Underwater Robot crosses Atlantic

Traveling from New Jersey to Spain in 221 days, the Scarlet Knight is the first autonomous vehicle to safely cross the Atlantic ocean. Traveling mostly underwater at depths of up to 600 feet, the device was controlled remotely from a control room at Rutgers University as it collected measurements of temperature and salinity of water.

I don’t know if it is possible for us to manage the environment, but if so I’m sure that lots of real time data will be needed. I’m no expert but it seems the oceans are pretty important in our ecosystem… and it looks like robotic vehicles will be helping collect oceanic data.

via slashdot

Scrap Lamp by Midas

I’m always wondering what do do with scrap wood. Using scrap wood from their furniture production,  Midas designed this nifty lamp that you can play with.

Now I’ll feel extra guilty when I just throw out my scraps….

via notcot

Drawings by Simon Evans Atley

Nice drawings – made me blog even when I felt too lazy…

via butdoesitfloat

Grown Up Word Problems

Found these nicely animated word problems on the Science Channel’s site. I got the first two but I never did figure out the third one….

via notcot

Hearing Aids

Caught my eye at butdoesitfloat

Glow in the Dark Bacteria

Marketing using glow-in-the-dark bacteria. nice.

via notcot

When I was a Kid I…

Great conversation starter tags from a recent creative mornings event hosted by Charlie Todd of the amazing ImprovEverywhere. More  tags here.

via swissmiss

Tear Off Wallpaper

Cool customizable wallpaper by ZNAK looks like fun!

via notcot

Bionic Fingers

One of the best things about the advancement of technology is the advantages it provides to disabilities. These motorized fingers look to be one of those great benefits in the making. The company Touch Bionics has developed these – called “Prodigits”. Seems to be the first time an aid has been developed to replace individual fingers. I don’t know the first thing about how the control systems would need to work but these little fingers look very cleverly designed.

Paper Battery

Stanford University researcher Yi Cui has developed a battery that is made by depositing an ink containing carbon nanotubes & silver nanowires on paper. He has previously done battery research using plastics but recently he’s found that the chemicals adhere much better to paper. The resulting battery or supercapacitor can then be folded, bent, rolled, and still work through about 40,000 charge cycles – twice the effectiveness of your standard Lithium Ion batteries.

via designboom