Inventor of the K ration dies at 100

Obituaries often make for intersting reading. Not only did the guy develop the "K" ration during WWII, he even found a use for Conscientious objectors, as subjects in one of the first controlled studies of starvation. After the war he was among the first scientists to sutdy the link between cholestral and heart disease. Since he lived to be a 100, maybe he knew what he was talking about. He was also Lon Chaney's nephew.

Inventor of the K ration dies at 100

Obituaries often make for intersting reading. Not only did the guy develop the "K" ration during WWII, he even found a use for Conscientious objectors, as subjects in one of the first controlled studies of starvation. After the war he was among the first scientists to sutdy the link between cholestral and heart disease. Since he lived to be a 100, maybe he knew what he was talking about. He was also Lon Chaney's nephew.

One place in Europe We're still Appreciated

Not that I'm planning a trip to Europe anytime soon but if I do go, I might make a side trip to Bastone.

Snakes! why did it have to be snakes?

Last year I read a stow aobut how nile monitors were turning up in the Everglades, apparently now its Burmese pythons popping up. Well, on the upside, at least the the alligators have something new to eat. click on title for the article.

The xprize is over. Long live the X-cup!

Looks like the folks behing the x-prize are trying to turn it into an annual competition.http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/10/05/spaceshipone.race.ap/index.html

SpaceshipOne claims X-prize

Well, it's over. Spaceship flew successfully this morning winning the X-prize. http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/10/04/spaceshipone.attempt.cnn/index.html
Mad props to Alien for sending me the story.

Trouble down on the ant farm

We hear lots of stories of native species getting crowed out by exoctic "invasive" species. Here's one where local bugs got the better of a museum's prized colony of army ants. And shame on those enytomologists for not understanding how badass dermistids are. They work in a frick'n natural history museum whe dermistids are both a tool for cleaning bones and a meance because the eat nearly everything else. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/02/MNG4M92UQC1.DTL

Trouble down on the ant farm

We hear lots of stories of native species getting crowed out by exoctic "invasive" species. Here's one where local bugs got the better of a museum's prized colony of army ants. And shame on those enytomologists for not understanding how badass dermistids are. They work in a frick'n natural history museum whe dermistids are both a tool for cleaning bones and a meance because the eat nearly everything else. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/02/MNG4M92UQC1.DTL

Trouble down on the ant farm

We hear lots of stories of native species getting crowed out by exoctic "invasive" species. Here's one where local bugs got the better of a museum's prized colony of army ants. And shame on those enytomologists for not understanding how badass dermistids are. They work in a frick'n natural history museum whe dermistids are both a tool for cleaning bones and a meance because the eat nearly everything else. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/02/MNG4M92UQC1.DTL

X-prize: One down, one to go!

SpaceshipOne made the first of two planned flights towards the X-prize. It was successful but a bit scarier than planned. Hopefully the can do something about that roll before Monday. http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/09/29/spaceshipone.attempt.cnn/index.html

Space... Virgin Territory?

Just a few days ahead of spaceship one's try at the x-prize Richard Branson has announced the formation of Virgin Galactic a company which plans to liscense the spaceOne technology to take tourists into space by 2007. Wonder if each seat will have its own tv screen. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3693020.stm

Building a better cockroach

So now even cockroaches need to worry about being replaced by robots! http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2004/09/16_full.shtml For a bit more detail and some cool viedo clips go here http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2002/09/rfull/rfull.html
and to think... a lot of this work is going on 3 floors above me! That's cool as long as none of the roaches (robotic or biological) escape.

Robot menace!

As long as the concept of the robot has been around there are those who have been fearful of it. robots could steal our jobs, take over the planet, exterminate the human race or even.... beat us at poker? Yep, with the rise of on-line poker comes the suspision that not all the players are human
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6002298/

Maybe Icarus would be a more appropriate name

Just when the Mars rovers were helping to rehabilitate NASA's pulic image, Genesis had to go muck things up.
The Genesis capsule was suppossed to deploy a parachute and be snagged mid-air by a helicopter. Instead the chute never deployed and capsule hit the desert floor in a 100 mph "hard landing". So now smples which should have been removed in clean room conditions areexposed to the elements. Sure hope these guys saw "The Andromenda Strain." http://genesis.entry.cnn/index.html

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

I'm not sure how I feel about this movie. It could be decent or it could really suck. The web site is kinda interesting and the trailer does look better than the first one I saw. http://www.skycaptain.com/

Faster than a speeding bullet it's a bird it's a plane it's the x-43 scramjet!!!!

I can remember reading the Guinness Book of records in the elementery school library. Back then my favorite part was the section on the rocket cars which set the land speed record. Now after a hiatus of a few decades air speed records are being broken again.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3613752.stm

Day of the Dolphin

Remember William Gibson's short story Johnny Mneumonic? Of Course you do! Anyway the story featured an ex-Navy junkie cyborg Dolphin named Jonesy the War-whale. Well, the Navy really does use Dolphins in mine-clearing operations but they're not cyborgs (or junkies either one hopes) anyway here's a pretty picture
http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/articles/military_photos_20048260.asp
For more pics, info and even calendar pages for your desktop go to the Navy's offical site at
http://www.spawar.navy.mil/sandiego/technology/mammals/index.html

More fun with exoskeletons!

Just to show that the japanese aren't the only ones working on exoskeletons here's the DARPA funded UC Berkeley BLEEX project http://bleex.me.berkeley.edu/bleex.htm

Dommo arrigatto Mr. robotto

Back when I went to NEXTFEST, there were a lot of demonstrations of Japanese robotic prowess. Of course the most impressive was the Sony Asimo but they also had a "muscle suit" a sort of exoskeleton developed to help disabled people with mobility. You can read more about it at http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/08/09/japan.robots/index.html

They blowed up real good!

While most of the xprize coverage has focused on the frontrunners Spaceship One and the Canadian Davinci Project, that doesn't mean the other teams are just sitting on their hands. Rubicon 1 had a test flight last week which didn't exactly go as planned. http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/08/09/bc.privaterocket.ap/index.html
learn more about this and other x-prize hijinks athttp://xprize.com/

Taking the rockets out of rocket science

Looks like NASA is finally investigating alternatives to chemical rockets for propulsion http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/08/12/space.propulsion/index.html
while most of these ideas have been around in one form or another decades actually testing them out to see if they work would be a positive step.

The more things change....

The last story remined me of something. If you drive through Moutain View on the 101 you will pass Moffit Field a formor Naval Air Station. From The freeway you can see the massive Hanger One, former home of the USS Macon, a 785 ft. long ridgid airship capable of launching and recovering its own fighter aircraft. The tragic history of the Macon is here http://moffetthistoric.arc.nasa.gov/history/history5.html. If we ever do build the Walrus it would be unwise to defer maintenance.

I am the Walrus.. coo-coo-ca choo!

Darpa is currently taking proposals for project Walrus, a megaairship roughly the size of an aircraft carrier capable of transporting 1,600 troops and between 500-1000 tons of equipment. This beast would be able to reach any trouble spot in the world in 4 days (Eat your heart out Phineas Fogg!). http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/12.08/start.html?pg=3

Open the pod bay door Hal.

Way back at the turn of the milliniuem, the Tech Museum had an exhibit comparing contemporary technology with that featured in the movie "2001: A Space Oddessy".
The exhibit itself is long gone but the online version is still up. http://www.thetech.org/exhibits/online/2001ds/

New Way to space or a bunch of hot air?

While X prize contenders like Spaceship One and the Davinci Project have grabbed the headlines
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/07/27/x.prize/index.html
They're not the only ones reaching for the stars. At JP Aeorospace there's a plan to achieve Earth orbit with-- get this, a really big hellium balloon and an ion engine! Well, it has the virture of never having been tried before. The downside? It would take about 5 days to reach Earth orbit (By comparision the Apollo 11 roundtrip took 6 day!). Well check it out, it's definately a novel approach. http://jpaerospace.com/

The blogging craze is offically over!!

I've finally jumped on the bandwagon which of course means the parade is over!
Lately I've been pondering how visions of the future are rarely fully realized. From Tomorrowland and World's Fairs of ages past the future just isn't what it used to be. For an example check out this link. http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/news_events/exhibits/futuristics/index.html