“Like neurons in the brain”: A molecular computer that evolves

from h+ Magazine: (Previously covered here)

The press release from Michigan Tech asserts that it is “the first time a brain-like ‘evolutionary circuit’ has been realized.”

His new molecular computer uses an organic molecular layer and can evolve to solve complex problems, similar to neurons. Like the human brain — and unlike any existing computer — the tiny molecular computer heals itself if there is a defect.

Anirban Bandyopadhyay, from the Japanese National Institute for Materials Science, explains: “No existing man-made computer has this property, but our brain does. If a neuron dies, another neuron takes over its function.”

• EOT Neuro archive

Toward a hydrogen economy: Clues from nature

from h+ Magazine: ⇦ Much more at source

Artificial photosynthesis may soon be a reality – splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen. You only have to look as far as your garden to observe one of the most common chemical reactions in nature at work pulling apart water molecules (H2O) and splitting them into carbohydrates and oxygen (O2).

Nature provides the template for this process using the energy from sunlight to fuel the reaction.  Here’s a video showing the basic process:

• Artificial photosynthesis achieved with nanotech
• EOT Energy archive

Siftables are changing the shape of computing

from Singularity Hub: ⇦ More videos at source

What if computers were more like a child’s wooden blocks?

Siftables are a new approach to computing developed by David Merrill and Jeevan Kalanthi. Each small square electronic tile has a small screen, motion sensors, and RF signals. The siftables interact with each other, letting you use orientation, proximity, and movement to control their performance.

• EOT Interface archive
• EOT Video archive

Wheelchairs that listen

from Boston.com:

Seeking greater independence, patients help MIT researchers design a voice-driven device

“They can know more about the environment — weather, scheduled events, menus — and exploit that knowledge to make more meaningful choices about how they wish to spend their time,’’ said Teller, a member of MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.

The prototype, under development since 2005, can cruise the halls of MIT’s computer science lab, often without a passenger. When one of the students working on the device tells it to “Go to the kitchen,’’ a computer-generated voice responds: “Do you want to go to the kitchen?’’

• Video
• Intelligent wheelchairs will navigate on their own

Video: Your window to the world is whatever you want it to be with DIY Winscape

from PopSci:

Winscape is a DIY project for you: install two HD plasmas in faux window frames that display whatever scene you’d rather see out your window. Using a Wiimote, the setup even detects your position in the room and shifts the perspective screens’ high-resolution video to create the illusion of looking out a real window.

The kit, which will run $2,500-$3,000 from Rational Craft, aims to transport you to wherever you want to be, be it San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park or the view from the Space Shuttle. You can even collect your own footage of your favorite places and cycle through them throughout the day.

Video: GM’s self-driving pod cars of the future

from DVICE:

When we first saw GM’s EN-V (Electronic Networked Vehicles), they looked like yet another far-fetched design concept, but now the company’s rolled out a video that shows the prototypes in action.

• EOT Transportation archive

‘Think-dial’ on your thought-controlled iPhone

from h+ Magazine:

Don your telepathic headset and plug into your iPhone. Want to call your friend? Just look at her picture and think about her.

A new iPhone app described in the MIT Technology Review blog developed by Tanzeem Choudhury, Rajeev Raizada, Andrew Campbell and others at Dartmouth College lets you “wink” or “think dial” your relative or friend when his or her photo appears on an iPhone.

• EOT Neuro archive

Video: New interface combines strength of touchscreen with precision of a pen

from MIT’s Technology Review:

The prototype for Manual Deskterity is a drafting application built for the Microsoft Surface, a tabletop touchscreen.

The interface’s most interesting features come out when the two types of interaction are combined. For example, a user can copy an object by holding it with one hand and then dragging the pen across the image, “peeling” off a new image that can be placed elsewhere on the screen. By combining pen and hand, users get access to features such as an exacto knife, a rubber stamp, and brush painting.

• EOT Interface archive

Video: ‘Building of the Future’ has swarm-robotic guides, AR, touchscreen walls & more

from Singularity Hub:

Set on the massive 16 hectare compound of Santander Bank outside of Madrid, El Faro awes its guests with technology that transforms their surroundings into a interactive mesh of the physical and digital worlds.

Integrated technologies providing humans with an enhanced environment – welcome to the future, boys and girls.

• EOT Video archive

Video: Virtual Reality in a box

from Singularity Hub:

pCubee is a small cube with five LCD screens on its sides. Stare at pCubee and it feels like you’re looking a 3D environment inside the box – a Fish Tank Virtual Reality (FTVR).

Users wear a head tracking device, allowing pCubee to correctly present you with depth perception and motion parallax on each of its sides – it’s a personalized experience (hence the ‘p’ in pCubee).

Video: Touchscreen wall explores gigapixel photos

from Singularity Hub:

Students at the University of Tromso in Norway have built an amazing multitouch wall with a mind-blowing 7168×3072 resolution – 22 megapixels!

The WallScope has 28 projectors whose graphics are fueled by 31 nodes in a cluster. A series of 16 cameras on the floor create a 2D ‘multitouch plane’ so you can control the WallScope without making contact with the wall.

Video: Computer-controlled bacteria build a miniature pyramid

from PopSci:

By using a computer-controlled magnetic field, the researchers turned the bacteria into fully-compliant biological nanorobots.

The trick was using a type of microbe known as magnetotactic bacteria. These critters have little internal compasses, and will follow the pull of a magnetic field. By manipulating a magnetic field, the researchers tricked the bacteria into forming a giant, computer-controlled swarm.

• EOT Nano archive

Text 2.0: Does this headline know you’re reading it?

from h+ Magazine:

Ralf Biedert and colleagues at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) are using eye-trackers from Tobii Technology of Sweden along with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to create a reading enhancement technology called Text 2.0.

This is not simply a case of using infrared light, a camera, and eye movement to move a cursor and click buttons: Text 2.0 infers user intentions and enhances the reading experience in far more complex ways.

Reading certain words, phrases, or names can trigger the appearance of footnotes, translations, definitions, biographies, even sound effects or animations. Ask how a word is pronounced and you get a verbal answer.

If you begin skimming the text, it fades out the less important words. If you glance away, a bookmark automatically appears, pointing to where you stopped reading.

Video: Light-controlled mouse brain

from Singularity Hub:

What do you get when you combine microorganisms and fiber optics? Mind control over mice and rats.

A fiber optic cable is connected into a living mouse or rat with the spliced genes allowing scientists to expose different neurons to different lights.

• EOT Neuro Archive

Video: GM develops Augmented Reality windshield

from MIT’s Technology Review:

A new “enhanced vision system” from General Motors could help drivers by highlighting landmarks, obstacles and road edges on the windshield in real-time.

Such a system can point out to drivers potential hazards, such as a running animal, even in foggy or dark conditions, GM says.

• EOT AR archive
• EOT Transportation archive

Kojiro – Could this be the robot who will serve you breakfast in bed?

from MailOnline:

Researchers at Tokyo University’s JSK Robotics Laboratory, have created a humanoid called Kojiro, who is learning how to mimic how we walk.

What makes him unique is that he has a skeletal structure similar to that of humans, which means he moves in a more natural fashion, and bends and twists via his artificial spine.

• EOT Robotics archive

Video: Future displays send pixels swarming all over your house

from Fast Company:

For her grad-thesis at the Art Center College of Design, Julia Yu Tsao created Curious Displays, a pretty amazing vision of what display technology might become, decades down the road.

Rather than a single screen, she envisions a swarm of autonomous blocks that occasionally join up to form a TV–but which can also disperse to highlight other information, such as what your schedule looks like, or even where your keys are.

Intendix Brain-Computer Interface goes commercial

from Singularity Hub:

The world’s first patient-ready and commercially available brain computer interface just arrived at CeBIT 2010.

The Intendix from Guger Technologies (g*tec) is a system that uses an EEG cap to measure brain activity in order to let you type with your thoughts.

• EOT BCI archive

Video: GestureTek to let you interact with images projected from your phone

from VentureBeat:

GestureTek specializes in interfaces that track a user’s hand gestures and body position using a camera. The video below is a concept demo from interface designers TAT.

But GestureTek is building the technology for real (initially to be used by a single user, unlike the multi-user scenario shown in the video). An extra camera module and custom lens is required to track the finger on the projected image. The tracking should be quite accurate, with similar performance to the iPhone touch interface.

• EOT Projection archive
• EOT Concept archive

Video: Motion-sensing, gun-mounted, laser-projected Augmented Reality game

from ecademy:

On the Intel booth at CeBIT 2010 we found Microvision with their motion-sensing, gun mounted laser projector… trust me, this is awesome!

• CrunchGear: Hands-On (details)
• EOT Projection archive