Really Rocket Science

In writing about the whole mobTV phenomenon, I’ve been wondering about something that I haven’t asked about until now. Just how does one enjoy watching video on such a tiny screen? I mean, I haven’t measured them, but the screens on even the best phones seem rather small for any serious or enjoyable viewing; definitely not for watching full length programs.

As usual, I should have known someone would be way ahead of me on this. Enter video glasses for mobile TV. 

Kowon Technology, a South Korean venture start-up, Wednesday announced it plans to introduce an eye-glass type display _ dubbed MSP-209 – in the local market next week at 199,000 won.

The product is equipped with a pair of liquid crystal display (LCD) screens, roughly the size of a human pupil _ 4.2 millimeters by 4.8 millimeters _ in both lenses.

“Weighing just 2 grams each, this micro LCD would be the world’s smallest and lightest screen available. The weight of the video glasses would be also fine at 58 grams,” Kowon vice president Park Hong-tae said.

Park continued Kowon did not compromise the all-important visual quality to minimize the display size because the miniature screen features programs at 320X240 pixels resolution, similar to that of digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB).

They’re also being called "anti-glance" glasses, because you can watch your video without worrying about your fellow commuters or other neighbors peeking over your shoulder. And it’s supposed to be like watching a 32 in. television screen about two yards away. So, it’s like watching television in your living room, but from anywhere. And you also get to look as though you’ve been "enhanced by Borg technology." Not bad for the equivalent cost of $216 in U.S. dollar. 

Via MobileMentalism.Com.

While we’re on the subject of robots, have you noticed they’re becoming more and more human all the time? This one — developed in Korea — is only the second android ever made, and though she can’t move from the waist down she comes in handy in some situations.

Korea has developed its own android capable of facial expressions on its humanoid face, the second such machine to be developed after one from Japan.

… Ever-1 can move its upper body and “express” happiness, anger, sadness and pleasure. But the robot is still incapable of moving its lower half. Ever-1’s skin is made from a silicon jelly that feels similar to human skin. The face is a composite of two stars, and its torso on a singer.

The 15 monitors in the robotic face allow it to interpret the face of an interlocutor and look back at whoever stands near it. Ever-1 also recognizes 400 words and can hold a basic verbal exchange.

According to the article, Ever-1 (Eve R-1. Get it?) could earn her keep by giving directions in department stores and read stories to children. On that last one, if you asked me, I’d bet that the kids (a) won’t be fooled by Ever-1, and might even be frightened.

But I just might lose that bet. Robot Dreams has a post up about a new robot from NEC that’s also designed to designed to interact with people, and is pictured with some happy looking kids.

Oh well. If I’m right, Ever-1 might be able to get work piloting tentacled flying robots.
 

Call me crazy, but if the folks who came up with flying robots got together with the people who’ve invented tentacled robots, they could potentially take over the world. Or at the very least have a pretty interesting sci-fi flick on their hands.

Robotic "tentacles" that can grasp and grapple with a wide variety of objects have been developed by US researchers.

Most robots rely on mechanical gripping jaws that have difficulty grabbing large or irregularly shaped objects. Replacing these with tentacle-like manipulators could make robots more nimble and flexible, say the scientists.

The tentacle-like manipulators, known as "Octarms", resemble an octopus’s limb or an elephant’s trunk. They were developed through a project called OCTOR (sOft robotiC manipulaTORs), which involves several US universities and is funded by the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

"An elephant’s trunk can pick up a peanut or a tree trunk," says Ian Walker, a member of the project team from Clemson University in South Carolina. "This ability, inherent in the OCTOR robots, gives OCTOR arms a huge advantage over conventional industrial robots." 

Would it be a case of science fact catching up wth science fiction? 

Maybe. Just maybe.

But the question remains, once we have tentacled flying robots … what do we do with them?

What’s that in the sky? A bird? A plane? No, it’s a flying robot. An unstoppable flying robot, according to some experts. 

The technology for remote-controlled light aircraft is now highly advanced, widely available — and, experts say, virtually unstoppable.

Models with a wingspan of five metres (16 feet), capable of carrying up to 50 kilograms (110 pounds), remain undetectable by radar.

And thanks to satellite positioning systems, they can now be programmed to hit targets some distance away with just a few metres (yards) short of pinpoint accuracy.

Security services the world over have been considering the problem for several years, but no one has yet come up with a solution.

The article quotes a number of experts who suggest flying robots may be a security threat, includes a photo of the U.S.-built "Predator" unmanned aerial vehicle, and cites development of similar technology in other countries. 

But the discussion in the blogosphere is tinged with doubt. Over on Dvorak Uncensored, at least one commenter rattles off a laundry list of pitfalls between having the technology and making it work, including everything from getting a decent engine to finding an open channel. Meanwhile, Bruce Scheiner pegs the article as tipping the" movie-threat hype meter." 

On the other hand the DefenseTech post mentioned in the article ends with the statement "How great the threat is this time remains to be seen."

Doug Lung presented his paper RF Delusions Saturday afternoon at the NAB2006 Conference (which we covered here) and has now posted the presentation online for those who missed it:

The presentation addresses common "delusions" concerning broadcast coverage, interference and RF safety. The major focus is coverage. One example illustrates that using data from the azimuth patterns in the FCC CDBS and the standard elevation patterns from OET-69 may lead to significantly different results from those obtained by using the actual antenna azimuth and elevation patterns. (These would include the actual electrical and mechanical beam tilt.) This is one of the more extreme cases and limitations on time and computer resources would make it difficult, if not impossible, for the FCC to study all U.S. TV stations using their actual 3D antenna patterns.

Most interference studies conducted using the FCC software (available on its Web site) with its inherent simplifications and methodology for calculating the depression angle will not show such an extreme difference in signal levels. Ironically, errors are likely to be greater when azimuth and elevation patterns from the FCC antenna database and OET-69 are used instead of actual antenna patterns for studies conducted with third party coverage and interference software that accurately calculates the depression angle. Directional antenna azimuth and elevation patterns should be included with recent TV construction permit applications, but they have to be extracted individually from exhibits attached to the application.

Audio copies of the presentation are also available at NABStore.com.

Seed Magazine takes a look at Fermi’s Paradox:

Sometime in the 1940s, Enrico Fermi was talking about the possibility of extra-terrestrial intelligence with some other physicists. They were impressed that life had evolved quickly and progressively on Earth. They figured our galaxy holds about 100 billion stars, and that an intelligent, exponentially-reproducing species could colonize the galaxy in just a few million years. They reasoned that extra-terrestrial intelligence should be common by now. Fermi listened patiently, then asked, simply, "So, where is everybody?" That is, if extra-terrestrial intelligence is common, why haven’t we met any bright aliens yet? This conundrum became known as Fermi’s Paradox.

"The Paradox has become even more baffling" in the past 60 years, as the technology to conduct the search for intelligence has improved dramatically with no results, according to the article’s author, Professor Geoffrey Miller of the University of New Mexico. Miller posits a radical hypothesis:

I suggest a different, even darker solution to the Paradox. Basically, I think the aliens don’t blow themselves up; they just get addicted to computer games. They forget to send radio signals or colonize space because they’re too busy with runaway consumerism and virtual-reality narcissism. They don’t need Sentinels to enslave them in a Matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are doing today. Once they turn inwards to chase their shiny pennies of pleasure, they lose the cosmic plot. They become like a self-stimulating rat, pressing a bar to deliver electricity to its brain’s ventral tegmental area, which stimulates its nucleus accumbens to release dopamine, which feels…ever so good.

It’s an interesting theory. Perhaps ET is too busy playing Pac Man (does that reveal I’m a Gen Xer or what?) to care about reaching out to explore our solar system. Zoning out takes precedence over homing in for alien species, says Miller:

This is the Great Temptation for any technological species—to shape their subjective reality to provide the cues of survival and reproductive success without the substance. Most bright alien species probably go extinct gradually, allocating more time and resources to their pleasures, and less to their children. They eventually die out when the game behind all games—the Game of Life—says "Game Over; you are out of lives and you forgot to reproduce."

 The full entertaining article can be found here. 

While we’re on the subject of robots, how’d you like to strap these to your feet and stroll through a minefield? 

That’s what developers at Singapore’s BioMedical Research Centre have in mind. But before you decide, you should know these shoes are designed to keep you from stepping on a landmine. There’s a research paper (in PDF format) about them, that has more technical lingo than I can decipher. Fortunately Robot Gossip has translated it all into laymen’s terms. 

The shoes have six short legs under each of your feet. The pods on each of the little legs has a metal detector. If one of the robot-shoe legs senses a trigger of a mine then it releases so that it can move up out of the way without setting off the mine. You would be supported by the other five legs on the shoe. When you step forward the leg locks in place again.

Also, everyone’s talking about Genibo — the robot dog that replaced AIBO — but there’s yet another robo-dog making the scene: the X-Cybie, which is an updated version of the iCybie. The X-Cybie is already available for order on Amazon, for $149, and will ship on May 4th. 

There aren’t any pictures the X-Cybie just yet, but word on the iCybie forum is that it’s basically the same as the iCybie (pictured below) except that this model has a fur coating that will come in a variety of colors. I can only imagine the fur would make the X-Cybie more fun to pet, but I can’t help wondering if it sheds. 

Over on Newsvine, I came across an interesting post by someone who claims to be busting the myths about science, and found a couple of interesting items on the list.

Myth 2. The Great Wall of China is the only manmade structure visible from space

There are several variations on this folkloric statement, and they’re all quantifiably false. Astronauts can spot the Great Wall from low-Earth orbit, along with plenty of other things like the Giza pyramids and even airport runways. But they can’t see the Wall from the Moon. 

…

Myth 12. There is no gravity in space

Blame the term "zero-gravity" for this common misconception. Gravity is everywhere, even in space. Astronauts look weightless because they are in continuous freefall towards the Earth, staying aloft because of their horizontal motion. The effect of gravity diminishes with distance, but it never truly goes away. It is also untrue that space is a vacuum. There are all kinds of atoms out there, albeit sometimes far apart. 

I don’t know about the gravity question (any physicists out there?), but apparently our mythbuster is dead on about the Great Wall.

“You can see the Great Wall,” Lu says. But it’s less visible than a lot of other objects. And you have to know where to look.

In fact stretches of the wall aren’t even visible from China. They’ve been buried by sand for centuries. NASA has used space-based radar to map out hidden parts of the ancient structure. [Astronaut Ed] Lu is trying to get a picture of it, too, with a digital camera. 

I don’t know if Lu every got his picture, but I did track down the pictures NASA took with its "space-based radar." 

The mythbuster also takes on some common myths about asteroids.

Seventh time’s the charm, right?

After six tries over eight days, NASA launched a Delta 2 rocket Friday and a pair of satellites that will give planet Earth its newest health checkup by examining the secrets of clouds.

The 12-story-tall rocket built by Boeing rumbled off Space Launch Complex-2 at 3:02 a.m. into foggy skies at Vandenberg Air Force Base.

The approximately $515 million mission placed two satellites into orbit: CloudSat and CALIPSO (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations). About 90 minutes later, officials confirmed that the satellites had arrived in space.

“With the successful launch of CloudSat and CALIPSO we take a giant step forward in our ability to study the global atmosphere," said David Winker, CALIPSO principal investigator from NASA’s Langley Research Center, Va. "In the years to come, we expect these missions to spark many new insights into the workings of Earth’s climate and improve our abilities to forecast weather and predict climate change."

 We wrote about the launch in anticipation on the 20th of April; Rocco kept us updated in the comment threads ("CloudSat can’t launch because of clouds. Go figure."); but now the wait is over, and you can view Friday’s successful launch here.

A belated happy Earth Day to all. We went kinda "off the grid" last Friday, in honor of Earth Day, and thus found it somewhat difficult to get a DIY Friday post published. We had it all ready to go, but that whole smoke signals set up didn’t quite work. So, here’s our belated DIY Friday post, as the clock ticks down on Earth Day afterglow.

This first bit isn’t exactly a DIY project,  but having a solar generating briefcase last Friday — like the one we spotted on ProductDose recently —  might have helped get the DIY Friday post published. It’s handier than a gas generator, and so much less fossil fuel dependent. Besides, it generates more than enough electricity to power a laptop, so we could have charged up the iPod while we were at it. 

Speaking of iPods, this Altoid tin hacked into an iPod charger sounds like a good idea, if only the inventors could get it working. They cite a couple of reasons why it doesn’t, which I’ll post here in hopes that someone will be able to help them out. 

There are (at least) two reasons this charger _does not_ work:

1. The transistor doesn’t let enough current flow to fully charge the inductor.  The other option is a FET, but a FET needs a minimum of 5 volts to switch fully on. This is discussed in the SMPS section.

2. The inductor is simply not big enough. The charger doesn’t produce nearly enough current for the iPod.  We didn’t have an accurate way to measure the iPod charging current (save cutting apart the origional charging cable) until our parts arrived from Mouser.  The inductors recommended are nowhere near large enough for this project.  A suitable substitution might be the coil Nick de Smith uses on his MAX1771 SMPS.  Its a 2 or 3 amp coil from digikey:

[ http://www.desmith.net/NMdS/Electronics/NixiePSU.html#bom ]

This device can provide a small amount of power to a USB or firewire device, but not enough to charge an (3G) iPod.  It WILL power, but not charge, a totally dead 3G iPod.

Meanwhile, as long as we’re on the subject of power, this homebrew wind turbine sounds like a pretty good idea. I don’t know how much power it generates, but I bet it will power a laptop and an iPod (probably) as the builder says he’s seen "3800 watts from it in a high wind." I’m not sure how much power that is, but he says he’s a bit more than he can use. 

The guy who made the wind turbine would probably do well to team up with the David Mears — a professor of Bioresource Engineering at Rutgers University —  who managed to hack his entire house into such an energy efficient mode, with adjustments including a woodstove and a solar enabled greenhouse (pictured above),  that he and his family went 25 years without getting a heating bill. That’s also 25 winters of not burning fossil fuels to heat the house.  That’s not just good for the pocket book, but good for the earth too. And that makes for a happy (though belated) Earth Day.