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Northeastern University students develop eye controlled robotic arm that's happy to feed you
As an alternative to receiving brain implants for robotic arm dominance assistance, check out this surprisingly cheap eye-tracking solution developed by six electrical engineering students at Northeastern University. Labeled iCRAFT, for eye Controlled Robotic Arm Feeding Technology, the award-winning senior project drew its inspiration from one team member's difficulty syncing spoonfuls with the eating pace of elderly and disabled patients. Simply gaze at the on-screen box that corresponds to your food or beverage choice and the robotic arm will swing your way with grub in its grip. Ambitious DIY-ers can chase down the open-sourced software behind iCRAFT, and construct a contraption of their own for about $900 -- considerably less than self-feeding rigs living in the neighborhood of $3,500. You can catch a video of the robot arm serving up some fine Wendy's cuisine after the break.
Cornell students steer Pong using brain waves, can't quite play during naps (video)
We here at Engadget are always fans of brain wave experiments, and so we were delighted when two Cornell University electrical engineering students, Chuck Moyes and Mengxiang Jiang, wrapped up a final project using brain waves in the best way possible: playing Pong. Their experiment links a baseball cap full of EEG-scanning electrodes to a computer, letting the cap wearer control a paddle using Alpha or Mu waves. Depending on the waves you use, you can move the paddle either by changing your concentration level or by thinking about moving your feet. You won't rack up a high score while napping (or with a teammate narrating over your shoulder), but with a budget under $75, it's hard to find fault. You can grab the source code below, and check out a video of Jiang and Moyes' handiwork after the break. [Thanks, Chuck and Mengxiang]
IBM outs integrated circuit that's made from wafer-size graphene, smaller than a grain of salt
Lest you don't care what your circuits are made of, listen up: graphene's the thinnest electrical material, comprising just a single atomic layer. In addition to its electrical, thermal, mechanical, and optical properties, researchers dig it because it has the potential to be less expensive, more energy-efficient, and more compact than your garden-variety silicon. So imagine IBM's delight when a team of company researchers built the first circuit that fits all the components, including inductors and a graphene transistor, on a single wafer -- a setup that consumes less space than a grain of salt. The advantage, scientists say, is better performance than what you'd get from a circuit combining a graphene transistor with external components. In fact, the researchers got the circuit's broadband frequency mixer to operate at 10GHz , a feat that could have implications for wireless gadgets running the gamut from Bluetooth headsets to RFID tags. That's all just a layman's explanation, of course -- check out the latest issue of Science for the full paper in all of its technical glory.
Amar Bose donates majority of Bose Corporation shares to MIT, says thanks for the education
If you haven't heard of Dr. Amar Bose directly, you've surely heard of his eponymous audio equipment company. Late last week, the 81-year old founder and chairman of Bose Corporation announced that he's donating the majority of shares in the privately held company to his alma mater, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A member of that college's graduating class of 1951 and its electrical engineering faculty all the way until 2001, Bose felt compelled to give something back and he's opted for the most grandiose of gestures. MIT won't be able to sell its shares in Bose Corp. nor have any say in the way it is run, but it'll receive dividends as and when they're paid out, which will then be reinvested in its research and education programs. In making this perpetual endowment public, Amar Bose took the time to credit Professors Y. W. Lee, Norbert Wiener and Jerome Wiesner as his mentors -- in the image above, you can see him pictured with Lee (left) and Wiener (right) back in 1955. Chalkboards, that's where it all began.
