Someone should seriously tell IBM's research and development team to take a much-deserved vacation, as these folks have been cranking out the goods at an alarming rate of late. Most recently, the company has announced the "world's first application of self assembly used to create a vacuum around nanowires for next-generation microprocessors," which just so happens to mimic the natural pattern-creating process that forms seashells, snowflakes, and enamel on teeth. Essentially, the process forms "trillions of holes to create insulating vacuums around the miles of nano-scale wires packed next to each other inside each computer chip," which should aid electrical current in flowing around 35-percent faster while it eats up about 15-percent less energy. This newfangled approach to insulation, dubbed airgaps, creates vacuums that enable the substantial boost in speed, and the self assembling process is reportedly "already integrated" into IBM's manufacturing line in New York. The chips will initially be used in the firm's server lineup sometime near 2009, and shortly thereafter, we can expect IBM to start cranking these out for other companies that rely on its CPUs.

[Via BBC, thanks Josh]

Just like your average five-year-old, Aidan Adkins is obsessed with robots, bubblegum and most of all, vacuums. He's been into the suckers ever since he could walk, and has amassed a collection of eleven various vacs, ranging from toys to pro models. For his birthday and Christmas he asks for money to buy more to add to his collection, and then carefully researches the options to spend his hard-earned allowance on the latest and greatest. Naturally, he's got names for all of them, like "Shoppy" the Shop Vac; "Scrubby," a Bissell Pro Heat 2X; and "Kitchy" for the kitchens. Bissell recently sent him a Healthy Home vac for his birthday, which he named "Sucky." We would poke fun at the peculiar hobby, but about half our Engadget Mobile editors have a similar basement phone collection, and our own Evan Blass opens his home for nursing abandoned and abused Pocket PC devices back to life. Sure, you won't see Paris Hilton at a vacuum launch any time soon, but we're sure Aidan has plans to change all that -- once he scores the dream job Dyson internship and single-handedly revolutionizes the industry with slim n' sexy vacs.

[Thanks, Brian P]

So you've got Roomba on carpet duty and a couple Scoobas taking care of the kitchen and bathrooms, but who's cleaning up that mess of a workshop where you spend most of your time getting your hacks and mods on? Well up until now you had to rely on your own prowess with a shopvac (meaning that nothing ever actually got tidied up), but thanks to the good folks at iRobot, the bad-ass Dirt Dog is coming to get your back. The same size and shape as the more timid Roomba -- meaning all your current batteries, remotes, and charging bases are compatible -- Dirt Dog comes equipped with a 40% larger debris bin along with specially designed brushes to sweep up caked-on dirt, heavy debris, and other messes that are "too dirty for a regular vacuum." This new $130 dog will be taking a bite out of some of your toughest cleaning chores starting on Friday, but you gotta make sure that it doesn't wander out of your workspace and into the rest of the house -- it probably won't pee on your couch, but those 1,000 RPM brushes will shred your shag carpets, scratch the hell out of your polished hardwood, and -- if you have a significant other -- get you confined to the garage for the rest of your natural life.

Update: So it looks like the vicious Dirt Dog isn't the only upcoming member of the iRobot family. A Cnet article tipped us off to a new military bot that the company is working on -- called the NEO Mover -- and a little digging around turned up a few solid deets. Touted as the PackBot's big brother, NEO is apparently a 200-pound robot that can haul cargo Big Dog-style, and interestingly enough, is also said to be able to "move like a soldier" -- not sure what that means, but we won't make any snarky comments for fear of a swift and deadly reprisal. Like PackBot, the NEO Mover will also serve as a demolition expert of sorts, detecting explosives and presumably sacrificing its own well-being so that its human overlords can remain safely packed into their Hummers.

[Via The Raw Feed]