Funny Spider

Nintendo Servers Hacked, But No Users Accounts Compromised Says Nintendo

2011-06-07T01:02:00.002+01:00

Over the weekend Nintendo released an announcement confirming that their US website server had been hacked, but stated that no customer account information had been compromised.

The hacking group responsible for the breach was ‘Lulzsec’ who have also been responsible for a number of attacks on Sony’s server over recent months. The hackers who broke into the Nintendo US website have reportedly not caused any problems or inconvenienced any customers with the hack, and just obtained a config file from the entry.

Nintendo spokesman Ken Toyoda acknowledged that there has been an unauthorized access to the company’s U.S. server, but stressed that the accessed information didn’t include any information on the company, or any personal data for its customers.

All that seems to have been stolen was a config file according to a tweet from Lulzsec: “we just got a config file and made it clear that we didn’t mean any harm. Nintendo had already fixed it anyway. <3 them!”

Source:

http://www.geeky-gadgets.com/

http://ifiwereatransformer.blogspot.com/

2011-06-03T20:12:00.001+01:00

A hacker group has engineered yet another attack on the computer networks of Sony Corp, a setback to the Japanese company's efforts to move past a security crisis that erupted in April.

The group, which calls itself LulzSec, said on Thursday that it broke into servers that run Sony Pictures Entertainment websites, and then compromised the personal information of more than 1 million Sony customers.

Sony officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

It posted some of the data it accessed on the Web -- including the names, home and email addresses, and passwords of some customers. But said it did not have the resources to extract and publish all of what it collected.

"From a single injection, we accessed EVERYTHING," the hacking group said in the statement. "Why do you put such faith in a company that allows itself to become open to these simple attacks?"

This is the latest embarrassment in an ongoing security crisis for Sony, which discovered in April that hackers had broken into its networks, stealing data from more than 100 million accounts. Nobody has claimed responsibility for that attack.

But Sony's networks have since become a target for hackers looking for holes that will allow them to get into servers located around the globe. Sony had confirmed at least four other break-ins prior to the attack on Thursday.

LulzSec had claimed responsibility for one of those attacks, an assault on Sony Music Japan.

The group took credit for Thursday's attack in a note posted on its website. It said it had hacked into a database that included unencrypted passwords as well as names, address and birth dates of Sony's customers.

The original attacks, considered the biggest in Internet history, prompted the Japanese electronics giant to shut down its PlayStation Network and other services for close to a month.

(Reporting by Liana B. Baker and Jim Finkle; Editing by Steve Orlofsky and Richard Chang)

Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/02/us-sony-idUSTRE74Q1EC20110602

A Crime-Fighting Armored Glove

2011-06-01T02:36:00.001+01:00

A robber is cornered in a dead-end alley. He turns to face the police officer pursuing him, ready to fight. He pauses. The officer’s left forearm is encased in ballistic nylon, and half a million volts arc menacingly between electrodes on his wrist. A green laser target lands on the robber’s chest. He puts his hands up; it’s a fight he can’t win.

For police and corrections officers, preventing and defusing confrontations can save lives, and that’s the premise behind the BodyGuard. Equipped with a highvoltage stunner, video camera, laser pointer and flashlight, the armor sleeve is intended to prevent violent situations. The invention was designed by David Brown, a cameraman, editor and producer who makes a living filming musical acts such as Rage Against the Machine and Snoop Dogg, as well as behindthe-scenes movie footage for the actor Kevin Costner, a friend and BodyGuard investor.

Brown developed the concept for the device one evening in 2004, when he and some friends were discussing a recent mountain lion attack in a nearby Orange County park that had left one cyclist dead and another maimed. During an attack like that, Brown recalls thinking, even if you have a knife or other handheld weapon, you’re going to drop it. He wanted something that a person could deploy instinctually.

How It Works: Armored Glove: The breathable glove weighs less than three pounds and is encased by a hard shell that extends across the forearm. A pull pin preps the stunner (generated by four electrodes on the wrist), and a button at the palm activates it. Similar buttons trigger the laser pointer, video camera and flashlight. Blanddesigns.co.uk

Name: The BodyGuard
Inventor: David Brown
Time: 7 years
Cost: Undisclosed

Source: http://www.popsci.com/diy/article/2011-05/2011-invention-awards-stunning-development

Windshield of 2020 packs Augmented Reality [Video]

2011-05-30T01:42:00.001+01:00

Projecting a head-up display onto your windshield is so passé; Autoglass reckons the future of digital driving is having augmented reality baked into the glass itself. The company has thrown together a video demo of what it believes the windshield of your car will be like in 2020, throwing in intelligent location-based services that can hunt down gas stations, flag up cyclists and pedestrians angling to get run over, and warn you when there’s a speed camera nearby.

There are also some reasonably distracting landmark indicators, along with links to the in-car entertainment system to let you know what music you’re listening to. It can even tell you the meal deals at the restaurants and pubs you’re passing. Since Autoglass specializes in windshield repairs, there’s a hook into your cellphone so that, should damage occur, it can automatically get alert a technician and tell them your location.

Clever stuff, though we’re still waiting for our flying cars controlled by all-knowing AIs. In case you’re wondering – and you don’t recognize London, UK – the video is filmed in the UK, hence the driver being on the left side of the road.

Sauce: http://www.slashgear.com/windshield-of-2020-packs-augmented-reality-video-27155132/

Sony drops hint of PlayStation 4 as it reports game profits for fiscal year

2011-05-26T21:38:00.005+01:00

Sony dropped a hint today that it is working on a PlayStation 4 video game console even as Nintendo prepares to announce the Wii 2 at the E3 trade show on June 7.

The PlayStation 3, which debuted in 2006, still has a lot of life left in it. But Sony has begun incurring increases in research and development costs. That means that we’re getting closer to the introduction of new game systems for the Big Three of video games — a transition time when billions of dollars are at stake and big market share shifts can happen.

Sony chief financial officer Masaru Kato said on the company’s earnings call, “For the home equipment the PS3 still has a product life, but this is a platform business, so for the future platform — when we’ll be introducing what product I cannot discuss that — but our development work is already underway, so the costs are incurred there.”

Sony has said it foresess a 10-year life span for the PS 3, and the company is not expected to say much about the PS 4 at its press conference at E3 on June 6. Nintendo, on the other hand, has said it plans to introduce a next-generation game console in 2012. Microsoft, whose Xbox 360 was introduced in 2005, hasn’t said if it will launch a new console or is working on one. All of the console makers want to postpone the introduction of a new console as long as possible so they can amortize the huge development costs over a longer period and reap more sales from games in each generation, but they generally introduce a new console when the older models start to see declining sales.

In some respects, a new console is always in development. But the important difference here is that Sony is incurring rising R&D costs. That means it may be in development on some chips, which are difficult to design and prototype and often carry big price tags during the R&D and early manufacturing stage.

For the fiscal year, the overall Sony Corp. reported sales at 7.18 trillion yen, or $86.5 billion, down slightly from $88.7 billion a year earlier. Operating income was $2.4 billion, up five-fold from $390 million a year ago. But net losses were $3.1 billion, compared to a loss of $501.3 million a year ago, mainly because of Japan quake-related impacts and accounting changes.

Sony’s Networked Products & Services division, which includes the PlayStation game business, saw an improvement. Sales were $19 billion, up 0.4 percent from a year ago. But profit was $429 million, compared with a loss of $1.02 billion a year earlier. Sony credited the game business for the turnaround.

During the fiscal year ended March 31, Sony sold 14.3 million PS 3s, up from 13 million a year earlier. Software sales were 147.9 million units, up from 115.6 million a year ago. The PlayStation Portable sold 8 million, down 1.9 million units from a year ago. Software sales were 46.6 million, up 2.2 million units. The PS 2 sold 6.4 million units, and software sales were 16.4 million units, down from 35.7 million units a year earlier.

Sony expects to sell 15 million units of the PS 3 in the new fiscal year. It plans on selling 6 million PSPs and 4 million PS 2s. Sony made no forecast for sales of its upcoming portable NGP gaming system. The PSN hacker attack is expected to take a toll on earnings in some way. Total sales are expected to be $92.1 billion for the coming year.

Sauce: http://venturebeat.com/2011/05/26/sony-drops-hit-of-playstation-4-as-it-reports-game-profits-for-fiscal-year/

Sony Music Japan hacked through SQL injection flaw

2011-05-24T21:41:00.001+01:00

Another day, another attack on Sony. I reported yesterday on the SQL injection attack exposing user information on SonyMusic.gr and today attackers have found flaws in SonyMusic.co.jp.

The Hacker News sent us a tip this evening documenting a couple of vulnerable web pages on SonyMusic.co.jp that allowed hackers to access their contents through SQL injection.

The good news? The database information that was published does not contain names, passwords or other personally identifiable information. The attackers noted that there are two other databases on the site that are vulnerable and it remains unclear whether they contain sensitive information.

It isn't clear whether the hackers are able to inject data into the database, or simply access the tables and records it contains. If they are able to alter the records, this could be used to insert malicious code that could be used to compromise people browsing the site.

The attackers appear to be the same crew who targeted Fox.com earlier this month. Known as Lulz Security, the group appears to attack sites primarily for fun and political reasons, not to steal credit cards and commit other types of fraud.

This doesn't change the criminality of their behavior. Accessing systems without authorization is still a crime in most countries.

Will Sony stop the bleeding? The attackers stated in their message "This isn't a 1337 h4x0r, we just want to embarrass Sony some more."

While there is an enormous target on Sony's back as a result of these very public attacks it is unclear why this is happening. Is Sony taking security seriously or are there simply so many flaws from the past that exist in their public facing sites that it will take them a long time to patch them all?

I hope this is the last time I have to report on a flaw at Sony. Sony has announced they are working with several professional organizations to get their security house in order and for their sake I hope this happens sooner rather than later.

Source: http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2011/05/24/sony-music-japan-hacked-through-sql-injection-flaw/

College Guys Who Reference Alcohol On Facebook Have More Friends

2011-05-23T02:18:00.001+01:00

Undergraduate men who often mention or post photos of alcohol have more Facebook friends than those who don’t, according to a study that will soon be published in the American Journal of Men’s Health.

The study combed through the public profiles of 225 male undergraduate students at one university for references to alcohol, including photos that contained an alcoholic drink — not just a cup — and specific textual references. It found that 85.53% of the profiles contained at least one reference to alcohol. On average, they contained 8.5.

Men older than 21 made about 4.5 times as many references to alcohol on their profiles than younger men did. And the number of references a man posted significantly correlated with the number of Facebook friends.

How students reference drinking on Facebook is of interest to those who want to prevent collegiate alcohol abuse. The study cites research published in 2002 that shows the strongest influence of alcohol consumption rates among college students is perceived peer use (which often exceeds actual peer use). Another suggests that media may exceed traditional peer influences for forming peer social norms.

“Our hypothesis is that because alcohol in college students is a predictor of social acceptance, there could be a similar correlation in the social networking world with alcohol references…[posting alcoholic references] might be a mechanism for peer acceptance,” says Katie Egan, who led the research as an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin in 2009.

Source: http://mashable.com/2011/05/19/college-guys-who-reference-alcohol-on-facebook-have-more-friends-study/

O_O

2011-05-20T23:44:00.001+01:00

This 2010 photo provided by Rob Summers shows Summers, center, receiving intensive physical therapy in Louisville, Ky. Summers was paralyzed below the neck in a 2006 car accident and in 2009, doctors decided to implant an electrical stimulator onto his spinal cord to try waking up his damaged nervous system. Summers is now able to stand and move during therapy sessions with the stimulator turned on. (Courtesy of Rob Summers)

A team of scientists at the University of Louisville, UCLA and the California Institute of Technology has achieved a significant breakthrough in its initial work with a paralyzed male volunteer at Louisville's Frazier Rehab Institute. It is the result of 30 years of research to find potential clinical therapies for paralysis.

More info: http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-implant-breakthrough-paraplegic-legs-voluntarily.html

Google warns agains facial recognition database

2011-05-19T22:01:00.001+01:00

Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt has warned Governments against ‘foolish’ legislation – and said facial recognition is too creepy even for Google

Eric Schmidt, Google’s executive chairman, has said that the search giant would not build a database capable of recognising individual faces even though it is increasingly possible.

Mr Schmidt, speaking at Google’s ‘Big Tent’ conference on internet privacy, said that the rapid development of facial recognition technology has been one of the things that has surprised him most in a long career as a computer scientist. Such “surprising accuracy” was, however, he said, “very concerning”.

Asked a question about coining the phrase “crossing the creepy line” to describe an aspect of how Google thinks about privacy, Mr Schmidt indicated that, for him, a database utilising facial recognition advances was “unlikely” to be a service that Google would create. He suggested “some company by the way is going to cross that line”.

Mr Schmidt, however, warned regulators and legislators against trying to prevent worrying services in such a way that may stifle innovation. “Hopefully the French or any other country won’t pass laws that are so foolish they force Google to not be able to operate in those countries,” he said referring to a French law requiring internet companies to retain unencrypted passwords for a year.

“Well-meaning people in government write something which is pretty broad and you have to be careful when you do this kind of regulation,” Mr Scmidt said in answer to a related question. “You might affect something and have an unintended consequence. So that is what we are always concerned about.”

Not so fast: Sony’s PlayStation Network hacked again

2011-05-18T19:41:00.000+01:00

Less than 2 days after Sony started bringing its PlayStation Network back online reports are coming in that the besieged gaming giant’s platform has been hacked yet again. MCV is reporting that the exploit allows for hackers to change users passwords using only a PSN account email and date of birth, two pieces of user information that were obtained in the original hack. Update below.

MCV says that the hack, which is really an exploit of Sony’s password reset system, was first reported by Nyleveia.comand then corroborated by Eurogamer. Now the PSN login option is unavailable on a number of Sony’s sites. Sony’s login site that is used to reset passwords using the email and date of birth is now down.

According to Nyleveia the exploit was demonstrated to it personally by someone who knew the method.

“It has been proven to me through direct demonstration on a test account, so I am without any shadow of a doubt that this is real. We have provided SCEE with a detailed description of the security hole,” said the Nyleveia poster, “While it’s unclear at this time if they will actually patch the flaw while they have the system taken down, I can also confirm that the system went down approximately 15 minutes after I received a response from SCEE on the matter.”

Note that if you changed your email when you regained access to the PlayStation Network you are most likely safe from this exploit. If you left your account email the same however, you may have been vulnerable. Sony has already been contacted about the breach and are aware of this new exploit.

Sony has commented on it’s takedown of the login site, stating:

“Unfortunately this also means that those who are still trying to change their password via Playstation.com or Qriocity.com will be unable to do so for the time being.”
“This is due to essential maintenance and at present it is unclear how long this will take,” Sony said, “In the meantime you will still be able to sign into PSN via your PlayStation 3 and PSP devices to connect to game services and view Trophy/Friends information.”

The PlayStation Network was originally hacked on April 18th but the news was not released for several days as Sony assessed the nature of what information was stolen. It turned out that millions of user accounts including names, birth dates and encrypted passwords were stolen by the hackers. In addition a database of credit card numbers were stolen but Sony has reported that those were also protected by industry standard encryption.

Sony has announced that it will be providing identity theft insurance for all users as well as a ‘welcome back’ package for PSN users that includes several free games and a month of free PlayStation Plus service. The hack was originally attributed to the hacking group Anonymous by Sony but the group refuted those claims saying that they had no interest in credit card theft.

The investigation into who performed the original hack is ongoing. It seems likely that this newest hack is either the same group or someone that was supplied with the birthdate and email information of users by the original hackers. This whole debacle is a terrible blow for Sony’s PlayStation brand but it also highlights the fact that our networks are not as secure as we think they are.

Update: Nyleveia has updated their posting, adding the following Q&A for those concerned about their account safety.

Q. If I already reset my password am I safe?
A. The exploit was possible on any account the email and date of birth was known for, regardless of if the password was changed or not, or what region the account was tied to.
Q. What if they don’t know my Date of Birth or Email account?
A. Then the average user would not be able to take your account, however due to the database being illegally accessed in April, it’s safe to assume that someone, somewhere, has access to a large number of users details, which include date of birth and email addresses, this alone should be reason enough to change your email.
Q. Are you sure this is real?
A. Yes, it was demonstrated to one of our empty accounts, then we were able to repeat the process ourselves after figuring out the method, this was additionally confirmed when a twitter user provided us with his data and requested that we change his password as proof.
We have since emailed him his new password, and no other data on his account was changed.
Q. Can Sony fix it?
A. Shortly after containing SCEE, the online forms connected to login and password recovery for the PlayStation and other linked networks was shut down and placed in a maintenance mode, I can only assume this is a direct response to our detailed reports to SCEE, with that said, I assume that when services resume the exploit will be patched and everyone’s data once again safe.
Q. If Sony fixes the hole should I worry?
A. I would suggest that everyone, regardless of if they have been affected or not, create a new password and change their account email to one they do not use anywhere else, and will not be sharing with anyone else just for additional security.
Q. Will you give us more details on the exploit?
A. Until we have confirmed that the security hole has been patched we will not release further details on how and why the exploit was possible.

Source: http://thenextweb.com/industry/2011/05/18/not-so-fast-sonys-playstation-network-hacked-again/

PSN IS BACK

2011-05-15T16:20:00.000+01:00

Sony has announced that it has just restored some PlayStation Network services after hackers forced Sony to take it down.

The announcement was made by Sony Corporation Executive Deputy President Kazuo Hirai. “The services are being restored in phases, and I am pleased to say that the first phase has been launched in most regions around the world,” Hirai said in a video statement.

Sony rebuilt the entire PlayStation Network following a breach of its security that resulted in the compromise of 24.6 million user accounts. The changes are being delivered in a new system update that is restoring online gaming and Qriocity services.

“We have greatly updated our data security systems,” Hirai noted in the video statement. “These changes were the result of an intensive investigation aided by some of the most respected forensic and security experts in the computer industry.” Those changes include more advanced security technology, advanced levels of encryption, additional firewalls and better early-warning systems, he said.

In addition to enhancing security, Sony is also giving PlayStation Network and Qriocity customers a free month of service. And while these measures are a good start, Sony has a lot of work to do to regain user trust. “Please know that we’re doing everything we can to fully restore network service around the world and to regain your trust in the days, weeks and months to come,” Hirai stated.

Source: http://newsonyngp.com/

Impressive sci-fi motorcycle helmets light up, change your voice

2011-05-13T21:08:00.001+01:00

As if soaring down the highway on a Harley Davidson motorcycle isn't all sorts of badass already, YouTuber Tigerpause444 created these six modified motorcycle helmets that take inspiration from a handful of geek movie and video game hits. These head protectors don't just look cool, some light up and change your voice too.

If you see someone riding down on a hopper with one of these helmets, you'll know it's Tigerpause444. The dude ripped apart a few Transformers, Iron Man and Star Warsmasks and strapped them onto motorcycle helmets. With a little wire rearranging and a few paint jobs here and there, they remained mostly faithful to their on-screen counterparts.

Note: Tigerpause444 reminds everyone that bolting screws into a helmet violates Department of Transportation rules and could lead to modified helmet wearers getting a ticket if caught on a motorcycle with them. He also warns that these helmets are not going to protect your noggin from the dangers on the road.

LINK: http://dvice.com/archives/2011/05/6-modded-motorc.php

Snail Braille reader could read books to the blind

2011-05-09T03:09:00.001+01:00

(PhysOrg.com) -- To most of us, Braille is largely a mystery. It feels really cool, but the idea of actually reading it is kind of a pipe dream. Our sense of touch simply is not as sensitive as that of a blind person. That is not a problem if you happen to have picked up a Braille book out of curiosity. If however, you have recently lost your eyesight, then this is a major problem. As with learning any new language, it takes time to adapt.

That time can be very frustrating, since writing and reading are still important forms of communication in our society. That is where a tool such as the Snail Braille reader could come in handy.

This tool takes Braille text, and by rolling over a straight line of Braille text, the machine is able to read the Braille, and then translate it into speech. The machine, which is capable of storing text for latter replay, can also be paired with a standard Bluetooth headset, similar to the ones you get with your cell phone. That is good news for students who want to study without having to search for the page in a book, or for people who like to hear the instructions while they are completing a task.

The machine would also feature kinetic recharging, which could possibly allow the reader to charge the device while they are using it. The only snag currently is that this device has not been created. It is currently in the design and prototype stages of development. With proper funding however, this tool could become indispensable to the newly blind.

More information: via http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-05-snail-braille-reader.html

Purdue University Students Turn Ordinary Saltwater into Hydrogen Power and Drinking Water

2011-05-04T23:03:00.002+01:00

Researchers from Purdue University are on the cusp on creating a new type of mobile technology that not only coverts non-potable water into drinking water, but also extracts hydrogen to generate electricity. The technology revolves around an aluminium alloy that the team believes could bring both water and power to poor villages around the world.

Leading the team is Jerry Woodall, a Purdue University distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering. Speaking to Science Daily, he stated that by immersing the new alloy (which contains aluminum, gallium, indium and tin) into water, you can create a spontaneous reaction that splits the water into hydrogen and oxygen molecules. The hydrogen can then be used to fuel power cells, while clean drinking water is produced in the form of steam.
“The steam would kill any bacteria contained in the water, and then it would condense to purified water,” Woodall said. “So, you are converting undrinkable water to drinking water.”
The technology even works with saltwater, which means it could be utilised on boats and marine vessels around the world to providing drinking water to sailors. A prototype has yet to be created and a patent is pending, but Woodall believes the portable technology could transform villages that aren’t connected to a power grid.
“There is a big need for this sort of technology in places lacking connectivity to a power grid and where potable water is in short supply,” he said. “Because aluminum is a low-cost, non-hazardous metal that is the third-most abundant metal on Earth, this technology promises to enable a global-scale potable water and power technology, especially for off-grid and remote locations.”
It would be cheap too, as water could be produced for about $1 per gallon, while electricity could be generated for about 35 cents per kilowatt hour of energy. ”There is no other technology to compare it against, economically, but it’s obvious that 34 cents per kilowatt hour is cheap compared to building a power plant and installing power lines, especially in remote areas,” Woodall said. ”You could drop the alloy, a small reaction vessel and a fuel cell into a remote area via parachute. Then the reactor could be assembled along with the fuel cell. The polluted water or the seawater would be added to the reactor and the reaction converts the aluminum and water into aluminum hydroxide, heat and hydrogen gas on demand.”
Simple! And as aluminum hydroxide waste is non-toxic it can be disposed of in a landfill.

Link: http://inhabitat.com/purdue-university-students-turn-ordinary-saltwater-into-hydrogen-power-and-drinking-water/

2011-04-30T15:54:00.004+01:00

Double entendres have been making us laugh since the days of Chaucer and Shakespeare, but up until now computers weren't in on the joke. Chloé Kiddon and Yuriy Brun, two computer scientists at the University of Washington, have developed a system for recognising a particular type of double entendre - the "that's what she said" joke, in which seemingly innocent sentences can be transformed into lewd utterances by appending just four short words.

The pair describe the "TWSS problem" as recognising when it is funny to follow a sentence with "that's what she said" - they give "Don't you think these buns are a little too big for this meat?" as one example. The equivalent in the UK is appending sentences with "as the actress said to the bishop" and is used in the same way.

Automating this process means identifying sentences that contain potential euphemisms and follow a particular structure - a "hard natural language understanding problem", say the researchers. Kiddon and Brun began by analysing two different bodies of text - one containing 1.5 million erotic sentences, and another with 57,000 from standard literature.

They then evaluated nouns, adjectives and verbs with a "lala" function to determine whether a sentence is a potential TWSS. Examples of nouns with a high lala function are "rod" and "meat", while raunchy adjectives are "hot" and "wet".

Their automated system, known as Double Entendre via Noun Transfer or DEviaNT, rates sentences for their TWSS potential by looking for particular elements such as nouns that can be interpreted in multiple ways. The researchers trained DEviaNT by gathering jokes fromtwssstories.com and non-TWSS text from sites such as wikiquote.org.

The system turned out to be around 70% accurate, but the pair say this is deceptively low because much of the training data did not consist of TWSS jokes, and with a more even data set it could achieve 99.5% precision.

The results will be presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics in June. Future work could also see DEviaNT extended to identify other kinds of jokes, say the researchers, writing "The technique of metaphorical mapping may be generalised to identify other types of double entendres and other forms of humor".

That's what she said.

Link: http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/onepercent/2011/04/software-works-out-whether-tha.html

New Robots Curl Up Like Caterpillars and Scoot

2011-04-30T03:08:00.001+01:00

When designing a robot with the ability to cover ground quickly, the seemingly slow, fuzzy little insect known as the caterpillar doesn't immediately spring to mind as the creature researchers would take their inspiration from.

Scientists, experimenting with a variety of soft-bodied robots with flexible structures that they hoped would adapt to unpredictable environments, found the robots were hampered by slow speeds. The researchers then looked to the soft-bodied caterpillar for design tips.

For instance, researchers have noticed that some caterpillars have the extraordinary ability to rapidly curl up and roll quickly away from predators, a trick called ballistic rolling that is one of the fastest wheeling behaviors in nature.

Now researchers at Tufts University have designed a caterpillar-like robot that mimics this behavior with lightning speed, capable of curling itself up in less than a tenth of a second. The hope is that such droids might combine the best of limbless robots, which can wriggle into tight areas but are relatively slow, with that of wheeled robots, which are relatively fast but find it hard to get into narrow spaces.

GoQBot

The 4-inch-long (10-centimeter-long) robot is called GoQBot, since it forms a "Q" shape before rolling away at more than a 1.6 feet (0.5 meters) per second, more than 20 times faster than it normally inches along. The automaton is made of silicone rubber with shape memory nickel-titanium alloy coils for muscles, which flex when heated by electrical current.

The scientists did find that caterpillars don't use the ballistic roll as their main form of locomotionbecause it is effective only on smooth surfaces, often ends unpredictably and demands a large amount of muscle power to quickly roll a body up.

The researchers noted that a soft robot attempting such tumbling would pick out which terrain might work first and pause between rolls to correct its heading if needed. To store up and quickly release the energy for such rolls, super-capacitors could be used, such as the ones employed in camera flashes, they added.

Roll and rescue

The researchers suggested that robots based on GoQBot could find use in search-and-rescue operations, building inspections and environmental monitoring.

"Due to the increased speed and range, limbless crawling robots with ballistic rolling capability could be deployed more generally at a disaster site such as a tsunami aftermath," said study team member Huai-Ti Lin, a biomimetics roboticist at Tufts University. "The robot can wheel to a debris field and wiggle into the danger for us."

Lin suggested these robots might be deployed in teams in the future.

"You can have a robot like a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) scout an area first and then drop swarms of these soft robots to work on the ground," Lin told TechNewsDaily.

The researchers detailed their findings online yesterday (April 27) in the journal Bioinspiration & Biomimetics.

Source: technewsdaily.com

Funny YouTube videos

2011-04-30T02:45:00.004+01:00

Hi everybody!
Today I wanna post some interesting videos from YouTube, here we go:

1# AIDES Willy the Tourist

2# DUCK VS. PUPPY

3# Tornado at Lambert