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Robotic BigDog is US army's best friend
Video footage of BigDog, which has been built to carry equipment and march alongside troops in rough terrain such as in Iraq, has attracted millions of viewers.
The robot, which is described as its creators as the "alpha male" of robotic animals, is about the size of a Great Dane. It runs at 4 mph and can hold a 24-stone load. However its makers, Boston Dynamics, have claimed that it will soon be succeeded by an even faster, stronger model.
A computerised brain sits at its core, and controls a small petrol engine which drives its aluminium legs. Each of the legs features three joints that can be repositioned 500 times every second, meaning the robot can even withstand a hefty blow to its body.
Marc Raibert, the president of Boston Dynamics, said: "Internal force sensors detect the ground variations and compensate for them. And BigDog's active balance allows it to maintain stability when we disturb it."
Current models of BigDog are remote-controlled from army bases by commanders. However it is thought that future versions will be built with eye-like sensors that allow it to become "unleashed" by making intelligent decisions about a journey.
The project was sponsored by the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is responsible for coming up with radical inventions for the military. Video footage of BigDog, which has been built to carry equipment and march alongside troops in rough terrain such as in Iraq, has attr... more -
Pentagon Begins Fake Cat Brain Project
The Pentagon's crash program to create an artificial brain is just about up and running. And, if it all goes as planned, we could see an electronic chip that mimics the "function, size, and power consumption" of a cat's cortex some time in the next decade.
Darpa, the Defense Department's way-out research arm, recently tapped is in late-stage negotiations with Malibu's HRL Laboratories to spearhead its Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics ("SyNAPSE") program. The goal: Build a chip with a "neuroscience-inspired architecture that can address a wide range of cognitive abilities -- perception, planning, decision making, and motor control," a company release notes. [UPDATE: An HRL spokesperson says the deal, in fact, "has not been finalized yet." The press release "should not have been sent out."]
The first nine-month phase of the program will focus on designing, fabricating, and characterizing synaptic and neural elements and combining them into a high-density, interconnecting microelectronic "fabric," which will be incorporated into a more complex system-level fabric design...
*****In the following 15-month phase, HRL [a joint venture between Boeing and General Motors] will combine the synaptic and neural elements to fabricate and demonstrate "cortical microcircuits" that can model various lower-level brain functions and actually "learn" by interacting with the environment.:
"The follow-on phases of the project will create a technology that functions like the brain of a cat, which comprises 108 neurons and 1012 synapses," Dr. Narayan Srinivasa, SyNAPSE Program Manager and Senior Scientist, said. "The human brain has roughly 1011 neurons and 1015 synapses."
The gray area between circuitry and gray matter has become one of the hotter topics in military research. The Army is funding a study into "synthetic telepathy" that would translate the brain's electrical activity into computer code. Darpa-funded researchers have taught monkeys how to control robotic limbs with their thoughts. Defense contractor Northrop Grumman is building binoculars that tap the unconscious mind. Honeywell has built a system that monitors pre-conscious neural firings, to help pick out targets in satellite imagery. The JASONs, the Pentagon's premiere scientific advisory board, has warned of the dangers of enemies implanted with brain-computer interfaces. And the Defense Intelligence Agency just released a report, saying the military needs to spend more on neuroscience - up to and including "mak[ing] the enemy obey our commands." The Pentagon's crash program to create an artificial brain is just about up and running. And, if it all goes as planned, we could... more -
Military lays out $4.4 M to supersize network monitoring technology
Bigger, better, faster, more are the driving themes behind the advanced network monitoring technology BBN Technologies is building for the military.
The high-tech firm got a $.4.4 million contract today from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop novel, scalable attack detection algorithms; a flexible and expandable architecture for implementing and deploying the algorithms; and an execution environment for traffic inspection and algorithm execution.
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"April the 4th, 1984. To the past, or to the future. To an age when thought is free. From the Age of Big Brother, from the Age of the Thought Police, from a dead man... greetings. " Winston Smith, 1984 Bigger, better, faster, more are the driving themes behind the advanced network monitoring technology BBN Technologies is building for... more -
Darpa Aims to Snuff Flames with Electricity, Sound
Darpa, the Pentagon's far-out research arm, typically works on morphing airplanes, thinking robots, and "kill-proof" soldiers. Now, the agency wants to help build a better fire extinguisher -- by using electromagnetic fields or sonic waves, naturally.
Darpa announced today its new research program into "Instant Fire Suppression." "Fire, especially in enclosed military environments such as ship holds, aircraft cockpits, and ground vehicles, continues to be a major cause of material destruction and loss of warfighter life," the agency notes. And "despite extensive research in this area, there have been no new methods for extinguishing and/or manipulating fire in almost 50 years."
Typically, we've relied on chemicals like halons, to choke out flames. But halons are on the way out, because "their depletion of the Earth's ozone layer." And all of the "halon replacements are inferior in performance and are typically toxic and/or ozone-depleting."
So Darpa is proposing "a radically new approach to both fire manipulation and suppression" -- one centered around the realization that flames are, in many ways, electrical. Darpa, the Pentagon's far-out research arm, typically works on morphing airplanes, thinking robots, and "kill-proof" so... more -
From the people who brought you the internet, DARPA presents: CY-BUGS!
Insect cyborg spies or HI-MEMS (Hybrid Insect Micro-Electro-Mechanical System) are the latest rage at the Pentagon
[..]
Vice President Dick Cheney is so favored by the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency -- DARPA -- that they invited him to blow out the candles at their 50th anniversary bash.
"This agency brought forth the Saturn 5 rocket, surveillance satellites, the Internet, stealth technology, guided munitions, unmanned aerial vehicles, night vision and the body armor that's in use today," Cheney claimed. "Thank heaven for DARPA."
The secretive Pentagon outfit, a research arm which develops new military technologies, refused to allow a scientist to be interviewed for an article Sunday about on a program that has received scant attention by the press: small insect cyborgs that may mark the next generation in military surveillance.
[..] Insect cyborg spies or HI-MEMS (Hybrid Insect Micro-Electro-Mechanical System) are the latest rage at the Pentagon [..] ... more -
Latest BigDog video makes us all sad for slipping robots
This video showing off the latest iteration of Boston Dynamics BigDog quadruped robot. The robot is being design to help solders carry heavy loads into battle. Skip ahead to about 0:35 to see it recover from a pretty might kick to the midsection and 1:40 to see it recover from a slip on icy asphalt.
It's pretty impressive feature of engineering to say the least but I couldn't help but wonder, wouldn't it be easier to just use a real pack animal? This video showing off the latest iteration of Boston Dynamics BigDog quadruped robot. The robot is being design to help solders carry... more -
Runaway Robot
It's just the start of the Defense Department's $3.5 million Urban Challenge street rally for unmanned cars and already the autobots are crashing into walls and driving off on their own.
Autobots...TRANSFORM!...and suck at driving It's just the start of the Defense Department's $3.5 million Urban Challenge street rally for unmanned cars and already the ... more
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