from Engadget

For everything from family to computers…
from Engadget
NASA can’t just park up in the middle of space and rely on Robotnaut 2 for its entertainment. Actually, it probably can, but at some point the urge to explore new worlds will become too strong to resist. That’s when it’ll need a suborbital rocket guidance system like the GENIE (“Guidance Embedded Navigator Integration Environment”), which transforms a flood of sensory data into reliable and autonomous maneuvers. Fortunately, the system’s economics make a whole lot more sense than its name, which is why NASA is depending on technology like this to control the next generation of affordable and reusable space craft. The test flight shown after the break can only boost GENIE’s chances: it took a Xombie rocket up to 160 feet and then made it fly laterally for another 160 feet before landing with a degree of swagger that makes the previous flightin 2010 look plain rickety.
Continue reading GENIE rocket system does smooth VTOL, lateral flight, cheap trips to Mars (video)
from Engadget
We’ve all been there, completely immersed in a long involved phone call and you hear the dreaded battery-beep. “Are you getting another call?†asks the person on the other end. “No, my battery is going dead.†and then you look around frantically, hoping that by some stretch of luck an electrical outlet will magically appear… and more often than not, it never does. You inform the other party that you are going to lose them, defeated, and ashamed.
Well here is a concept that I really hope comes to pass, The Continuance Battery — designed by Haimo Bao, Hailong Piao, Yuancheng Liu and Xiameng Hu, this rather ordinary looking AA battery isn’t so ordinary after all. Not only is it an earth friendly rechargeable battery that can traditionally power any AA hungry device, but it is charged via USB AND has the ability to add some emergency power to any device that can be charged via USB as well!
“Can you hear me now?†Anyway, it’s only a concept at the moment, but it seems like one of those ideas that could change lots of things, and it would certainly be easy to rotate out a spare Continuance battery in my glove compartment or purse and always have an extra bit of juice when I need it. I don’t know how many times I’ve been searching for a free outlet in a restaurant or movie theater. I don’t often venture into the wilderness, but I guess it would be handy there too!
There has been some discussion about higher discharge rates and lower capacity due to the extra circutry, Blah blah blah, I’m not sure I understand most of it, my electronics knowledge barely extends past a rousing game of “Operation†but I sure hope these guys can figure it out, because I need a few dozen.
from Coolest Gadgets
If you live under a rock, then you may not have heard of the latest news sensation, Jeremy Lin, the starter guard for the NY Knicks. I have been just amazed at his gameplay and the respect for him only grew as I learned of his faith in God and his journey. Read and be encouraged… God does bless those who are faithful…
I am a basketball fan now and I had never really watched any sports!!
It’s about time we started prosecuting these money-hungry corporations (I mean “people”, NOT!) to do better practices!
==================================================
Citigroup will pay $158 million to settle charges that its mortgage unit defrauded the Federal Housing Administration by inaccurately claiming that certain mortgages were eligible for government insurance, government officials announced Wednesday.
This little chameleon is one of four miniature lizards identified in Madagascar, adding to our growing list of amazingly teeny animals. The one on the match in this picture is a juvenile, but even the adults max out at 30 millimeters. They’re the smallest lizards in the world, and some of the smallest vertebrates found to date.
The Lilliputian lizard is near the lower limits of size in vertebrate animals. Learning about how these creatures live can put some constraints on animal morphology – if your species has eyes, a backbone and a brain, there’s likely a limit to how little you can get. A different group of field biologists just announced the world’s smallest frog, and they claim it is the smallest vertebrate in the world, knocking a tiny Indonesian fish off the pedestal of puniness.
The chameleons are related to other Madagascan lizards, but DNA analysis showed they have enough genetic differences to count as distinct species, according to the researchers who found them, led by Frank Glaw of the Zoological State Collection of Munich. The animals live in leafy undergrowth in Madagascan forests.
Tiny and camouflaged – how did they find these guys? Most of the lizards were collected at night, when they typically climb up into the underbrush to roost. The field biologists used torches and headlamps to spot the sleeping lizards, according to their paper.
The paper appears in the open-access journal PLoS One.
from Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now