Homely Scientist

 Here’s a great example of science and engineering looking to nature for new and innovative ways to solve problems.  Look at that robot!  It’s tiny!  It hops!  It finds pollution!
Umberto Scarfogliero, one of the men behind the University of Lucca project, says that the team focused on fleas and frogs in particular when researching the ‘bot. “Robots like these are far more efficient than larger ones in scouring vast areas of land in a shorter time,” he explained. The little critters are now being equipped with sensors that will allow them to locate sources of mercury poisoning. Source: Leaping Lizards: …read more

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 I don’t know if this is a post for here or PimpYourWork, but eh, we’ll do it here (more science than work I guess).  We know that electrical resistance makes heat (this how toasters and electric heaters work, btw) and our computers are packing in so many electro-bits (I made that up) that heat generation is a big problem.  I have no less than three devices handy to help keep my laptop cool.  All involve passive cooling (letting more cool air get to the machine), not what if the processors were made to cool themselves!
US researchers have developed a prototype …read more

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 Now this is what I’m talkin’ about!
Built on just 3 acres of land, (most single-story storage facilities need ten times that amount) Portland City Storage will be the largest solar facility in the Northwest. Excess power will be sold on to Portland General Electric, and there is a rainwater collection area on the roof. Source: Eco: Portland’s Solar-Powered, 22-Story Storage Facility – Gizmodo
Really what we have to do is build this kind of facility in order to satisfy our energy thirst.  Is it easy?  Of course not, but also fears that something like this has to be ugly…well just look …read more

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On my bacteria making hydrocarbons post, Dave commented on what if something hadn’t been discovered or had been discovered by a different person…how would things be different.  Which leads to ethics and science.  Both Einstein and Oppenheimer decried the use of their discoveries.  Yes, Oppenheimer is noted as “the father of the atomic bomb”, but he also didn’t want the world destroyed either.  Nobel invented dynamite, but was so morally devastated by its use that the Nobel Prize was created.
We scientists often discuss how discoveries are ethically “neutral”, it is their use that matters.  Is that entirely true, though?  Are …read more

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I don’t know anyone with a severe allergy to peanuts, but I do know that people who are live in a world where just about any food could make them sick, or worse.
News from North Carolina might give them some hope:
People with life-threatening allergies to peanuts might be able to rest easy at their friendly neighborhood Thai restaurants soon, if research announced this week proves true. A release from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University says researcher Mohamed Ahmedna has developed whole, roasted peanuts in which the allergen is completely inactivated and that serum from people with severe …read more

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Replacement limbs have generally been somewhat useful objects.  Sure, there are hooks, and some bio-mechanical hands, and much better legs now, but true bionics have eluded us, until now:
Touch Bionics announced Tuesday what it calls the world’s first commercially available bionic hand, a prosthetic hand that moves more naturally than traditional prostheses and can hold awkward or delicate objects. While most prostheses today can open and close, allowing people to grasp some items, they lack the detailed movements of a natural hand. The i-Limb Hand gets one step closer to that natural movement, with motors in each finger that make …read more

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 In the Andes, the Incas and modern-day descendents have been gathering water from the fog for centuries.  The process there is simple, the fog hits some kind of cloth or sheeting and the water condenses on it.   Then the water collects and rolls down into a container.  These work amazingly well, but they are also huge and need pretty heavy fog to work well.  Max Whisson has taken the idea that there is always (pretty much) water in the air and uses condensation to make a water gathering machine:
There’s a lot of water floating around in the air everywhere, and …read more

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This caught my eye on Read/Write Web:
A new project from the University of Oxford (UK), the University of Portsmouth (UK) and Johns Hopkins University (US) aims to harness the power of the human brain to identify and classify galaxies and stars. On the Galaxy Zoo website, users are asked to identify the objects in photographs as spiral or elliptical galaxies, the direction of rotation, or if the photo depicts a star or merger of galaxies. The site launched yesterday and says they have already had an “amazing response.”
“The human brain is actually better than a computer at pattern recognition tasks …read more

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Making artificial limbs work like the original has been a lofty goal for years.  Hooks, pulleys, servos, all sorts of gadgets to make fingers and wrists move and respond.  Until now, that’s been the limit, but now inspired by the elephant’s trunk, a breakthrough has been made:
It’s not often you see a piece of tech touted by its developer as being inspired by something “long, gray, and soft,” but that’s exactly how the researchers at Germany’s prolific Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft Institute are describing their ISELLA robotic arms. Inspired by the finesse and power of an elephant’s trunk, the team developed a …read more

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How would you like to have a device that generates electricity just from the vibrations that are all around us?  How about if this device were smaller enough to be used in lots of small devices?  Making things like wireless transmitters small, cheap, and self-powered?  It’s a reality now:
The trick with this generator is efficiency: Its vibrating magnets are 10 times better at generating current than other machines of this sort. The obvious use for this is in wireless sensors, that currently use batteries that need to be replaced, and therefore must be located in accessible spots. With a vibration …read more

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