GLIMPSES OF THE
FUTURE |
Scientists Reinvent The Wheel Scientists have developed an artificial intelligence system to allow the wheels of a car to think and act for themselves. The 'smart' wheel, which is being developed by researchers at the University of Portsmouth in conjunction with UK company PML Flightlink, allows the wheels on a car to communicate with one another while performing thousands of calculations per second. As a result, the wheels think and learn as the car is being driven, making calculations and adjustments according to travelling speed and road conditions. Autonomous Robots To Be Armed With Tasar Stun Guns Taser International of Arizona has just announced plans to equip robots with stun guns. The US military already uses PackBot, made by iRobot of Massachusetts, to carry lethal weapons, but the new stun-capable robots could be used against civilians. If we arm robots before we educate them, could this be the beginning of a Terminator future? Exploding Mobile Phone Kills Owner A man has died in China after his mobile phone reportedly exploded in his chest pocket. Metal welder, Xiao Jinpeng was working at the Yingpan Iron Ore Dressing Plant in the western province of Gansu, when reports say his mobile phone suddenly exploded. He died later in a local hospital. The handset was a Motorola brand, and the official Xinhua News Agency reports citing a spokesperson for the company said that the company doubted its own components were to blame, suggesting that a fake battery may have been used. In most previous cases of exploding mobile phones, investigations have found the batteries to be poor quality copies, not original manufacturer supplied units. Micro Generator Converts Vibrations To Power A tiny electrical generator, the size of a sugar cube, has been developed by researchers at the University of Southampton, UK. It could power swarms of wireless sensors or even medical implants, its developers claim. The new micro-generator harvests power electromagnetically, exploiting the wobbling of several magnets attached to a millimetre-sized cantilever. It measures just 7.0 millimetres by 7.0 mm by 8.5 mm, and the team behind it say it is the most efficient micro-generator yet developed. The generator converts 30 per cent of environmental kinetic energy into electrical power, and could keep all sorts of low-power devices running without batteries – particularly when alternatives like solar power are not an option. Bio-Electronic Interface For Faster Drug Development Researchers at the Max Planck Institute in Munich, Germany, have developed a cell-transistor interface that they believe will usher in a new era of bioelectronics, allowing cells to be manipulated and studied without destroying them in the process. In a demonstration prepared by institute biochemist Peter Fromherz, living cells were grown atop an array of transistors, thereby enabling the silicon chip to monitor the cell activity directly. The chip was used to test the effect of new drugs on the living cells. The results were then read out instantly from the chip, in an application that the researchers said could hasten drug development. New Artificial Skin Could Reduce Need For Skin Grafts A long-lasting artificial skin which is 'fully and consistently integrated into the human body' has shown promising results in early clinical trials. The technology could revolutionise the treatment of burns and skin damage, offering a less painful alternative to skin grafts and reduced scarring. Tests show the new membrane integrated fully by 28 days, producing a closed and healed wound site. Called ICX-SKN, the artificial skin mimics the process of natural wound healing. It is made up of a matrix of fibrin, which is a protein found in healing wounds. Fibroblasts – cells that produce collagen in natural skin – are integrated into the matrix.The matrix can be implanted into the wound, where it integrates with the patient’s own skin, closing the wound.
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Top Ten Forecasts From The World Future Society - 2007 It's that time of year again. When the U.S.-based World Future Society holds its annual convention (in Minneapolis for 2007), the organisation releases its top ten predictions for the future. This year the visionary futurists predict: 1. Americans now under age 30 will migrate in great numbers overseas, many for their entire adult lives. Which just shows how parochial, U.S.-centric and unimaginative the World Future Society has become, which is why I resigned my membership of the organisation seven years ago. Any intelligent 18 year-old could have produced that list (and several of the predictions above are just plain daft). Robotic Cats With Emotions In my 2001 novel, Emergence, I imagined robot cats with powerful human-like emotions. Now scientists in the Netherlands are endowing a robotic cat with a set of logical rules for emotions. They believe that by introducing emotional variables to the decision-making process, they should be able to create more natural human and computer interactions. 'We don't really believe that computers can have emotions, but we see that emotions have a certain function in human practical reasoning,' says Media Dastani, an artificial-intelligence researcher at Utrecht University, in the Netherlands. By bestowing intelligent agents with similar emotions, researchers hope that robots can then emulate this humanlike reasoning, he says. The hardware for the robot, called iCAT, was developed by the Dutch research firm Philips and designed to be a generic companion robotic platform. By enabling the robot to form facial expressions using its eyebrows, eyelids, mouth, and head position, the researchers are aiming to let it show if it is confused, for example, when interacting with its human user. The long-term goal is to use Dastani's emotional-logic software to assist in human and robot interaction, but for now, the researchers intend to use the iCAT to display internal emotional states as it makes decisions. A Cure For Fear Are you afraid of fear itself? MIT biochemists have identified a molecular mechanism behind fear, and successfully cured it in mice. Researchers from MIT's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory hope that their work could lead to the first drug to treat the millions of adults who suffer each year from persistent, debilitating fears - including hundreds of soldiers returning from conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan. Inhibiting a kinase, an enzyme that change proteins, called Cdk5 facilitates the extinction of fear learned in a particular context, Li-Huei Tsai, Picower Professor of Neuroscience in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and colleagues showed. Clear Glass-Acrylic Projection Screens Totally transparent projection screens can now become part of your interior architecture with the invention of a rear projection screen that looks simply like a piece of glass when it's not in use, producing crystal clear images that appear to be floating in the air. The new CristalLine glass and acrylic screens come in flat sheets that can be cut, bent, folded and shaped to produce unique projection media that will no doubt be popular in retail, corporate and trade show applications, not to mention the awesome stage effects they could help create. German company Woehburk will soon announce the release of their CrystalLine transparent projection screen technology. The screens will be available in sizes up to 135", or around 2x3 meters, but naturally several screens can be used together where larger displays are needed. Back issues of 'Glimpses' are archived here. |