Science, Space, & Robotics - Page 454

Elon Musk gets a lot of attention for his work as CEO of Tesla, but it would seem that SpaceX, his space company, holds true potential for human greatness. The company isn't designed to cater rich tourists into space, and Musk would rather launch satellites and ferry astronauts to the International Space Station.

NASA and other space programs hope to launch future missions to Mars, including a possible manned mission to the Red Planet. It seems that thought isn't necessarily lost on SpaceX, which continues to develop space rockets:

"I know for a fact that the guys within SpaceX already have a design for the engines and the rocket that would get to Mars," said Ashlee Vance, biographer of Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, in a statement to National Geographic. "Knowing the caliber of talent there, I trust that that part is feasible if not profitable. The colonizing part? That's still an enormous question."

Researchers have a strong curiosity about the red planet of Mars, and a manned mission one day seems like a possibility. However, the spacesuits used by astronauts aboard the International Space Station would need to be replaced with newer generation spacesuits, and some type of flexible spacesuit would be ideal.

The suits designed for space today must take into consideration an astronaut's ability to complete work in microgravity. The lower half of the suit is extremely stiff and makes moving around more naturally difficult - but increased mobility would be required for future space missions.

Astronauts must be able to twist, bend, and move around easily, especially if they needed to take soil samples or collect items from a foreign planet. A number of different prototype spacesuits are currently in development - and some are being tested - so there is hope that changes will be coming.

Research teams from the University of Exeter and Cardiff University want to develop a video game that is able to actually help gamers by controlling our need for junk food.

To win the game, a player must press images of healthier food options instead of unhealthy snack foods. This game is said to help condition the players, so they will make similar food choices while raiding the refrigerator or rummaging through the food pantry.

"This research is still in its infancy and the effects are modest. Larger, registered trials with longer-term measures need to be conducted," said Dr. Natalia Lawrence, research team lead, in a public statement. "However, our findings suggest that this cognitive training approach is worth pursuing: it is free, easy to do and 88 percent of our participants said they would be happy to keep doing it and would recommend it to a friend. This opens up exciting possibilities for new behavior change interventions based on underlying psychological processes."

The US Army is helping fund a research project at the University of California, Berkeley, with a focus on developing intelligent robots that don't require extra sensors or software. The robot, which physically looks like a cockroach, is able to overcome obstacles on its own.

The ability to teach robots and AI to identify - and successfully navigate obstacles without human guidance - is a difficult task.

"The majority of robotics studies have been solving the problem of obstacles by avoiding them, which largely depends on using sensors to map out the environment and algorithms that plan a path to go around obstacles... however, when the terrain becomes densely cluttered, especially as gaps between obstacles become comparable or even smaller than robot size, this approach starts to run into problems as a clear path cannot be mapped," said Chen Li, lead author of the UC Berkeley research, in the Bioinspiration & Biomimetics journal.

The unmanned SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket exploded two minutes after launch, when its two stages were expected to separate. This is the first time in 19 launches that ended in failure, as the 63-meter rocket was able to complete six cargo trips to the ISS and has a 15-flight contract with NASA.

Musk offered a second statement: "There was an overpressure event in the upper stage liquid oxygen tank. Data suggests counterintuitive cause. That's all we can say with confidence right now. Will have more to say following a thorough fault tree analysis."

Astronauts on the space station can sustain themselves until July 24 on normal levels, and have enough reserves until September. There are three scheduled cargo missions scheduled to launch to the ISS over the next three months.

We're only 15 years away from the year 2030, where we're expected to see human brains assisted by nanobot implants that will turn us into "hybrids", according to one of the world's leading thinkers.

The Director of Engineering at Google, Ray Kurzweil, has said that in the 2030s, we will see implants connecting humans to the cloud. We would then be able to pull information from the cloud, from our own brains, all while information will be allowed from your brain to the cloud, letting you back your brain up to the cloud. You know, in case of a bad hangover one night, you could just restore your brain to the night before. #backsupforlife

Kurzweil has said that as the cloud accessing our brain improves (and before Skynet takes over), our thinking and cognitive abilities would expand quicker than we can imagine. At first, it would be a "hybrid of biological and non-biological thinking", but as we shift into the 2040s, most of our thinking will be done off-brain, and would thus be non-biological. Think, "OK Google, can I afford to buy pizza tonight" or "OK Google, what is 5.2 million divided by 2.39".

Scientists in China were able to train mice in less than one week to be able to sniff out explosives, narcotics, and other items. The mice, trained by researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences Kunming Institute of Zoology, said they were able to accurately identify targets 98 percent of the time.

Researchers trained the mice by withholding water resources, and then put a custom sensor in the cage that released water droplets after it was touched. After being moved to a box that offered two different smells, water was given as a reward when they pressed the sensor. It took five days for the mice to learn they would receive a water reward every time they detected the appropriate smell.

It's much cheaper to train and store mice over dogs, and could see widespread use in the future, after additional testing is completed.

Screenwriter and director Alex Garland, the mastermind behind Ex-Machina, recently answered questions regarding artificial intelligence. Of particular interest was when Garland spoke regarding sentient and non-sentient technology - sentient is a term used to describe the ability to perceive or feel things.

When asked about the idea that non-sentient technology has the capacity for good or danger, he offered the following thoughts:

"No. It wouldn't be capable of good or evil in that way, because it is not sentient," Garland said during a recent conference call. " And [whether] they have a good or evil aspect [...] would be defined by the humans, the sentient things that are defining it, and controlling it and using it, essentially. [... Our] whole system of right and meaning [...] behind intention and in our action is based on [being] sentient."

NASA wants to launch a mission to Jupier's moon Europa, as it seems like the most logical place in the Earth's solar system able to support life. Beneath Europa's icy surface, researchers believe they will be able to find liquid oceans.

Despite being about half the size of our planet's moon, some scientists estimate there could be twice as much water as the Earth has. Based on the NASA Galileo Mission that studied Jupiter in the late 1990s, it would appear Europa has all the necessary ingredients for life: plenty of salt water, a rocky sea floor, and tidal heating that contribute necessary energy and chemistry.

If everything goes according to plan, NASA wants to launch a spacecraft sometime in the 2020s, which would take the several year journey. Orbiting the entire planet of Jupiter every two weeks, NASA researchers would have plenty of chances to capture data about Europa.

NASA and General Motors are testing its humanoid robot, dubbed the Robonaut, aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

The Robonaut was designed so it can complete simple and repetitive tasks that allow astronauts to take care of other action items. Specifically, NASA hopes the Robonaut is able to reduce the number of dangerous tasks that the ISS must complete.

Researchers are curious about how the Robonaut can survive in a minimal gravity environment. If it does well, future editions could be used on missions outside the ISS.