Festo BionicFinWave Is a Creepy Robotic Fish

Posted on 29/07/2018 by Conner Flynn

Biomimicry is the art of making technology and robots that mimic attributes of real-life animals. Festo is all about biomimicry. Take a look at this eel-like robotic fish called BionicFinWave. It swims like a cuttlefish and is mighty creepy to behold. Its fins go from head to tail and the wave-shaped movement of the fins allows the faux-fish to push the water behind it, creating a forward thrust. Creatures with this design can also swim backward in this way. Pretty weird, huh?

BionicFinWave can communicate wirelessly, transmitting sensor data, temperature, pressure, and more to researchers. It operates on the principle of a crankshaft, driven by servo motors, which facilitates the undulating fin movement. The robot is an experiment that allows them to see how this movement could serve as an effective propulsion mechanism.

It is effective alright, and is also eerily life-like. Why did they have to give it those creepy eyes? It already has a camera on the nose. Apparently, they want it to be as life-like as possible, not caring how it creeps out humans like me.

[via Mike Shouts]

Just How Aerodynamic is an X-Wing or TIE Fighter?

Posted on 26/07/2018 by Conner Flynn

Have you ever wondered how aerodynamic Star Wars ships really are? Well, wonder no more. EC Henry decided to give us some answers. He used AutoDesk’s now discontinued Flow Design software to analyze the aerodynamics and drag coefficients of ships from the Star Wars universe. I know, they don’t travel through air, they travel through space, but it’s still fun to see how aerodynamic their designs are anyhow.

As you may have guessed TIE Fighters are pretty useless when flying through the air. A TIE Interceptor is not much better than a standard TIE Fighter. X-Wings are better, but still not all that great. It turns out that A-Wing fighters are pretty fast.

Boba Fett’s Slave 1 would totally suck in the atmosphere and I’m guessing the Millennium Falcon would too. So basically Star Wars ships flying through the air are not a good idea and if they did, the Empire would never catch the rebels anyway. It doesn’t matter anyway because spaceships are for space.

I would love to see this done with Star Trek ships because I’m pretty sure that the Federation’s ships would be terrible in the atmosphere. The worst ship ever? The Borg cube. You can’t just fling a brick into the air and expect it to do much.

[via The Awesomer]

This Sun-seeking Robot Flowerpot Will Keep Your Plant Alive

Posted on 16/07/2018 by Conner Flynn

The Vincross Hexa is a programmable six-legged robot that looks all creepy walking on its bug-like legs, but now it has found its purpose thanks to Vincross founder Sun Tianqi. Now, the robot’s one job in life is to make sure that a single plant always get the sunlight it needs.

Tianqi got the idea for the Sharing Human Technology with Plants project from a sunflower exhibition where he noticed dead sunflowers near other plants and also observed how the plant could have survived if only it could move into the sun to get nutrients.

He replaced the original shell of the robot with a two-layer flowerpot large enough to hold a small succulent. Using sensors, the robot can move the succulent into the sun when needed. So with one of these, you will never kill your plant from lack of sunlight.

When the plant needs to be watered, the robot will even do a little dance to let you know. It is a very cool robot that could help anyone who has more of a brown thumb than a green one. Though it is a bit creepy to watch your plant walk around via six-legs. Good thing the plants and the robot can’t communicate or we would have some mobile plants taking over the world.

[via CNet]

World’s Smallest House Is Invisible to the Naked Eye

Posted on 24/05/2018 by Shane McGlaun

Look at this house. It looks a bit old and dilapidated, but it is the world’s smallest house. It measures a scant 300 x 300 micrometers, which means it’s too tiny for even a dust mite to make it into the door.

It was built by the nanorobotics team from the Femto-ST Institute in Besancon, France. The building of the tiniest house ever was to show off their µRobotex nanofactory. The construction was completed inside a vacuum chamber and required a process almost surgical in execution.

The team used a focused ion bean like scissors to cut a silica membrane. Once cut, a gas injection system was used to stick the edges of the structure in place. This project is the first time that the team was able to realize patterning and assembly with less than 2 nanometers of accuracy. This might be just the place for Antman to hang out when he’s really, really small.

[via Geek.com]

Watch The Omnicopter Drone Play a Game of Catch

Posted on 08/01/2018 by Conner Flynn

Fathers and sons do it, people do it in the park with their dogs, and Baseball players do it professionally, so why not let the robots get in on a fun game of catch? They want in on this human pastime too. And guess what? They are doing it. The Omnicopter drone is pretty good at it. It won’t be long before robots everywhere are tossing the ball to one another and forming their own Baseball teams.

It’s happening thanks to Swiss mechanical engineer Dario Brescianini and ETH Zurich professor Raffaello D’Andrea, who worked together to create this unique aerial vehicle. This drone is a super agile omni-directional drone that can fly in any direction, at any time, meaning it can change flight vectors much faster and more reliably than traditional quadcopters. That tech is the key to its success at this game. The drone is able to play a game of catch by adding a “computationally efficient trajectory generator.” So basically, it’s able to watch where the ball is being thrown, rapidly calculate its flight path, and make its way to where the ball will be in time to catch it.

The Omnicopter never fails to catch the ball, and never drops it. It is the perfect outfielder since it knows where the ball will be ahead of time. Sure, it’s impressive, but talk to me when it can swing a bat and hit a home run. We will probably see that next week.

[via Laughing Squid]

Space Putty Is Oooey, Gooey, Magnetic Fun

Posted on 13/10/2017 by Technabob Shop

Did you know putty can do more than be smooshed around and stretched into weird shapes? It can if it’s Scientific Magnetic Space Putty.

Like regular play putty, this stuff is still viscoelastic for all the funky stretching and stress-relieving. But this putty is also embedded with magnetic properties, so you can use it to interact with magnets. It even bounces, so the possibilities for play and fun are virtually endless.

Wow your kids (or even your coworkers — magnetic putty doesn’t discriminate by age) with Scientific Magnetic Space Putty. Try it out for only $9.99(USD) at the Technabob Shop.

Elon Musk’s Latest Idea? Fly People Around the World on SpaceX Rockets

Posted on 29/09/2017 by Paul Strauss

To be honest, I’m a bit of a cynic when it comes to Elon Musk’s “big ideas.” Sure it’s cool that he’s made some insanely fast electric cars at Tesla, but the cars have suffered from lots of reliability and build quality issues. In fact, a Tesla Model S that I drove at a track had to be returned to the dealer after I managed to brick it after just a single lap. That said, as cool as his visions for the future are, I’m not sure they’re all ready for prime time.

Musk’s latest concept? Use rockets made by his company SpaceX to fly passengers intercontinentally around the Earth. The idea is to use their BFR (“Big F**king Rocket”) platform to launch a capsule filled with passengers around the globe at speeds up to 18,000 mph. The result, flights from New York to Shanghai in just 39 minutes, Los Angeles to Toronto in 24 minutes, or Paris to New York in about 30 minutes.

The rockets would work in two stages – one with the fuel and big rocket engine needed to lift off into space, and a second one which contains the passengers and retrorockets which allow it to land. While SpaceX has demonstrated their ability to land a rocket back on Earth after it flies, their track record of success hasn’t exactly been stellar, as demonstrated below:

So while the idea of flying anywhere on the planet in less than 1 hour sounds great, how many of you would take the significant risk being blown up at just about any point in the flight? Never mind the fact that each flight must be ridiculously costly, between the fuel and the risk of losing the first stage rocket.

This Staircase Does the Climbing for You

Posted on 14/07/2017 by Conner Flynn

Stairs are the worst, right? Too much exercise. Especially if you are talking a multi-story building with no elevator or escalator. Well, the engineers at Georgia Tech and Emory University have created stairs that will do all the hard work for you one day soon.

These energy-recycling stairs store energy as you descend, then release it to make it easier on the way back up. It is a brilliant idea. Our bodies use a lot of energy to prevent us from falling. It’s usually wasted energy however. These energy-recycling stairs store that energy with a spring-loaded mechanism that compresses each step and locks it down as you climb down. So you are basically charging each step with potential energy once you’ve hit the bottom. When you climb back up, pressure sensors on each tread release the locking mechanism on the step below it, turning that stored potential energy into kinetic energy. This helps lift a climber’s leg as the step raises again, reducing the amount of effort required.

Hopefully they can perfect this because I’m getting sick of using my actual muscles.

[via New Atlas via Gizmodo]

Third Thumb Prosthetic Gives You an Extra Functional Thumb

Posted on 10/07/2017 by Conner Flynn

Want an extra thumb? Check out the Third Thumb, a prosthetic extra digit designed by London’s Royal College of Art grad student Dani Clode. The idea is that the additional finger can provide more versatility for gripping and interacting with objects than with just five fingers.

Basically, this additional finger attaches to your hand with a strap and is connected to a bracelet with a motor and battery that powers the movement. The gripping is controlled by a pressure sensor in the heel of your shoe, which is relayed to the bracelet using Bluetooth. After seeing the video demonstration, I think I could use another thumb. Looks pretty handy. Pun intended.

Dani says the Third Thumb was designed to “reimagine what we think of as a prosthetic – something that adds capabilities, rather than just replacing those lost.” It is a cool idea. We’re going to need some extra body parts if we are going to keep up with the robots.

[via The Verge via Geekologie]

Robots Are Now Milking Scorpions

Posted on 05/07/2017 by Conner Flynn

Humans are milking cows to feed other humans, but robots are now milking scorpions. Ha ha! Stupid robots! Seriously though, there’s a reason that robots are milking scorpions. The robots are designed to extract and store venom, making this process easier and safer for scientists who work with bugs.

Researchers at the Ben M’sik Hassan II University in Morocco say that their robot also speeds up the extraction process. Scorpion venom is used in a variety of medical fields, like cancer research, and antimalarial drugs. Current harvesting methods are often deadly for the scorpions and not great for scientists either, due to electric shocks from the equipment. Besides, no one wants to hold a deadly scorpion.

The robot works by clamping the scorpion’s tail and electrically simulating the animal to get droplets of venom, which it captures and stores, and it doesn’t harm the scorpion. Let’s just hope the robots don’t start stockpiling the stuff and start using it on human victims during the inevitable robopocalypse.

[via Engadget]

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Tag Archives: Weird Science

Festo BionicFinWave Is a Creepy Robotic Fish

Just How Aerodynamic is an X-Wing or TIE Fighter?

This Sun-seeking Robot Flowerpot Will Keep Your Plant Alive

World’s Smallest House Is Invisible to the Naked Eye

Watch The Omnicopter Drone Play a Game of Catch

Space Putty Is Oooey, Gooey, Magnetic Fun

Elon Musk’s Latest Idea? Fly People Around the World on SpaceX Rockets

This Staircase Does the Climbing for You

Third Thumb Prosthetic Gives You an Extra Functional Thumb

Robots Are Now Milking Scorpions

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