In each of our brains, 86 billion neurons work in parallel, processing inputs from senses and memories to produce the many feats of human cognition. The brains of other creatures are less broadly capable, but those animals often exhibit innate aptitudes for particular tasks, abilities honed by millions of years of evolution. Most of us […]
Just about every device you own is probably available with Internet connectivity. Whether or not every device you own actually needs Internet connectivity is up for debate. But if you want it, it’s there—as long as you’re able to afford it, of course. Connectivity usually comes at a premium, and it also usually involves buying […]
Your weekly selection of awesome robot videos Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We’ll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months; here’s what we have so far ( send us your events!): RO-MAN 2021 – August 8-12, 2021 […]
Winston Struye/StoryTK Standardization makes life easier, but it is often impossible to introduce it to systems that have a messy evolutionary history. Electricity supply is a case in point. Edison’s pioneering 1882 Pearl Street station transmitted direct current at 110 volts, and the same voltage was used when alternating current at 60 hertz took […]
In five years, operating a coal or natural gas power plant is going to be more expensive than building wind and solar farms. In fact, according to a new study by Bloomberg New Energy Finance, building a new solar farm is already cheaper than operating coal and natural gas plants in many regions of the world. […]
Blind Veterans UK Mary Jameson began using the optophone in 1918. By 1972, she could read 60 words per minute. On 25 June 1912, the Irish writer, inventor, and physicist Edmund Edward Fournier d’Albe demonstrated a curious machine at the Optical Society Convention in London. He called it an “exploring optophone,” and his remarkable claim […]
Modern cell phones are packed with radios to send and receive phone calls, text messages and high-speed data. In turn, each relies on a mix of technologies—for instance, the filters used to extract the desired signal from the welter of radio waves hitting the antenna are typically so-called acoustic devices based on piezoelectric crystals, whereas the […]
Amazon’s innovation blog recently published a post entitled “New technologies to improve Amazon employee safety,” which highlighted four different robotic systems that Amazon’s Robotics and Advanced Technology teams have been working on. Three of these robotic systems are mobile robots, which have been making huge contributions to the warehouse space over the past decade. Amazon […]
Photo: Patrick Pleul/Picture Alliance/Getty Images Reap the Wind: Turbines of the Jacobsdorf wind farm tower over homes in Brandenburg, in northeastern Germany In 2000, Germany launched a deliberately targeted program to decarbonize its primary energy supply, a plan more ambitious than anything seen anywhere else. The policy, called the Energiewende, is rooted in Germany’s naturalistic […]
Pickup trucks have suddenly become America’s latest battleground in electrification: Whether General Motors’ reborn Hummer, deep-pocketed start-ups like Rivian, or Tesla’s Mad Max-style Cybertruck, companies are angling for a slice of a wildly popular and lucrative market. Ford, whose F-Series pickup has been America’s best-selling vehicle of any type for 38 straight years—it finds 900,000 […]