The Professor: Cellphone mind control, robotic fly eyes, lab-on-a-chip meets papercraft

The Professor rounds up a handful of interesting and informative gadget-related science stories from the week and presents them in an easily digestible liquid form.

Having trouble keeping your fingers, thumbs, or eyeballs on the pulse of modern science? Do you find yourself in the throes of panic due to misunderstandings in molecular goings-on? Did the latest aircar, split atom, or robotic insectoid go buzzing over your head before you had time to ready a response? Don't worry friends, The Professor is here to help. Though not an actual scientist, professor, or even a college graduate, he can help guide you through the cascading, complicated, and spasmodic visionary vistas of human invention and achievement as smoothly as a hot knife descending into softened butter.

Scientists theorize that in addition to causing cancer and decreasing sperm count, cellphone radiation may also cause changes in your behavior. Researchers discovered that exposure to the typical electromagnetic radiation which cellphones give off caused test subjects to experience short-term bouts of insomnia, and could affect other brain functions to greater or lesser degrees. Finally you can blame your late mornings on something other than a night of heavy drinking.

Read - Mind Control by Cell Phone

Common flies may contribute to the robots of the future, thanks to their complex eyes. Scientists at the Naval Air Warfare Center and University of Wyoming have created a fiber-optic sensor which resembles the pest's eye structure. Apparently, the overlapping fields of view generated by a fly's compund-eye photoreceptors create a more thorough picture of its surroundings. Future droids might be able to use the data to build a more accurate image than the kind that can be gleaned with simple cameras or crazy hunches they get late at night.

Read - Flies' eyes could enhance robot vision

In the future, medical tests may be available in cheap and disposable "lab on a chip" solutions -- made of nothing but paper. Scientists at Harvard's Whitesides Research Group have created microfluidic testing technology which uses a hydrophobic polymer coating to direct fluid to separate "nodes" on a tiny scrap of paper. The design does away with expensive components from traditional testing equipment, and can help bring affordable medical diagnostics "to the masses."

Read - Lab-on-a-Chip Made of Paper

[Brian K. @ May 18th 2008 9:06PM]

So what do you do? Bleed on the paper?

[ratnikh @ May 18th 2008 9:18PM]

Yes.

Read the article.

[quiksilv3r @ May 18th 2008 9:23PM]

This really didn't explain anything at all.

[Jordan @ May 18th 2008 10:22PM]

Thank you for explaining that this doesn't explain anything.

[John @ May 19th 2008 12:17AM]

Why am I Mr Sparkle?

[El Taco @ May 18th 2008 10:11PM]

Wow. those fly eyes look like...ya...im immature I know but thats what I thought they were when I saw them until I read underneath.

[Tim @ May 18th 2008 10:47PM]

Come on man, if you thought those looked like anything other than fly's eyes, you've got some issues. And god forbid you're alluding to resemblance of any part of human anatomy . . . I mean, what kind of messed up manga kinky porn nasty geeky shit have you seen?!?!?
Doctor's Orders: go out and get a girl (in your case you might have to pay,) and we'll never have this misunderstanding again.
And you're not immature, just a moron.
nice avatar, though.

[Za @ May 18th 2008 11:05PM]

No, I don't know - care to share?

[sachin @ May 18th 2008 11:55PM]

ha, i see it too

[Sean @ May 19th 2008 12:23AM]

if you have beard, then get a DD cover your eyes, and you look exactly like that fly.

[ryan @ May 18th 2008 10:56PM]

is "lap on a chip" a phrase I'm unfamiliar with, or should it be "lab?"

[aahatimy @ May 19th 2008 7:15AM]

I thought that was Chelsea's John Terry's face photoshopped onto that guys face.

[kelly @ May 26th 2008 10:55PM]

Nice feature of the Professor: keep using him. I met him once, and he is one of the good guys.