Researchers at automation technology company Festo have developed what just might be the Best Robot Ever. They’ve made a version that swims in the air using helium and lightweight tentacles, as well as one that swims underwater. Totally mesmerizing - check out the video!
Best. Lake. Ever. Lake Baikal, in southern Siberia in Russia, contains over 20% of the world’s fresh water and is home to over 1700 species of plants and animals, of which two thirds are found nowhere else. Although less than half the surface area of Lake Superior, it’s over a mile deep, comprised of an ancient rift valley where the Earth’s crust is pulling apart at two centimeters per year. As the rift has expanded over the millenia, it has filled in with a layer of sediment that is now four miles deep.
Due to its extreme age (25-30 million years) and isolation from other bodies of water, Lake Baikal has developed many unique species that are unlike any found elsewhere, and is therefore often called the “Galapagos of Russia”. The lake is home to a species of freshwater seal, as well as the translucent Baikal oil fish, known for liquefying into a slurry of oil and bones when dredged up from the extreme pressures at the depths of the lake.
In the late 1990s, artists Vitaly Komar and Alex Melamid, along with composer David Soldier, polled 500 music listeners to determine the least desirable musical qualities. They compiled their data and then composed a piece of music that incorporated as many of these qualities as possible, titling the final product “The Most Unwanted Song”. The folks polled apparently don’t like rap music, sopranos, or songs about cowboys, so their song prominently features a soprano rapping about cowboys. Other features include tubas, banjos, accordions, sudden changes in dynamics and tempo, children’s choirs singing about holidays (Labor Day, Ramadan) and corporations (Wal Mart, Coca Cola), and an uncomfortable length of 25 minutes.
The end result, in my opinion, is catchy and fascinating - much more than the sum of its unwanted parts. If you’ve ever enjoyed Mr. Bungle, I think you’ll love this song. You can stream it from the Wired article, or download the MP3.
The V-2 rocket, produced by Nazi Germany during World War II, was the first man-made object to achieve suborbital spaceflight and was the precursor to all modern rockets, including those used for human spaceflight. Germany launched over 3,000 of them at Allied countries up through 1945, claiming 7,000 military and civilian lives, mostly in London and Antwerp, as well the 25,000 slave laborers who died while being forced to produce them.
The 46-foot-long rocket’s liquid oxygen-fueled engine would burn for only about 65 seconds before cutting off, using two gyroscopes and a simple analog computer to determine the exact angle of the rocket at the moment the engine cut off. The rocket then followed a purely ballistic trajectory the rest of the way to its destination, sometimes landing within meters of its target. The V-2 had a range of up to 200 miles at an altitude of 55 miles.
Whenever the rockets fell in London, there would be no warning before the explosion, as the V-2 traveled at supersonic speeds. Just after the explosion, a characteristic fading whistling sound could often be heard. In fact, the British government denied that the city was under rocket attack until it had been going on for weeks, instead attributing the explosions to other causes.
When Germany fell to the Allied troops in 1945, the V-2’s creator, Wernher von Braun, and his whole team surrendered to the Americans in order to prevent their technology from going to the Russians. Von Braun went on to create the rockets first used by the fledgling US space program, including the giant Saturn V rocket that took astronauts to the moon.
D. B. Cooper was the alias of a man who hijacked a Boeing 727 in 1972 and then disappeared after parachuting out of the plane. The dapper man in a crisp suit passed a note to a flight attendant claiming he had a bomb in his suitcase. He demanded $200,000 in unmarked $20 bills, and four parachutes. After the plane landed and officials met his demands, he released the passengers and told the crew to take the plane back into the air. Then, somewhere over the Pacific Northwest, he opened the rear stairway of the plane and, strapped into a parachute and clutching the briefcase full of cash, leapt into a furious rainstorm, never to be seen again. It is unknown if he survived the jump, but in 1980 about $5000 of the bills he had been given by the FBI were found in the mud on the banks of the Columbia river. It not known if they were buried or just washed up there.
Silicon Valley company Luxim has created the most efficient light source yet, at 140 lumens (units of light output) per watt. For comparison, today’s most efficient LEDs only produce 70 lumens per watt, and a normal incandescent bulb produces a measly 15. They have produced a bulb the size of a Tic Tac that produces as much light as a street lamp using a fraction of the power. They use an electrical charge tightly focused into a small capsule of argon gas. The argon turns into a 6000 degree plasma, as hot as the surface of the sun - which is the reason why the light it emits has the same spectrum as natural sunlight. Check out the CNET video to see it in action.
So Bruce is the lead singer for this heavy metal band called Iron Maiden, which was pretty big in the 80’s but is still rocking out today. As if being the lead singer for Iron Maiden wasn’t awesome enough, Bruce was also really into fencing and competed internationally, and started his own fencing equipment company. And as if being the lead singer of Iron Maiden and being a top international fencer wasn’t awesome enough, Bruce also decided to become an airline pilot and now flies Boeing 757 jets for a UK charter airline. Then, in a final coup de awesome, he had a 757 painted with the Iron Maiden logo, climbed into the pilot’s seat, and flew his band on their world tour. Bruce Dickinson, you’re awesome.
Music software company Celemony has announced the latest version of their pitch correction software, Melodyne. While it’s been possible for quite some time to use software to correct or change an individual note in a recorded melody, until now it’s only been able to do that with a monophonic melody, meaning only one note is playing at a time, such as a voice or a flute. The breakthrough is that they’ve finally made it possible to actually access all of the notes in a polyphonic recording, such as a strumming guitar or a chorus of voices. The software extracts each note and displays it in a grid, where time goes from left to right and pitch goes from bottom to top. You can then select each individual note with your mouse and move it up or down in pitch, forward or backwards in time, adjust it louder or quieter in volume. You can use this as a tool to make subtle corrections, or create a whole new piece with the same instrument. Check out the video to see it in action (and forgive the poor voiceover announcer for not knowing how to pronounce “monophonic” or “MIDI”).
Indonesian photographer Rarindra Prakarsa conjures magical vignettes of misty rainforests, with sunbeams peaking through to illuminate his characters from behind like scenes from a fairy tale. I suspect there’s more than a little photoshopping going on here, but the result is breathtaking.
Martin Amm specializes in nature macro photography. This photo of fly beaded in morning dew (a small section of which I’ve cropped below) is my favorite shot, but you should check out his whole gallery.
