Archive for the ‘Robots’ Category
Friday, February 8th, 2008 |
Some researchers at the University of Michigan are clearly misdirected in their goals to harvest energy from a knee brace. The device generates electricity in a method similar to regenerative breaking in a hybrid car, so the attempt is to harvest wasted kinetic energy in your knee from when your leg hits the ground and at other points in your stride. Hopes are to reclaim this energy for use to power gadgetry on your person, or perhaps a prosthetic limb, and the researchers claim it only takes an extra watt of metabolic power for each watt of electricity generated — compared to 6.4 watts of metabolic for a hand-crank, for instance — but we’d say that’s still one watt too many: if we were meant to use our own calories to power devices, why did God make batteries and solar panels?
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Saturday, December 29th, 2007 |
Now you can have soccer playing, dancing salsa fighter robot. The Kondo robot KHR-2 HV has improved its looks taking up a more Robocop-ish style. Its features are much more robust and curved then the square-like head the previous one had. And this pretty, very entertaining little robot can be yours for just $152. And there’s not one of us who didn’t want his or her own robot when growing up.
You can also buy him a couple of soccer strips to make the whole thing more real. They only cost $10 each. Now go on and buy yourself a little robotic friend.
Source: http://www.latest-gadgets.info
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Sunday, November 25th, 2007 |
Sure, your average helicopter can land in a whole mess of places, but what if you really need to squeeze that sucker onto a steep incline? Normally, you’d be out of luck if the slant were anything more than a measly 20-degrees, but some Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have managed something a bit more extreme. Eric Feron, an aerospace engineer, and colleague Selcuk Bayraktar have created a new breed of robot helicopter which can land, or “perch,” at inclines up to 60-degrees. On a similar tip, MIT researcher Jonathan How has fashioned another unique unmanned aircraft which can take off and land from a “prop hang” position, wherein the plane stands on it’s tail in midair. The hope is that these new technologies will help get aircraft into — and back out of — complicated spots with a new level of maneuverability. Also, the engineers probably just love blowing people’s minds. Check the videos after the break to experience the gravity-defying moves yourself.Continue reading Researchers create “perching” robotic aircraft
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