Robot Skin Can Feel Touch, Sense Chemicals, and Soak Up Solar Power When you meet your robot overlord, it may be wearing super-intelligent skin designed by a Stanford researcher--a solar-powered, super-sensitive, chemical-sampling covering that makes your meatbag covering look pathetic. Zhenan Bao is behind the advances, and the recent development centers on a stretchable solar cell system that can expand and shrink along two different axes, making it perfect for incorporation into artificial skin for robots, human prosthetic limbs, or even clothing. Bao's earlier successes with artificial skin have resulted in a highly flexible and durable material, which is part of a flexible organic-chemistry transistor, built on a thin polymer layer. When the skin is subjected to pressure, the current flowing through the transistors is modified as tiny pyramid shapes molded into the polymer layer compress, resulting in a super-sensitive transducer that can apparently detect the pressure from a house-fly's feet.
손오공의 '슈퍼보드'가 되고 싶은자동차. :: 행복한 하루를 위한 속삭임 만화 '날아라 슈퍼보드'에 보면 손오공도 이젠 여의봉을 타고 다니기 보다는 첨단 기기인 슈퍼보드를 타고 하늘을 날아 다니면서 온갖 악당들을 물리치는 걸 볼 수 있습니다. 그리고 영화'Back to The Future'에서는 날으는 스케이트 보드를 선 보이기도 했는데요. 이젠 저희들도 자동차를 이용하기 보다는 가까운 거리에서는 날라다니는 슈퍼보드와 같은 스케이트 보드를 접할 수 있는날이 멀지 않은 것 같군요. 인테리어 모티브 디자인 어워드 2008 이미지는 클릭하시면 크게 보이걸랑요~~~~ 크게해서 보세요. 자동차라고 하기에는 조금 이상하게 생겼습니다. 바닥에 달린 5개의 팬을 적절히 이용해서 조종을 하게 되는데요. 충전은 가정이나 사무실등 어디서나 가능합니다. 기술과 디자인이 발달할 수 록 자동차들의 모습이 점점 심플해 지는 것 같습니다. The Robot Hiring Boom Has Arrived The knock against many technology companies is they create too few jobs in their own countries. That complaint needs serious amending. Tech companies are creating plenty of jobs for robots. Foxconn currently supplements its 1.2 million human workers with 10,000 robots. In one regard, this investment will help the company's labor relations. The official response to the media sounded every bit as cynical. Watch: What's the Big Idea? Foxconn has annual revenues of over $60 billion, and the company has put up an astounding compound annual growth rate of over 50 percent for the last decade. This could be a step in the right direction from both a business and humanitarian perspective. What's the Significance? The use of industrial robot labor is spreading rapidly in China. Every industry, from agriculture, to the military, will be impacted by robot labor. Watch here: Image courtesy of Shutterstock