This week I’ll share a few advances in technology that I’ve run across recently. The first project however isn’t really an advancement but simply ingenuity at it’s best. I’ve always been a bit of a hands on tinkerer and lately I find that my web work dominates the majority of my time. Hopefully soon I’ll be able to get back into electric dune buggies and useless yard sculpture, but until then…stories like these keep me hooked.
Pictures from space for under $150.00
A group of MIT students wanted to see how cheaply they could launch a balloon into space to take pictures of our atmosphere. For under 150 bucks they turned a beer cooler, camera and prepaid cell phone with GPS into a mini Hubble telescope. Check out the full story Here and a list of what they used to do it Here.
Mecha from the garage
Carlos Owens is a 31 year old army mechanic that built an 18 foot tall mecha monster. It uses 27 hydraulic pistons to walk, bend, and move it’s arms and hands. Check out the full article Here.
Racing the sun
A solar powered plane called “solar impulse” is set to circumvent the earth without using a single drop of oil. The plane will fly 45 miles per hour and take three weeks to complete one full circle around the planet. Check out the full story Here.
A two wheeled robot balanced drink
The final advancement for this article is a robot that has only two wheels. It uses gyroscopes similar to the Segway. The inventor is working on an automated version with proximity sensors and voice control so that it could take commands from a human from rooms away. Full article Here
