SCIENCE! ...finally getting to the good stuff

[Harry]

THE MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE EXPLAINED! #1 - How Cats Drink:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/11/11/how.cats.drink/index.html?iref=NS1

While dogs slurp to alleviate thirst, cats display a mastery of physical dynamics that leaves their whiskers, chin and the counter top free of liquid, researchers found.

Researchers spent hours watching a feline consume liquids in order to understand the forces. They also made a robotic version of a cat's tongue and watched YouTube videos of big cats drinking.

Using complicated formulas, the four-member team from Virginia Tech, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Princeton University came up with their findings, detailed Thursday in the online journal Science.

Here's how a house cat, which averages about four laps per second, personifies daintiness while drinking.

Cats extend their tongues straight down with the tip curled backward like a capital "J" to form a ladle, so that the top surface of the tongue touches the liquid first.

"The speed of the tongue is quite incredible," co-author Pedro M. Reis, an assistant engineering professor at MIT, told CNN.

"The smooth tip of the tongue barely brushes the surface of the liquid before the cat rapidly draws its tongue back up," said the researchers, who received no funding for the study.

"As it does so, a column of milk forms between the moving tongue and the liquid's surface. The cat then closes its mouth, pinching off the top of the column for a nice drink, while keeping its chin dry."

That column, they say, is a balance between gravity, which pulls the milk back toward the bowl, and inertia, which refers to the tendency of a liquid to continue moving in a direction unless another force interferes.

Kitty knows how quickly to lap in order to balance these forces, according to the study, which drew on mathematics, fluid mechanics, physics and engineering.

"This suggests that cats are smarter than many people think, at least when it comes to hydrodynamics," writes co-author Jeffrey M. Aristoff of Princeton.

Unlike humans, who can seal their cheeks to suck in liquids, dogs and cats rely on lapping, Reis said.

A dog's tongue in effect forms a little cup to scoop up water.

"Cats are far more complex," Reis said. Their tongues don't pierce the surface of a liquid.

Big cats don't lap as rapidly as house cats, the scientists said, in part because their tongues are larger.

"Lions and tigers [tongues] will go about half [the speed] of house cats," said Roman Stocker, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at MIT.

Reis and Stocker said one of the reasons they undertook the 3-year study was to apply the scientific method and rules of basic research about something scientists don't understand.

Results of the study also may have implications for soft robotics, they said.

Stocker got the idea for the study after watching his cat Cutta Cutta lap milk.

Cutta Cutta, which means "stars stars" in an Australian aboriginal language, is the subject of several videos and photos taken by the team.

Asked whether Cutta Cutta is enjoying the celebrity from the release of the study, Stocker told CNN, "I'm not sure he realizes it."

[Harry]

FLYING CARS!

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/11/11/flying.car/?hpt=C2

Along with the jetpack, the flying car tops the list of classic science-fiction imaginings that lead legions of fans to ask -- why don't we have this yet?

Now researchers, with some cash from the U.S. military, might be taking a step toward making these hovering vehicles -- seen in such diverse works as "Blade Runner" and "The Jetsons" -- a reality.

DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, is awarding grants to scientists to help develop its Transformer program, which seeks to create a road-worthy vehicle that can take off vertically like a helicopter and fly.

This week, the robotics institute at Carnegie Mellon University was awarded a $988,000 contract to develop a flight system for the Transformer.

The institute has already worked on automated flying vehicles, which researchers say would be crucial to the success of a military craft that could go from an earthbound combat situation into the air seamlessly.

"The [Transformer] is all about flexibility of movement, and key to that concept is the idea that the vehicle could be operated by a soldier without pilot training," said Sanjiv Singh, a CMU research professor of robotics.

"In practical terms, that means the vehicle will need to be able to fly itself, or to fly with only minimal input from the operator. And this means that the vehicle has to be continuously aware of its environment and be able to automatically react in response to what it perceives."

Carnegie Mellon is one of six contractors DARPA has chosen for the Transformer, or TX, program. AAI Corp. and Lockheed Martin Co. were selected by DARPA to develop overall design concepts for the transforming vehicle.

DARPA frequently engages private-sector businesses and amateur technology buffs for for ideas on innovations that could be used on the battlefield and elsewhere.

Among them are a recurring robot race and a nationwide DARPA balloon hunt that awarded prizes to players who most efficiently used online networking to hunt down 10 weather balloons.

The vehicle DARPA is considering would be able to carry four troops and up to 1,000 pounds of equipment for 250 miles, either on land or through the air.

"Its enhanced mobility would increase survivability by making movements less predictable and would make the vehicle suitable for a wide variety of missions, such as scouting, resupply and medical evacuation," Carnegie Mellon said in a written release.

This isn't Carnegie Mellon's first outing with DARPA, or in the field of automated vehicles.

The university won DARPA's 2007 Urban Challenge robot road race with a self-driving SUV called "Boss."

They've worked on a self-driving submarine, and earlier this year had an autonomous helicopter demonstration. The Carnegie Mellon contract is for 17 months.

The Carnegie Mellon prototype follows the recent news that a Florida man built a flying car Video that was certified by the FAA.

[Harry]

IRON MAN SUITS!

http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/innovation/11/11/iron.man.suit/index.html?iref=obinsite

A lunchtime crowd is gathering beside the parking lot at Raytheon Sarcos, the defense contractor, on a recent day in Salt Lake City. White-collar workers from nearby office parks stand with their yogurt cups and sandwiches, watching with quiet awe as a man in a metal suit -- sort of half-man, half-robot -- performs superhuman feats of strength.

This may be the closest these people will get to a real-life "Iron Man," the character from the comic books and hit movies.

Inside a prosthetic shell of metal and hydraulics, Raytheon test engineer Rex Jameson is putting an XOS-2 exoskeleton through its paces.

As the crowd watches, Jameson uses his robot hydraulic arm to shadowbox, break three inches of pine boards and toss around 72-pound ammunition cases like a bored contestant on the "World's Strongest Man."

The suit moves as he moves and amplifies his strength 17-fold. It doesn't fly though.

"You don't have this immense feeling of strength," Jameson says. "It's just when you go to do something that you couldn't do without it, then that's when you notice it."

Jameson is part of a team designing in real life what comic books and Hollywood have promised for years: bringing an "Iron Man"-like suit to the battlefield.

Raytheon is seeking to develop the suits to help the U.S. military carry supplies, and claims that one operator in an exoskeleton suit can do the work of two to three soldiers. If all goes as planned, the company hopes to see "Iron Man" suits deployed in the field by 2015.

"The logistics personnel in the military typically move 16,000 pounds a day, which is an awful lot of load," said Fraser Smith, vice president of operations for Raytheon Sarcos. The XOS-2 suit can be used in tight spaces where a forklift cannot.

And with the extra of strength the robot gives the operator, "that means you exert one pound, and it exerts 17. That's a major amplification of strength and that's all load the person doesn't have to carry themselves," Smith said.

Jameson may be about the furthest thing from the fictional designer of "Iron Man," playboy billionaire Tony Stark. "I roll in a minivan," said the married father of three.

The painted black, steel, aluminum and hydraulic pumps of the wearable robotic suit wrap around Jameson's slight frame, mirroring the human skeleton in form. Its structure runs up the side of Jameson's legs and arms. Its backbone carries the load of the machine, and on this day is tethered to hydraulic power and a team of engineers.

Jameson straps into the suit, stomps his feet into the exoskeleton's modified boots and straps down the snowboardlike bindings.

"I'd describe it as feeling like wearing a backpack -- a light pack -- and really big shoes. It kind of clomps around a bit," he said shortly after the power came on and the suit jerked to life.

"It reacts to the force of your feet, so you want it to react immediately," he added, pulling the bindings tight.

Jameson's hands grip actuators in a fist. Technicians can attach grips and hooks to the robot's hands, some of which look like they would be more useful for combat than for loading supplies.

Jameson said the response time from his movements to the robot reacting is less than 10 milliseconds. He marches around, balances on his tiptoes and kicks a soccer ball around. The peanut gallery at the edge of the parking lot loves it. A woman with a yogurt cup shakes her head in disbelief.

Raytheon's Smith also sees soldiers using the robot in a modified form -- from the waist down -- to help carry equipment and take the strain off their legs during long marches.

One big obstacle, however, is how to power the suit. Raytheon is working on reducing the energy load; the version demonstrated on this day runs off hydraulic power from the Sarcos shop. Smith said chemically powered batteries such as lithium ions are not powerful enough to run the suit for eight to 24 hours at a time.

Batteries also raise concerns over safety.

"If they get breached, they aren't gentle in the way they explode," Smith said. A single-cylinder gas or diesel-powered engine may do the trick instead, he said.

The wearable robotics suit is now in its second iteration. XOS-2 has all its wires and hydraulics fully enclosed, unlike the first prototype, whose innards were more exposed. That would be problematic in places such as Afghanistan or Iraq, where a sand-encrusted robot would mean a dead robot.

"Sand, water, mud are all things we like to keep out of the system, and these current [robotic suits] include sealing strategies that basically exclude them." Smith said.

While the suit has obvious military applications, Smith also sees broader commercial possibilities -- and a shorter timetable. He said if orders come in and production ramps up, within three years you could have your very own $150,000 "Iron Man" suit to help push boxes around your warehouse.

[Name Lips]

I'd like to rent one of those suits for moving.

[Ancalagon]

Neat stuff... and you know it's just a matter of time before they add armor to those suits, and tada, space marine!

[Hatter]

The power problem is easily solved, just use a nuclear reactor. Duh.