www.youtube.com/watch?v=MP7pni7AZGk

Deep above the earths atmosphere brave astronauts are pointing downwards laughing at the crew of the mars 500. They will boldly go, well, nowhere. Scientists are currently monitering the crew, which make up scientists from Russia, France, and China for signs of physiological and psychological changes due to the extreme isolation to simulate a mission to mars. The crew members shower once every 10 days to conserve water and all supplies are onboard the “station”. In essence a bunch of scientists will be stuck in a pod for 520 days with nothing but stink and wii fit to keep em busy. halfway through the mission they will land and be released into a “simulated” mars area where they are to conduct experiements. Even radio communications will be delayed 20 minutes. All I know is that all work and no play make jack a dull boy…

via:popsci,esa

www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgCDcobtZHs

The video above shows a spider crab molting. During this phase it is completely vulnerable and disgusting. Now if only you could molt your ugly exterior to reveal a squishier less uglier exterior underneath.

Dr. Andrew Schwartz at the University of Pittsburgh implanted sensors into the brain of a monkey and allowed it to move a robotic arm to feed itself. That arm in 2008 had 4 degrees of freedom and many more degrees of terrifying. It used the arm as shown below to feed itself marshmallows and chunks of fruit. One day when the researcher in the video runs out of marshmallows I imagine a super powered mech/monkey chasing me down the street throwing poo at high velocities and doing shakedowns on elementary school children looking for marshmallows with dire consequences for coming up dry.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxIgdOlT2cY

This year, however, a newer arm with sensors located deep within the monkey’s brain, specifically the hand area and the other in the monkey’s motor cortex allowed the monkey to control a robotic arm with 7 points of articulation. In the video below the monkey is trained to use the arm to touch a knob to be rewarded with a sip of juice from a straw in its mouth. They might as well be training it to punch a picture of a face to be rewarded with Jack Daniels.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZn46l7uEKg

Researchers one day hope this will advance prosthetic techology by allowing the brain to directly control a device. Or at least create Monkeys that can tear you in half.

via:[physorg]

If you are like me and have been sitting in front of your toaster thinking to yourself, “Toast is great and all, but if only it could grow arms and both punch and stab me.” Well you are in for a treat my friend.

 At the 2010 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation held in Alaska researchers found that Robots were able to “inflict wounds that were lethal”. Now maybe I’m not qualified to fund research projects but they could’ve saved all that money if they would’ve talked any child under five. The research aimed to see just which weapon robots were best with including giving the robot arm weighing 14kg and a 1.1m a variety of bladed household weapons including a steak knife, kitchen knife, scissors and screwdriver. The robot arm was then programmed to use the weapons to stab and cut a silicone lump, a leg from a dead pig and the arm of a human volunteer. That’s right, a human volunteer.

httpv://www.youtube.com/v/dMh6cHSG3ng

The research is attempting to limit danger by using a safety system that can detect when the robot hits flesh of a different consistency and thus limit the damage done. Researchers from the Institute of Robotics and Mechatronics at the German aerospace agency used torque sensors to spot when it has hit a different substance and halts movement.

In 1981, to kick off robot killing season, Kenji Urada, a 37 year old man Japanese factory worker was carrying out some maintenance when he was accidentally pushed into a grinding machine by a powerful hydraulic robotic arm which was unable to detect him. Thus making him the first recorded casualty ever by a robot. Despite safety efforts robots have claimed even more since 1981, people have been “crushed, hit on the head, welded and even had molten aluminium poured over them by robots. Last year there were 77 robot-related accidents in Britain alone, according to the Health and Safety Executive.”  The German company DLR hopes to change this by making the robots more sensitive to our human presence. Or, they could be just teaching them how to kill us better. I for one think the final stage in this research should be teaching them kung-fu. If the technology isn’t there yet maybe just watch this other DLR research project below.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Gx8jpwyQ0

Ladies and Gentleman the doomsday clock has officially moved one more minute closer to midnight.

via: [the economist, BBC]

 In northern Alberta a giant rampaging beaver has devastated local communities. While the local military has made several attempts to no avail, local communities are at a standstill as its giant pancake style tail flattens buildings and maims children….

That is what this article should have began like. However, both disappointing and fascinating at the same time is a giant beaver dam that can be seen from space. While tracking permafrost in Wood Buffalo National Park in northern Alberta, researcher Jean Thie stumbled upon the massive beaver dam. Originally found in 2007 using satellites and google Earth the beaver dam was discovered 190km north of Fort McMurray in Alberta. Working since the 1970s these creatures don’t disappoint their “busy beaver” moniker having several generations hard at work constructing the 850m structure (2800 feet). Normally these dams reach roughly 10 – 100m and rarely do they ever get bigger.

“Several generations of beavers worked on it and it’s still growing,” Jean told AFP in Ottawa.

According to Geostrategis.com the actual search strategy was based on analysing hundreds of dams across Canada and using broad characteristics, certain areas were considered having the highest probability of high density beaver dam landscapes. Using Canada’s national Air Photo Library in Ottawa and Google Earth images the new dam was found and would have remained hidden without such technology.

Beavers were hunted extensively for their pelts for many centuries throughout north america. Thie also describes how they are not only repopulating areas but even ”re-engineering the landscape,”. Beavers use these dams to create deep water which allows the them to be more mobile and they are an essential part of creating Canada’s wetland habitat. With all the trees it took, I think we can rest with that whole “who ruined the environment” search we’ve all been on.

via[physorg.com, Geostrategis.com]

Initially created to help hearing impaired people articulate vowels, this rubber mouth will become the stuff of nightmares as it muscles its way through various vowels. Using an air pump, fake vocal chords, nasal cavity and plenty of voodoo Japan’s Kagawa University has managed to produced a robot that can not only produce the sounds which can summon demons from the necronomicon as shown below, but also at this point in development can allegedly sing. Whatever the case i’m still waiting for it to stop asking me for human blood. Wait, you can’t hear that?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=57zsMfuTk1U

via: [popsci,abstract]

Zombies, Meteors, and Robots? who cares, I just made nachos in my Vivos APOCOLYPSE SHELTER. Is the world going to end in 2012? If it does I will owe you $100. Using Granny magic a twenty sided die and a shadow seeking groundhog, some scientists have interpreted the Mayan calender ending to signify the end of the world. The Mayans on the other hand believe the end of the “Long count” to be a time of celebration. The calender itself has ended multiple times before in fact. In any case, if you need a way to trick that girl of your dreams to give her last romp in the hay with your ugly self, convince her to enter THE VIVOS APOCOLYPSE SHELTER. Together you may re-emerge to spread your alarmist genetic seed across the planet. On the Vivos website is a ticker counting down to the end of the world as we know it and also the time you have left to prove your idiocy by buying one of these. Vivos also showcases all the potential disaster scenarios peppered with stock photos of loving families and sunrises. With around 20 shelters peppered across the states it will cost you a mere $50 000 to secure a spot with Vivos in their $10 million, 200 person shelter with enough supplies to last you one year. so far about 1000 applications have been submitted. Other than an awesome reality show with slutty girls and fist pumping idiots I can’t imagine a use for this. All the same, if the world really does end save me a spot…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T9heta_qLI

via: PhysOrg, Vivos

Geminoid F is hotter than your girlfriend, and by girlfriend I mean that poster of Jessica Alba you taped to your pillow. Strangely, using less pneumatic actuators than her predecessor 12 vs. 46, Hiroshi Ishiguro designed the Geminoid F to mimic many facial expressions. The company Kokoro plans on using these approachable automated robots to replace secretaries and the like. I imagine this will solve that whole “why can’t I sexually harrass anyone I want at work” problem. For a price tag of $225, 000 Geminoid F will go on sale and as long as you have a good hiding place you won’t weird out your neighbours.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dJOAf2Dt98

 Source via: popsci, Spectrum

A Russian mathmetician, Grigory Perelman 43,  living in his mothers tiny cockroach infested apartment has won the Clay Millenium Prize in mathematics for solving the “Poincare Conjecture”. The Poincare Conjecture is one of the world’s most complex mathematical problems and has made scientists everywhere limp in bed from its massive mind bending powers.  Not only has Dr. Perelman solved the elusive problem, but he has also given a Million dollar middle finger to the world saying that he “has all he wants” (yelled through a closed door). Declining the prize saying ”I don’t want to be on display like an animal in a zoo. I’m not a hero of mathematics. I’m not even that successful; that is why I don’t want to have everybody looking at me.”  A total recluse, he has been urged by a local children’s charity in St. Petersburg to accept it and donate it. Instead, I recommend to accept the $1 million dollars and construct a large shiny solid aluminum statue of his bearded self. If that doesn’t do it, he could always invest in 1 million mechanical pencils and continue fighting the good fight on the lonely math front.

Hey smartass try it yourself:

Consider a compact 3-dimensional manifold V without boundary. Is it possible that the fundamental group of V could be trivial, even though V is not homeomorphic to the 3-dimensional sphere?

source via: BBC

After being blinded by a rocket propelled grenade in Iraq, that’s right a ROCKET PROPELLED GRENADE.  L/Cpl Craig Lundberg of Merseyside England has now licked the problem using terminator/Robocop esque sunglasses and a electric lollipop. Using the device Brainport he is promised neither to be faster nor stronger, but instead not as blind. The device rests on his tongue and converts video from the sunglasses into electrical signals delivered to the tongue and is described as the  ”tingling” one gets licking a 9-volt battery or ”pins and needles”  or “popping candy.” Even so the individual must have this lollipop like device hang out of his mouth like they are at an awful never ending tragic rave where there are rocket propelled grenade flashbacks. Currently the Minister of Defence in England has spent £18,000 on the prototype which will one day hopefully be a smaller permanent implant on the roof of the mouth to allow one to be able to talk/eat. The device as the L/Cpl has described has the potential to “change his life” allowing him to grab objects he perceives from the 2-D black and white display projected electrically on his tongue. I suggest however that before we start investing in these devices en masse. We first begin investing in FEWER ROCKET POWERED GRENADES.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaTzQVHi-C4