UniversityOfMunich
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Personal Energy Orb Arduino project knows you haven't been exercising, cripples your computer
Spending too much time indoors? You need a Personal Energy Orb, a glowing Arduino powered ball that allows you to trade physical exertion for a tolerable mouse speed. Developed by two students at the University of Munich for a physical computing course, the PEO connects to a bike-mounted revolution counter to note how far a user rides, counting the total distance toward usable time on a computer. A fully "charged" green orb will allow a user to use their PC unhindered -- but a spent red orb will drag Windows' cursor sensitivity settings to its lowest. The idea, the project's creators say, is to annoy the user off of the computer and back on to their bike. It sure sounds aggravating to us. Check out the full homework assignment at the source link below, complete with goals, follies and Python scripts.
Scientists bend gamma rays, could neuter radioactive waste (update: more credit)
Bending most light is easy; bending it in gamma ray form, however, has often been deemed impossible given how hard it is for electrons to react to the extreme frequencies. LMU Munich scientist Dietrich Habs and his Institut Laue-Langevin teammate Michael Jentschel have proven that assumption wrong: an experiment in blasting a silicon prism has shown that gamma rays will refract just slightly through the right material. If a lens is made out of a large-atom substance like gold to bend the rays further, the researchers envision focused beams of energy that could either detect radioactive material or even make it inert by wiping off neutrons and protons. In theory, it could turn a nuclear power plant's waste harmless. A practical use of the technology is still some distance off -- but that it's even within sight at all just feels like a breakthrough. Update: The research also involved the Max Planck Institute of Quantum Optics' Marc Günther. Thank you, Dr. Günther.
New use for an old technology brings touch input to... almost anything
Imagine, if you will, a world where everything from the clothes on your back to the glass in your hand was a touch-enabled device. We're not there yet, but thanks to researchers at the University of Munich and the Hasso Plattner Institute, we're closer to just such a touchy-feely future. Those German scientists are now able to tell when and where your fingertip touches (or gets close to) a wire using time domain reflectometry, or TDR. It works by sending electrical pulses through a wire and measuring the time it takes for the pulses to return. See, the presence of a finger reflects some of the pulse, and by using an oscilloscope and a computer to view and analyze the resulting waveform, researchers can pinpoint where the touch occurs. TDR has been used for years to find faults in underwater cabling, but only recent advances have allowed its application over the short distances used in consumer applications. In its current form, the equipment isn't quite ready for public consumption -- those pulse generators and detectors need to shed a few pounds first -- but given how quickly silicon's shrinking, it shouldn't be long before our truly tactual world is real.
Robot uses semantic search to get a Subway sandwich, do Jared's evil bidding (video)
Old PR2 can already fold towels, play pool and grab an ice cold beer -- really, the Willow Garage robot is just one task of short of mastering the day-to-day activities of your average college student. What's that? It can get a sandwich, too? Never mind. And this isn't just any "get me a sandwich" command -- the stout white 'bot uses semantic search to infer possible locations for sandwich, using knowledge of similar objects and environmental models. In the below video, you'll see PR2 make its way to a refrigerator, in search of sustenance, only to come up empty-clawed. Undaunted, it hops on an elevator and makes its way to a Subway sandwich shop. The joint project from the University of Tokyo and University of Munich was recently shown off at recent robotics conference. No word on when PR2 will be programmed to hold the onions.
