ending soon

So a machine starts with the basic properties of the physical world and derives truths and implications from it. I’m pretty sure we don’t fit in the results where we want to.

An interdisciplinary team of scientists has taken a major step toward automating the scientific process with the Automated Biology Explorer (ABE) system, which can analyze raw experimental data from a biological system and derive the basic mathematical equations that describe the way the system operates.

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What could possibly go wrong with a machine that can rewire itself? I suspect the machines probably won’t focus on making a better toaster.

Scientists at Northwestern University have developed a new nanomaterial that can “steer” electrical currents. The development could lead to a computer that can simply reconfigure its internal wiring and become an entirely different device, based on changing needs.

[Via]

I’m looking forward to some zombie-proof armor or protection from machine laser cannons. I think diamond-hard material could probably stop teeth from the undead.

This new carbon form was capable of withstanding 1.3 million times normal atmospheric pressure in one direction while confined under a pressure of 600,000 times atmospheric levels in other directions. No substance other than diamond has been observed to withstand this type of pressure stress.

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“These findings open up possibilities for potential applications, including super-hard anvils for high-pressure research and could lead to new classes of ultradense and strong materials,” said Russell Hemley, director of Carnegie’s Geophysical Laboratory.

[Via]

Why let people with disabilities hog all the glory? I want some extra arms!

Doctors at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center had installed an ECoG (electrocorticography) array at a precise location against the brain to control the robotic arm.

[Via]

Robots built directly on the moon to invade earth? It could happen.

A new map of the moon has uncovered a trove of areas rich in precious titanium ore, with some lunar rocks harboring 10 times as much of the stuff as rocks here on Earth do.

Titanium-rich minerals are more efficient at retaining solar wind particles, such as helium and hydrogen. These gases would likely be vital resources in the construction of lunar colonies and for exploration of the moon, according to Arizona State University researchers.

[Via]

Now we’ve covered all the bases. We’ve got huge, crap-your-pants robots; tiny nano bots to kill you from the inside out; human-sized robots; animal-sized robots; and now small, cute robots. Ah, balance. Can’t you feel the zen?

the U.S. Army, Marine Corps and the Pentagon’s Joint IED Defeat Organization (JIEIDDO) are working to procure and deliver thousands of small, easily transportable “throwable” robots. These robots are to be equipped with surveillance cameras designed to beam back video from confined spaces, buildings, tunnels and other potentially dangerous locations.

[Via gizmag]

Since zombies can’t jump, a flying carpet could be extremely useful in floating above the undead masses. Just hope there aren’t any zombie basketball players with long reach (and you somehow have a batter to power the thing).

Princeton University graduate student Noah Jafferis has opened up a whole new world of innovation by developing a miniature fully functional flying carpet. The 10cm (4in) sheet of plastic is propelled by “ripple power”, which uses waves of electrical current to drive thin pockets of air from the front to the rear of the device, allowing it to fly.

[Via INHABIT]

Squids are not only tasty but useful for making robot overlords as well!

Enterprising minds at the institution’s materials science and engineering department have discovered a use for chitosan — an extract made from squid pen or crab shells that could lead us down a cybernetic road to human / machine interfaces. The team incorporated the organic compound into their field-effect transistor prototype, and effectively created the first protonic circuitry “that’s completely analogous to [the way] an electronic current” can be manipulated. Naturally, the silicon-based tech isn’t ready (or safe) for implantation into humans just yet, but could one day be used to control biological functions, sending on / off commands to our bodies.

I, for one, will be running away silently.

Researchers in Japan and Germany have converted energy from soundwaves into electromagnetic energy, trapping a magnetic “spin current” between metal layers.

Someone poses questions to you and to a computer model of your brain, trying to figure out who’s the human. If a computer, operating deterministically, can reproduce your answers, then you, too, must be operating deterministically and are therefore not truly free. The output of this game, as Aaronson portrayed it, would be a level of confidence for whether your will is free or not.