Category Archives: Unusual

A Broken Bone? 3-D Print Your Cast!

Posted on October 8, 2013 by Hellmuth Broda

Recently there had been some bad vibes around 3-D printers due to all the reports that you can now download files to print your own (working) guns. But this new development is rather fascinating: As the Daily Mail in its … Continue reading →

Posted in e-Health, New and Noteworthy, Unusual | Tagged , , , , | 2 Comments

Gravity-Powered LED Lamp Revolutionizes Self-Sufficient Lighting

Posted on December 14, 2012 by Hellmuth Broda

This is a very interesting new development. Since the arrival of affordable LEDs and their increasingly better efficiency and light quality new mechanisms can be used to power these new lights in any dwelling. British designers Martin Riddiford and Jim … Continue reading →

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Cloud Singing: The Virtual Choir Project

Posted on May 17, 2012 by Hellmuth Broda

I am reposting this from Simon Phipps‘ blog “Wild Webmink.” He writes in his blog: “Eric Whitacre launched Virtual Choir 3, the composite performance of his choral work “Water Night”, to promote his new album of the same name. Once again, it’s transcendently beautiful.” (Virtual … Continue reading →

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Invisible Mercedes Brings James Bond Technology To Life

Posted on March 22, 2012 by Hellmuth Broda

Usually I don’t promote companies or products. But this is too good to let pass. RT from TechCast.org: From the Yahoo Auto Blog (By Justin Hyde | Motoramic): In a promotion for its first production fuel-cell vehicle in Germany, Mercedes-Benz turned a … Continue reading →

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A Strong Personal Vote For The Cloud

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Hellmuth Broda

On Friday, January 13, 2012 at 13:00 (yes, really!) I closed the cover of my MacBook Pro. This was when I had seen the computer alive for the last time. When I re-opened the flap nothing happened. Going through all … Continue reading →

Posted in Cloud Computing, Internet, On blogging, Unusual | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Teenager + Fibonacci = New Hope For Solar Energy

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Hellmuth Broda

Welcome to my first blog of 2012. I would like to start the New Year with some hope. Hope that we experience when we look at the young generation (no—not that one, even younger): A report in yesterday’s Wall Street … Continue reading →

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Plastic Bottles Lighten Up the Slums

Posted on December 13, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

As recently reported in our local newspaper in Basel (Plastikflaschen für den Klimaschutz – News Wissen: Technik – bazonline.ch) philanthropist Illac Diaz from the Philippines is using simple low-tech discarded plastic bottles filled with water to bring light into the … Continue reading →

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Telekinetics? Bed-Bound Patients Move Robots Using Just Thoughts

Posted on December 5, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

“They’re not quite psychic yet, but machines are getting better at reading your mind. Researchers have invented a new, noninvasive method for recording patterns of brain activity and using them to steer a robot. Scientists hope the technology will give … Continue reading →

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Liquid Robotics’ Wave Gliders Begin Historic Swim Across Pacific

Posted on December 2, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

A few days ago, “four Wave Gliders—self propelled robots, each about the size of a dolphin—left San Francisco for a journey that combined will total 60,000 kilometers. Built by Liquid Robotics, the robots will travel together to Hawaii, then split into … Continue reading →

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Slow Food for the Mind

Posted on November 20, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

For many years our focus has been on making things faster and faster. Computer chips are doubling their speed about every 18 months (Moore’s Law). But in our faster and faster spinning world we rarely focus on really long-lasting or long-term … Continue reading →

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Fraunhofer Sends Spiders to the Rescue

Posted on November 14, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Silicon.de recently reported on a new robot for hazardous missions: The high-tech spider developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation IPA in Stuttgart (Germany). The spider is built using a 3-D printing technique and is extremely lightweight. … Continue reading →

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QR Codes (Updated): From Urinals And Bus Stops to National Parks to Art, Shopping and Tombstones

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

We can observe more and more adoption of QR codes and their pervasiveness. In Asia you find these codes anywhere in the meantime and they allow quick responses usually by use of a smart phone’s QR reader. I have seen them … Continue reading →

Posted in Identity Management, New and Noteworthy, Social Media, Unusual, Web | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Daddy, Is this iPad Broken? (Baby Handling a Magazine)

Posted on October 17, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Recently I discussed Digital Recluses, Digital Immigrants and Digital Natives (see picture below) in a blog. But what is shown in this video makes a new category necessary. Maybe “Digital Thoroughbreds?”

Posted in New and Noteworthy, Social Media, Unusual | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Robot Birds and Octoroaches On The Loose at UC Berkeley

Posted on October 13, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

As mentioned in an earlier blog (Quadrotors Can Now Play Catch, All-Robot Baseball Team Closer to Reality) I have a weakness for flying robots and having studied insects for a considerable time during my research years I find the objects mentioned … Continue reading →

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Ultrasound Can Read Your Mind

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

“Ultrasound is good for more than monitoring fetuses and identifying heart defects. According to engineers in Canada, it can help tell what people are thinking as well. “Their research suggests that ultrasound-based devices could lead to a new kind of brain-computer interface.” … Continue reading →

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The Social Media Velocipede | Spiegel Online

Posted on August 31, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Usually I don’t write about products. But today I’ll make an exception: In today’s Spiegel Online was an article on an interesting US-Swiss Cooperation. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) worked with the Swiss company MTB Cycletech. The result of … Continue reading →

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Robot Swarm Could Steal Your Books

Posted on August 24, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Swarmanoid Robot Teams Up with Itself to Steal Your Books – IEEE Spectrum. “The Swarmanoid swarm consists of three discrete types of robots, all of which we’ve been introduced to before: Foot-Bots can grab onto other robots and move horizontally. Hand-Bots have manipulators and … Continue reading →

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Jonathan Livingston Seagull the Robot

Posted on August 9, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Festo‘s SmartBird robotic seagull is barely four months old, but already it’s flown (or we should probably assume, been flown) from Germany to Edinburgh for the 2011 TEDGlobal conference. Festo has a fairly fascinating, frankly fantastical, and frequently full-on fabulous … Continue reading →

Posted in New and Noteworthy, Unusual | 1 Comment

A 508 Year Old Painting Brought To Life

Posted on July 13, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

Art and Technology combined can lead to beautiful results. Here an installation by Mat Collishaw where he animates the 1503 painting of Albrecht Dürer, “Das große Rasenstück” (Great Piece of Turf) in a LCD/PC installation called “Whispering Weeds” and brings … Continue reading →

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Puzzle: Warped Turboprop Propeller Blades

Posted on July 11, 2011 by Hellmuth Broda

I recently took these two picture from the window of a Dash-10 Turboprop. Camera: HTC Desire HD. I can assure that the blades looked normal to the naked eye. Any explanation on the observed warping of the propeller blades in the pictures? Puzzle solved: … Continue reading →

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