 06 Jul 10
     
    yeah the problem is the amount of antimatter you can get and more specifically how to trap it. I found that you would need around one gram to go to the outer Solar System. So we are far from that, but finding an efficient way to trap it, with an electromagnetic trap rather than solid walls is a first step !
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Physics - Small-scale hydraulics - 1 views

physics.aps.org/...PhysRevLett.103.144503 phy nan nanofluidic bio
shared by pacome delva on 07 Oct 09 - Cached
  • Taking a cue from biology, scientists are now designing nanofluidic devices in which molecular interactions at the walls of a narrow channel are engineered to control fluid flow.
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How to walk through walls - 6 views

physicsworld.com/...44576 phy transformation_optics
shared by pacome delva on 15 Dec 10 - No Cached
  • Luzi Bergamin on 15 Dec 10
     
    and yet another TO nonsense... And why always Harry Potter, dont't these darn scientists have more imagination or is their intellectual level just as low as being unable to read more complex literature than J.K. Rawling?? btw.: how about this skype session on TO, Leo?
  • dejanpetkow on 15 Dec 10
     
    Combine it with touchable holography (search for SIGGRAPH 2009 at youtube) and name it Holosuite 0.1.
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BBC NEWS | Science &amp; Environment | Military robot 'hops' over walls - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8253807.stm hopping robots
shared by Juxi Leitner on 16 Sep 09 - Cached
  • Video footage has been released of a robot that can leap over obstacles more than 7.5m (25ft) high.
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Gecko's tail... a new way of reaching stability. Possible space uses - 0 views

www.thetechherald.com/...o-enhance-wall-climbing-robots biomimicry biotechnology BIO
shared by ESA ACT on 24 Apr 09 - Cached
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