Kamal Youcef-Toumi and Pablo Valdivia Y Alvarado, mechanical engineers at MIT, have developed a foot-long mechanical fish that uses a single motor and fewer than ten individual components to move its compliant body. It isn't quite as fast a swimmer as a biological fish, but it's a vast improvement over the four foot long Robotuna MIT engineers debuted in 1994, which had 2,843 parts and six motors.

The robotic fish's similarity to biological fish make it an ideal underwater explorer, able to travel where other underwater vehicles cannot and tend to last longer than their submersible robotic brethren. The engineers' hope is that one day schools of robotic fish can be used to explore submerged structures, patrol lakes and harbors, and monitor large bodies of water for pollutants.

[MIT via Inhabitat]

The EyeStop, as it's called, was designed by SENSEable City Lab for the city of Florence, in Italy. According to the official press release,

it aims to enrich the city with state of the art sensing technologies, interactive services, community information and entertainment. The project is partially covered with touch sensitive e-INK and screens, so that it can deliver information to people seamlessly. Users can plan a bus trip on an interactive map, exchange community-relevant information on a digital message board, surf the web, monitor their real time exposure to pollutants and use their mobile devices as an interface with the bus shelter.

It's also solar-powered, and each individual Stop will be designed to fit its specific surroundings, rather than given a generic shape and fail to blend in with its surroundings.

The design was presented earlier this month, although a working prototype is expected to cost Florence somewhere in the region of $120,000.

EyeStop [SENSEable/MIT]

According to reports, Professor Angela Belcher's MIT team have created viruses that will form both a negatively charged anode and a positively charged cathode that takes place at room temperature and is entirely absent of toxic materials:

Belcher explained that the virus created a network of highly conductive material and because it is able to recognize and bind specifically to certain materials, each iron phosphate nanowire can be electrically "wired" to conducting carbon nanotube networks. As a result electrons can travel along the carbon nanotube networks, percolating throughout the electrodes to the iron phosphate and transferring energy in a very short time.

The discovery has already been demonstrated to President Obama, and the team is currently looking at ways to increase power and longevity of the virus batteries with a view to possible commercial production. Before everyone else in the world begins to share my worry about relying on viruses to power our lives, Belcher's team would like to point out that the viruses used are completely harmless to humans. Or so they say...

MIT team touts sci-fi style "virus battery" [Business Green]

According to Wired's Kim Zetter, who reported on the device from entertainment technology conference TED:

The prototype was built from an ordinary webcam and a battery-powered 3M projector, with an attached mirror — all connected to an internet-enabled mobile phone. The setup, which costs less than $350, allows the user to project information from the phone onto any surface — walls, the body of another person or even your hand . . . The gestures can be as simple as using his fingers and thumbs to create a picture frame that tells the camera to snap a photo, which is saved to his mobile phone. When he gets back to an office, he projects the images onto a wall and begins to size them. When he encounters someone at a party, the system projects a cloud of words on the person's body to provide more information about him — his blog URL, the name of his company, his likes and interests.

Mistry and his colleagues have patented the device, which they believe will integrate nicely into next-generation mobiles that come equipped with projectors. I love the idea of dialing a phone from my hand, or taking pictures with finger gestures.

Read more about the project at Wired.

Developed by former schoolmates of yours truly at the MIT Aero-Astro Department, the Transition calls itself a Roadable Light Sport Aircraft — because apparently it's too shy for the media frenzy that will ensue once people realize it's a car that can fly. Or, more accurately, a plane that can drive, say its creators:

Every pilot faces uncertain weather, rising costs, and ground transportation hassles on each end of the flight. The Transition® combines the unique convenience of being able to fold its wings with the ability to drive on any surface road in a modern personal airplane platform. Stowing the wings for road use and deploying them for flight at the airport is activated from inside the cockpit. This unique functionality addresses head-on the issues faced by today’s Private and Sport Pilots.

The Transition can skirt these issues because of recent FAA regulations designed to attract new pilots, says Discovery News:

In 2004, the Federal Aviation Administration created a new category of aircraft and license for sport aviation, an attempt to re-awaken interest in flying after steady drops in the number of licensed pilots. ... Sport pilot licenses don't require as many hours of training as private and commercial pilot licenses, though sport fliers are not eligible to take off and land at runways with air traffic control towers. The medical requirements for sport pilots also are less stringent than for other types of pilot licenses, matching what is needed for a driver's license.

Yes, the problem with flying is all that pesky carpooling to the airport, and the annoyance of coordinating with air traffic control. That's probably what killed the first "roadable aircraft," the Aerocar, which was designed in the late 1940s by Moulton Taylor and flown on television by James May in 2008:

Still, I took some comfort from the fact that the yahoos who double-park in cities and speed on windy country roads would probably find themselves ineligible for a pilot's license. Times are a-changin', however; come 2010, when the first Transition is expected to coast into the waiting arms of its buyer, we might get a very different view of safety in the skies.

"Flying Car" Goes to Market [Discovery via MSNBC]

Image from Terrafugia.

You might remember Gondry for his mind-bending, surrealist movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind; its script won an Academy Award, which Gondry shared with Charlie Kaufman and Pierre Bismuth. Gondry, an artist-in-residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2005 and 2006, recently visited the school to screen his short film Tokyo! (also a collaboration). While there, he confessed to Boston.com that his two years at MIT had influenced a new project:

The former MIT artist-in-residence said he was happy to be back in Cambridge, despite the excruciating cold. "It's a perfect environment for me, because it's where art meets science," he said, of MIT. "In France, art is much more associated with literature, and more political. I like the spirit here." Gondry also revealed that he's working on a new film, set at MIT, about time travel. "I'm rewriting the screenplay, so we're not shooting yet," he said, laughing.

It may be a long wait for this story to hit the screen, but when it does, I'm sure we'll all feel that it was a relatively short travel through time. Let's just hope it turns out better than MIT's 2005 Time Traveler Party, which, according to Tina Fey, was a bust because "people from the future already know the party sucked."

On November 21 2008, the Futures of Entertainment 3 conference took place at MIT, and moderator Henry Jenkins joined Alisa Perren (from Georgia State University) and super-designer Alex McDowell at MIT to discuss the work behind making Watchmen so beautiful. For over 100 minutes, they talked set design, easter eggs, how some movies fail in the marketing department (Fight Club) and how they've all remained pretty on top of Watchmen to keep things like the toys (which will be featured in the movie) top notch.

But most interesting were the stills McDowell shared with the crowd that allowed us into Dr. Manhattan's apartment and inside a few other rooms in Watchmen. Even though Zack Snyder admits he followed the comic-book panel storyboard style of directing, there were a few places that weren't terribly fleshed out in the novel, where Snyder could have a little fun. For example, can you see the Dr. Strangelove influence in the Watchmen war room below.

Dr. Manhattan's apartment is built inside his laboratory. I love the reasoning behind the design of this set. McDowell explained that they thought that in the Watchmen world:

The powers that be, who know nothing about design, but needed him to feel like he was the most important guy in America, went to the designers of the White House, who had just recently designed for Jackie Kennedy, Maison Jansen, and had them design this completely artificial set.

And on top of that is a reference to The Man Who Fell To Earth: the book in the front is Masterpieces in Paint and Poetry directly copied from a book that Thomas Newton produced, but instead McDowell explained that they stamped it Veidt Enterprises.

The table tennis room in Dr. Manhattan's apartment was also inspired by The Man Who Fell To Earth, with the outside indoor wallpapering.

Now onto more details: McDowell shows all the touches that they added to Archie (Nite Owl's ride) including a copy of Under The Hood (of course) but also a 8-track player, to get everybody in the mood.

Here is another great example of the many pains the production crew went to, to get the perfect look on set. This is Dan Dreiberg's desk, and the signed photograph is none other than the Twilight Lady, whom Laurie Juspeczyk kind of teases old Dreiberg about.

It's pretty surreal the amount of detail the crew went into, even when press was visiting on set. McDowell explained that during one press trip a journalist mentioned that he didn't see the four-legged turkey anywhere, which was one of the many subtle touches in the novel that explained just how different this alternate universe really was. Immediately McDowell went to work crafting the perfect genetically engineered prop bird.

Sadly this discussion took place during a much happier time in November, and the trial over the movie rights hadn't taken such an ugly turn yet. When McDowell was asked about the legal proceeding between Fox and Warner Brothers., McDowell had pretty good faith that the movie would still be released:

I was in a press conference with Zack a couple months ago and he basically said that they're not stopping us from making the movie. In fact it sounded awfully like Fox was contributing to the press and marketing campaign. So it looks to me like a big spoof that just engages. It looks like a big spoof that ends up with a lot of money changing hands down the line and the audience won't notice the difference. But I think Warner Brothers' coffers will be lighter. I think somebody made a mistake along the way, and they're going to pay for it. But I don't think anyone is going to stop the release of the film, that seems foolish for all.

I wonder if he still feels the same now. The entire meeting is very interesting just to hear about the franchising and taking care of every detail and past failed works with the Tim Burton Charlie And The Chocolate Factory video game that eventually tanked because the studio wouldn't give Burton control over some of it. McDowell talks about the Watchmen video game and the pains they are going to recreate it, including fans and fleshing it out as best as they can, but we'll see on that idea.

Here's the entire lecture, enjoy!:

The Future for Interactive Storytelling was founded by three members of MIT’s Media Lab: V. Michael Bove Jr., who studies object-based media and interactive television, Cynthia Breazeal, who works in personal robotics and human-robot interaction, and Ramesh Raskar, who cultivates new technologies in imaging, display, and performance capture. Together, they are looking at how storytelling is changing and what it is capable of in a world of advanced technologies and community interactions:

According to a release from the newly-formed group:

By applying leading-edge technologies to make stories more interactive, improvisational and social, researchers will seek to transform audiences into active participants in the storytelling process, bridging the real and virtual worlds, and allowing everyone to make their own unique stories with user-generated content on the Web. Center research will also focus on ways to revolutionize imaging and display technologies, including developing next-generation cameras and programmable studios, making movie production more versatile and economic.

Part of the lab’s work will involve creating more effective robotic actors and improved blending of human and animated movement in motion capture, but at the core of the project is finding new ways for stories to become living, changing products of human interaction. Says Bove:

Imagine what people could do in storytelling if our rooms and our furniture and our cars and our shoes and everything else we interacted with could be collecting information as in a diary and we could play that all back and use that as part of creating stories.

The Center’s work will not be merely theoretical. MIT is partnering with Plymouth Rock Studios, which is planning to build a 14-soundstage complex in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 2010. The studio is looking to produce traditional story-based productions, which it hopes will come out of MIT’s research.

[MIT and The New York Times]

This isn't to say that B and T cells will be forced to do our bidding. "The goal is to perturb the cell as little as possible," said Robert Cohen, one of the authors of the paper in Nano Letters. Each synthetic patch only covers a small part of the cell's surface, so the cell can still carry out its normal functions without disturbance.

In fact, "backpack" is a near-perfect analogy for this technology. The synthetic patch application consists of three layers of polyelectrolytes (certain types of polymers). Inside, the middle layer is whatever the scientists want the cell to be carrying: examples include a vaccine, a protein marker, or magnetic nanoparticles for controlled direction. The bottom layer of the patch is a polymer that attaches to the surface of the immune cell, and the top layer binds to other cells.

If you squint while you're watching this video (courtesy of MIT TechTV), the hordes of marauding B cells kind of look like ants with backpacks:

Now that we know human immune cells can carry a bit of extra load, it's time to start thinking about how we can use that capability to treat cancer or improve our bioimaging — or if you prefer, what kind of pencil boxes and notebooks will go into these new cellular backpacks.

Leaf-cutter ant image from Wikimedia Commons.
Surface-functionalized cell diagram courtesy American Chemical Society.

Tiny backpacks for cells [MIT News Office]
Surface functionalization of living cells with multilayer patches [Nano Letters]

Sørvin, Slaatto and Kronick hope that their high-tech mobile home will one day be affordable for the average person. To that end, they've assembled a manual of their project; so with the right tools, the right upholstery, and the right programming algorithms, this hexagonal spider-dwelling could be yours.

Kronick, who designed the inverse kinematics software that controls the six-legged house, has high hopes for the design:

Kronick says he would love to test the walking house in Africa with a herd of elephants, and has ideas about an amphibious version that can float on water as well as walk on land.

"We plan to make the house walk well and reliably enough that you could program a set of GPS waypoints via the onboard computer, remotely from an iPhone or over the internet through a Google Maps interface or similar, and have the house follow that path," he says.

Sounds convenient, but going over to a friend's house for dinner will now involve a whole new level of complexity. Whose dinner table should you set? How do you stop the kids from running back to their own house to play video games in the middle of the evening? At the end of the night, when you decide it's too late to start a long housewalk elsewhere, will your new neighbors hear you through the window as you deconstruct the evening? And God help us all if you accidentally hit the wrong GPS bookmark and show up at your parents' house instead.

A House That Walks [via Popular Science], Manual for micro dwellings [N55]

Using laser microfabrication techniques, Freed and Engelmayr created a scaffold out of an elastic polymer called poly(glycerol sebacate) (PGS). Though there have been previous attempts to rebuild heart tissue in this way, their new approach has three key advantages that make it the best bet so far for broken hearts. First, they can control the stiffness of the PGS structure to match the mechanical properties of actual heart tissue. In addition, by exciting the tissue with electrical fields, they can encourage the growth of the scaffold in any direction they want. Plus, Freed and Engelmayr found that their PGS structure conformed naturally to the desired alignment of healthy cardiac cells — "the scaffold itself has an intrinsic ability to guide the orientation of cultured heart cells," says Freed. And as an added bonus, their growing structure looks really ridiculously cool:

Mending broken hearts with tissue engineering [MIT]
Accordion-like honeycombs for tissue engineering of cardiac anisotropy [Nature Materials]

Image by G.C. Engelmayr, Jr. of MIT.
Video courtesy of Macmillan Publishers Ltd.: Nature Materials, advance online publication, 02 November 2008 (doi: 10.1038/nmat2316).

Controlling the weather may seem godlike, but as Xconomy reports, Langer begs to differ:

Langer says he believes hurricane mitigation is a chemical engineering problem. Hurricanes draw energy from the heat of evaporated seawater, gaining power as they move over tropical oceans, often not slowing down until they hit land—and devastate populated coastal areas in the process. Langer is thinking about ways to interfere with the energy transferred from the ocean up to the hurricane. It’s a tough nut to crack, however.

I'll say. But if Langer believes we can do it, I'm pretty well sold — and if anyone needs me to fly planes filled with carbon particles into the eye of the storm, consider this my statement of interest.

MIT’s Langer, Renowned for Inventing Solutions to Medical Problems, Strives to Do the Same for Hurricanes [Xconomy]

Numerous studies have found that the LHC poses no risk of creating reality-devouring exotic matter or world-shredding mini black holes, but still the messages of anger and concern pour into CERN headquarters. Mixed in with the hand-wringing have been a few actual death threats, notably directed at physicist Frank Wilczek of MIT. Scientists have noted that cosmic particles bombard the Earth constantly, yet they haven't caused an apocalypse yet, so there's really nothing to worry about. I guess "the potential end of the world" sticks in people's minds better than "the search for the Higgs Boson."

Of course, when the Telegraph quoted Professor Cox's vitriolic paroxysm, they used asterisks to disguise the word he actually used. So what's a t***? Some obscure physics term, no doubt. Image by: xkcd.

Scientists get death threats over Large Hadron Collider. [Telegraph]

Here's the MIT recipe for splitting water molecules. Take one glass of water that's pH neutral. Add a dash of cobalt and a pinch of phosphates. Apply a mild current via a conductive glass electrode. As the cobalt-phosphate mix forms a film on the electrode, a steady stream of oxygen bubbles will appear. Meanwhile, hydrogen ions collect at another electrode.

The crazy thing is, the MIT researchers don't really know why this works (they have a lot more research to do). They suspect the cobalt-phosphate is somehow catalyzing the reaction, but they need to figure out how to scale it up and collect the byproducts efficiently. They think they'll have marketable technology in ten years.

So how will you use this when the time comes? The current required could be supplied by solar cells. The resulting hydrogen and oxygen could be stored with relative ease, making this process an important new way to store and transport solar energy. There are lots of things you could do with all that O and H - like powering the hydrogen fuel cell in your car, perhaps. And what's the byproduct of a hydrogen fuel cell? Water. Images by steakpinball and EurekAlert!

Water refineries? [EurekAlert!]

In the USDA experiment, cows equipped with special ear receivers (like iPods for cows) receive signals from a remote controlling station. By giving them irritating stimuli, such as unpleasant sounds, they can direct the cows to move in a certain direction. They can even play them traditional "gathering songs" used by cowboys to group the herd. Based on invisible fence technology used by ranchers, the devices were upgraded by MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory to include GPS and a full suite of animal diagnostics. That could make it very easy to track and return a lost pet, and it could be a huge boon to biologists who track and study wildlife. Image by: Flikr.

A Futuristic Linkage of Animals and Electronics. [U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service]

Up until now, the only planets outside of our solar system that we've successfully detected are way bigger than earth. This is because most satellites detect planets by observing the pull their gravity exerts on the stars they orbit, so it's easier to find large planets orbiting close to their stars. TESS does things a little bit differently: it'll search for planets by measuring the amount of starlight it obscures, allowing astronomers to see a lot more planets of different calibers all at once. Examining the spectrum of a planet's star as it passes through its planet's atmosphere also lets researchers gauge the planet's size, temperature, and atmospheric chemistry much more accurately.

If all goes as planned, TESS could launch in 2012, and we could be making friends with aliens by 2013. Image by Tess Team

MIT aims to search for Earth-like planets with Google's help [MIT News]

AT&T is a sponsor of the project, and handed over reams of phone records to the group so they could link NYC with cities around the world based on phone calls and IP traffic. No, it's not a surveillance spree, though it's hard not to wonder about that given AT&T's recent eagerness to hand over its phone data to the government without warrants. But this project merely aims to show how busy NYC can be. And just how pretty busy can be. This will be part of the MoMa's "Design and the Elastic Mind" exhibition starting February 24th.Images by senseable city lab

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