Micro stories - small news bits too small to have their own thread

[SvenSvensonov]

Launching a rocket underneath ice is always shatteringly great

I wouldn’t exactly advise everyone to try this when winter comes along again but I’d definitely say that launching a rocket underneath an icy lake is a very not bad way to spend like the forty seventh cold and boring winter day. It’s a little more spectacular than throwing boiling water in the air to watch it freeze, at least.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

A Handy Guide to Every Robot Competing In This Weekend's DARPA Challenge

Having trouble telling Japan’s JAXON from Germany’s Johnny 05? If you have any hope of following along with the DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals this weekend, you’re going to need to get up to speed on every robot competing.

Thankfully Erico Guizzo and Evan Ackerman over on IEEE Spectrum’s Automaton blog have put together a handy guide to the 24 bots you’ll see fumbling their way through the competition this year.

And when the competition is over, the guide can still serve as a handy reference chart of which robots might one day be replacing you at work, or, more likely, opposing you on the battlefield. Let’s just hope that Grit Robotics’ diminutive Cog-Burn bot does well in the competition, I’m pretty sure I can take him.

 

[Transhumanist]

A Handy Guide to Every Robot Competing In This Weekend's DARPA Challenge

Having trouble telling Japan’s JAXON from Germany’s Johnny 05? If you have any hope of following along with the DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals this weekend, you’re going to need to get up to speed on every robot competing.

Thankfully Erico Guizzo and Evan Ackerman over on IEEE Spectrum’s Automaton blog have put together a handy guide to the 24 bots you’ll see fumbling their way through the competition this year.

And when the competition is over, the guide can still serve as a handy reference chart of which robots might one day be replacing you at work, or, more likely, opposing you on the battlefield. Let’s just hope that Grit Robotics’ diminutive Cog-Burn bot does well in the competition, I’m pretty sure I can take him.

Yes, yes and more yes, this is awesome!

@SvenSvensonov any competition for human robotics.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

Scientists Grew a Rat Limb in the Lab

The dream of regrowing limbs? It’s just gotten one step closer. Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have grow a rat forearm out of living cells in the lab. A primate limb may be next.

As New Scientist explains, the lab-grown limb makes use of an existing technique called “decel/recel,” short for decellularization and recellularization. It’s been used to successfully grow organs like hearts and lungs and also windpipes.

Basically, scientists took the limb of a dead rat and doused it with detergents that got rid of all its cells. Decellularization leaves only a scaffold of collagen proteins that give blood vessels, bones, and muscles their shape.

Without any living cells remaining from the donor, the recipient’s immune system is less likely to reject it. Then comes the more difficult challenge of regrowing all those cells from scratch. Harald Ott’s lab at Massachusetts General Hospital used the following procedure, as described by New Scientist:

A forearm is much more difficult to create in this way than a windpipe, say, as a number of different cell types need to be grown. Ott began by suspending the decellularised forelimb in a bioreactor, plumbing the collagen artery into an artificial circulatory system to provide nutrients, oxygen and electrical stimulation to the limb. He then injected human endothelial cells into the collagen structures of blood vessels to recolonise the surfaces of blood vessels. This was important, he says, because it made the vessels more robust and prevented them from rupturing as fluids circulated.

Next, he injected a mixture of cells from mice that included myoblasts, the cells that grow into muscle, in the cavities of the scaffold normally occupied by muscle. In two to three weeks, the blood vessels and muscles had been rebuilt. Ott finished off the limb by coating the forelimbs with skin grafts

The resulting limb could flex and unflex when electrically stimulated. When transplanted onto anesthetized rat, blood flowed through the limb. However, they have not yet tested whether the rat can move its limb. The team hopes that the recipient rat’s nervous system will grow into the new limb.

The researchers have also decellularized a primate arm, though it’ll be even more difficult to successfully recellularize a larger and more complex limb. Regrowing human limbs is still a long way off. But here we have is a possible path forward.

@SvenSvensonov any competition for human robotics.

Nothing I can confirm publicly, much of the work I do is for the US military.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

This ISS to Earth 'Handshake' Was First Space-To-Ground Remote Control

Humankind has remote-controlled plenty of objects in space before, but up until this week, no space-to-ground control —a vital component in mankind’s future invasion of other planets—had happened.

The demonstration of remote control was conducted by ISS astronaut Terry Virts and the ESA this week, and was pretty basic: Virts moved a joystick on the ISS, which moved an identical joystick on the ground in the Netherlands. The system is meant to let astronauts interact with objects from thousands of miles away—for example, operating a rover on Mars whilst in orbit around the Red Planet.

From the ISS, the signal from the joystick had to travel to another communications satellite, from there to Houston, and then across the Atlantic to the Netherlands. All in, the round trip—from the ISS to Earth, and back—took 0.8 seconds. 800 milliseconds would be a pretty bad ping if you’re trying to play Counter-Strike, but for interplanetary remote control, it ain’t bad.

More importantly, it’s a lot better than the 12 minutes it takes for commands to travel from Earth to rovers on Mars. The European Space Agency envisages an intermediate step in sending astronauts to Mars: before a round-trip mission can land humans, and then return them safely, we should put astronauts in orbit, and have them explore the planet below using robots. Space-to-ground remote control would be a vital part of that. Moving a joystick is a long shot from driving a multi-billion-dollar rover around all those Martians, but it’s an impressive baby step nonetheless.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

Hubble Images Turned 3D Are Your Best Chance To Fly Through A Nebula

The Hubble telescope has been responsible for showing us some of the universes most incredible sights. But as lovely as they are, sometimes seeing them flat just isn’t enough. Which is why we love this 3D nebula fly-by so much.

Commenter Michael Lansdell (or mlwoods, as per his Kinja name) shared with us these transformed Hubble images, that he put together using the raw images from the telescope. It’s a lovely and unusual look at the Crab Nebula, the Pillars of Creation in the Eagle Nebula, and, I believe, the Orion Nebula.

More Hubble fan art, please!

 

[SvenSvensonov]

The World's Biggest Aircraft Could Launch a New Age of Airships

Airships lost much of their popularity after the fiery Hindenburg disaster in 1937. But one company’s looking to revive the technology with the biggest aircraft on Earth.

It’s called the Airlander 10: over 300 feet long, it’s a floating airship that’s 25 percent bigger than a Boeing 747. It’s 1,340,000 cubic feet in volume, and can soar up to 20,000 feet and move at 90 miles an hour cruising speeds. It’s made by Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV), a British company that wants to make quiet aircraft that also don’t pollute.

Like a blimp, the Airlander lacks internal structure but keeps its shape with a helium-filled hull made out of Vectran, a tough fiber spun from liquid crystal polymer that resists cuts and moisture. It can take off and land anywhere like a helicopter—no ground crew or additional infrastructure is needed.

So, besides size and speed, how’s this different from your run-of-the-mill Goodyear? Why go through all the effort to build something with a record-breaking size but is considered an antiquated vehicle? Because of its cargo-carrying potential.

The company says it can lug up to 10 tons for 1,500 miles. You could even argue that the Airlander 10 is really just a giant drone, because it can fly without a pilot. With humans aboard, the company says it stays afloat for five days, and if unmanned—over two weeks without any need to refuel. Those are features that could also open up possibilities of military surveillance.

Despite its lighter-than-air construction, the aircraft is still laded with useful tech, like a weather radar that helps the UAV dodge storms. According to CNN, the monster drifter could also be powered by solar panels in the future, and the company also says it burns 20 percent less fuel than standard airplanes.

Incidentally, HAV originally planned to build it for the US Army (hence the UNITED STATES ARMY plastered on the vehicle in the vid below), but budget cuts kept it in the UK. The company later scored a $5 million grant from the British government, and now the first flight tests are on deck for later this year.

I don’t think anyone’s arguing that airships could ever rival airplanes (hopefully we’ll have high-speed rail that’ll do that), but airships have also had other near-comebacks in the past, too. Maybe it’s be to enlist some healthy skepticism, but we hope this inflatable fortress goes nowhere but up.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

Everything You Need to Know About Today's DARPA Robotics Challenge

The DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals kick off today in Pomona, California, with 24 teams from around the world competing for $3.5 million in prizes. We’re here at the event to bring you the latest robotic thrills and spills, but mostly to keep a lookout for any signs of a robot uprising.

Below we’ve got everything you need to know about today’s events, along with a live stream where you can watch the competition all day long.

What is it?

The DARPA Robotics Challenge is a competition hosted by the Department of Defense in Pomona, California. Twenty-four teams from around the world (about half from the U.S.) have built robots that must complete a number of tasks. The course is set up to simulate a disaster scenario not unlike the Fukushima nuclear disaster that occurred in Japan in 2011.

The teams that are controlling their robots are in a completely separate area without a clear line of sight to keep an eye on their bots. And much like a disaster scenario, there’s built in radio interference between the team and the robot, meaning that the bots must act somewhat autonomously when communications links go down.

The teams have two tries at the course, once on Friday and again on Saturday. Their best score from either day is the one that will determine their chance at prizes.

When is it happening?

Right now! You can watch the live stream above Friday June 5th and Saturday June 6th. The first teams started this morning and the action will continue until about 6PM Friday. The second day of the competition starts at 8AM on Saturday and lasts the entire day as well. The awards ceremony is tentatively scheduled for 7PM on Saturday. Four identical courses are set up so that four teams are competing at the same time.

What do the robots have to do?

Each team has an hour to complete eight tasks with their robot:

1. Drive a vehicle
2. Exit the vehicle
3. Open a door, enter a building
4. Locate and close a valve
5. Cut through a wall
6. Surprise task
7. Remove rubble or navigate the terrain
8. Climb stairs

Are the finals harder than the trials?

You bet. During the trials each team had 30 minutes to complete each of the eight tasks. Now, all eight tasks must be done in an hour. During trials, the robots were also allowed to be hooked up to safety belays so that they wouldn’t be damaged should they fall. Now if the robot falls it has to either 1) pick itself up or 2) the team must incur a 10 minute penalty and go in and pick the robot up manually.

Wired communication between the teams and the robots was allowed during the trials. Now, not only does all communications have to be wireless, there’s periodic interference of up to 30 seconds where teams can’t directly control their robot.

Who’s competing?

There are 24 teams from around the world, some of which are sponsored by governments. You can read more about the teams here.

Wait, I thought there was supposed to be 25 teams?

Yep. The only team from mainland China had to drop out. The rumor is that the Chinese team couldn’t get their visas in time.

What are the prizes?

• 1st prize - $2 million
• 2nd prize - $1 million
• 3rd prize - $500,000

Why should I care about stupid robots?

Because these robots are the great-grandparents of the robots that will no doubt lead the robot uprising one day. Today, disaster relief. Tomorrow, the world!

 

[SvenSvensonov]

We're Keeping A Close Eye On This Hole Punched In The Surface Of Mars

This crater on Mars is so fresh, it still has sharp, clean edges unsoftened by countless landslides.

This one-kilometer diameter crater near Sirenum Fossae on Mars isn’t a brand-new impact spotted within hours, but the relative lack of mass wasting events indicate it’s young on geological timescales. Because we expect that weathering and gravity will have their inevitable impact, the crater is being monitored for change over time in the hopes of spotting recent landslides. The steep inner rim is already carved by gullies, with colluvial fans building into tidy fans of rubble along the crater floor.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

Peer Out The Window Of A Rocket Returning To Earth

What does it look like when one of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets falls back to Earth? Here’s the view of our gorgeous planet captured during the uncontrolled tumble to reentry.

The coolest thing about the Falcon 9R rockets is hidden in the name — that R stands for “reusable,” an ambitious if not-quite-yet-proven attempt to soft-land on a barge and recycle the massive boosters in future flights. But before the rocket can try landing on a barge in the Atlantic Ocean, it first needs to find its way back to Earth. This video was captured by a Go Pro camera tucked inside the fairing of a Falcon 9R rocket during a recent flight, replayed in real-time to give us just the smallest glimpse of how surreal and lovely our planet is from afar.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

Cooking chicken and rice in space is always fun to see

Every variation of chicken and rice is great so even though this space version of tumeric chicken and whole red rice looks like the least chicken and rice-y dish ever (for obvious utilitarian reasons), I would totally give it a bite or five. The key to cooking in space (if this can be considered cooking) is making sure all that goop sticks to the tortilla.

Oh and make sure it doesn’t float away. The ESA writes:

ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti is currently living on board the International Space Station for her long duration mission Futura. Food is an important item in space, also on the psychological side; that’s why astronauts are allowed a certain quantity of the so-called “bonus food” of their choice that reminds them of their home cooking tastes. We asked Samantha to show us how she manages to cook one of her bonus food recipes in microgravity: whole red rice with peas and chicken turmeric.

Here’s how they make it on land:

And another recipe (mackerel, quinoa and leek cream tortilla):

 

[SvenSvensonov]

India's Recent Heat Wave Was Absolutely Brutal

India is known for becoming a sweltering furnace in May, but last month was exceptionally brutal, with temperatures hovering 10 degrees Fahrenheit above normal for nearly two weeks. By June 4th, the heat wave had claimed over 2,500 lives, making it the fifth deadliest in recorded history.

Roads melted in New Delhi as temperatures hit 113 degrees Fahrenheit and stayed there for days on end. Other parts of the country were nearly seven degrees hotter. Even in the mountain town of Mussoorie over 2,000 meters above sea level, residents felt the temperature climb to an unprecedented 97 degrees.

It’s difficult to image this sort of heat without experiencing it firsthand, but the false color map shown above is one lens that Earth scientists can use to see how badly India cooked last month. The colors represent outgoing longwave radiation—the amount of heat pouring off the Earth and into space—as measured by the Clouds and Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) sensor on NASA’s Terra satellite between May 15th and May 27th. Lighter colors indicate greater amounts of heat loss, corresponding with warmer surface temperatures. As we can see, the heat wave wasn’t limited to India, but rather, stretched across Pakistan and much of the Middle East.

But for a number of reasons, India tends to suffer more than neighboring countries during these spates of hot weather. In part, this has to do with the high relative humidity that typically accompanies the heat. We rely on sweat to cool ourselves, but if the air itself is too wet, our bodies can’t evaporatively cool efficiently. The sudden onset of the recent heat wave probably contributed to the death toll, as well—heat acclimation is a gradual process that occurs over weeks of exposure to progressively higher temperatures.

There’s also the fact that large swaths of the country are still very underdeveloped. A quarter of India’s 1.25 billion-strong population lacks electricity, and many Indians don’t have access to running water. Air conditioning is growing in India, but ironically, AC use is boosting the country’s climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions. And (surprise!) scientists expect these sorts of abnormal heat waves to become less and less unusual as our planet continues to warm.

At least for the moment, the worst of the heat wave seems to have past. But as Indians cross their fingers and hope for strong monsoon rains this year, the future is looking hotter and hotter.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

World's Largest Telescope Begins Construction

After nearly a decade of planning, construction of the Giant Magellan Telescope is finally underway. And boy, does it look cool.

Perched high in the mountains of northern Chile, the GMT—whose primary optics consist of 7 separate 8.4-meter (27 foot) diameter mirrors—will proudly claim the title of the largest optical scope ever built. Its mirrors will be capable of focusing more than 6 times the amount of light of the largest optical telescopes today, into images 10 times sharper than those captured by Hubble.

“Every time someone builds a new telescope, we learn something about the universe that we never expected,” Patrick McCarthy, director for the Giant Magellan Telescope Observatory told Gizmodo over the phone. “Astronomy is about discovering new things, and telescopes are our vehicle.”

Working in concert with forthcoming space-based scopes, including the James Webb Space Telescope, the GMT will enable astronomers to peer further back in time than every before, observing the birth of stars and coalescence of early galaxies in the first hundred million years of the universe.

“Hubble has given us great views of how the universe evolved when it was 2 to 5 billion years old,” McCarthy said. “It’s also given us just the most tantalizing view of the earlier universe. Now we’ll be able to look back and see the formation of the very first structures, when the universe went from a uniform sea of gas to stars and galaxies.”

Another key science goal of the GMT will be to get a first good look at some of the exoplanets orbiting nearby stars. This work will pair the GMT with the Transit Exoplanet Survey Satellite, a small, space-based telescope that, like NASA’s Kepler mission, will detect the tiny shadows of distant planets transiting in front of their stars. Unlike Kepler, which focuses on exoplanets 500-1,000 light years away, when TESS flies in 2017, it’ll set its sights on our nearest neighbors, getting the distribution of planets in our very close cosmic vicinity.

If TESS detects a neighboring world that seems interesting, astronomers will be able to use the GMT to take a closer look, measuring the planet’s mass using the doppler technique. In some cases, GMT might be able to measure the spectral fingerprint of the light filtered through the atmospheres of nearby planets, information which astronomers can use to decode atmospheric chemistry and hunt for signs of life.

A perennial challenge for astronomers is dealing with the distortion of space caused by molecules in our atmosphere. According to McCarthy, the GMT will be outfitted with a brand-new mechanism to help compensate for this. In principle, the technology works a bit like a pair of noise-canceling headphones, except the GMT will be canceling distortions of light rather than sound. After light is filtered through the instrument’s primary mirrors, it hits a smaller set of secondary mirrors, which change shape roughly 2000 times per second to cancel out atmospheric distortion. The result is that when the GMT sets her eyes on the night sky, she’ll see it more clearly than any human, or any piece of ground-based technology ever before.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

At the DARPA Robotics Challenge, We Saw A Lot of Robots Fall Over

Yesterday marked Day 1 of the DARPA Robotics Challenge Finals, in which elite robots from around the world faced off to compete for $3.5 million in prizes. We saw some of humanity’s finest bots drive vehicles, remove rubble, cut through walls and climb up stairs.

We also saw a lot of robots fall over. IEEE Spectrum captured the magic.

 

[SvenSvensonov]

50 Years Ago, Ed White Became The First American To Walk In Space

On June 3rd, 1965, Edward White became the first American astronaut to walk in space. His mission commander, Jame McDivitt snapped this picture over the Pacific Ocean over the course of the Gemini 4 mission. He later described the order to return to the spacecraft as being “the saddest moment of his life.”

White was selected for the Apollo 1 mission in March 1966, along with astronauts Gus Grissom and Robert Chaffee. In 1967, the crew perished when a ‘plugs-out test’ resulted in a fire, trapping the astronauts.