This summer the University of Cambridge will begin field testing self-healing concrete
that’s fueled by bacteria.
And NASA would like to explore Jupiter’s moon Europa with a robotic space squid.
Vsauce!
Kevin here - this is Mind Blow.
The worldwide leader in beauty products has partnered with a company that prints human
skin.
L’Oreal announced the partnership with Organovo - who specialize in growing skin tissue in
a 3D environment.
Growing with 3D bioprinting allows for the automated creation of living human tissues
that have the form and function of body tissues and this process allows for faster and more
accurate testing of pharmaceutical products.
The partnership could someday bring medical advances including 3D printed skin grafts.
Vortex Bladeless can harvest wind energy without any blades.
The bladeless cones produce energy by harnessing an aerodynamic effect known as vorticity,
which causes the cones to produce a pattern of spinning vortices.
The energy is harvested with a ring of magnets and an alternator at the base, and if this
model is successful it could be a cheaper and quieter alternative to traditional wind
turbines.
These are the first ever images of Pluto’s smallest moons, captured with the New Horizons
Spacecraft.
Pretty moons.
Whill is a personal mobility device that hopes to replace traditional wheelchairs.
A wheel composed of 24 small rollers was invented for this device to allow for making small
turns.
It also has four wheel drive, allowing it to drive over grass, pebbles, snow, and even
clear a curb.
You can test drive one yourself if you live in Japan or California, and they’re currently
looking for distributers to sell it worldwide.
Researchers in London are 3D printing medication into different shapes.
They wanted to see if a pill’s shape affected the release of the drugs, and it turns out
that a pyramid dissolves a lot faster than a cylinder due to the surface area to volume
ratio.
This could lead to greater precision and customization when prescribing medication and also it just
kinda looks cool.
The freight liner inspiration is the first autonomous commercial truck to operate in
the United States.
It utilizes radar and a system of cameras to scan a range of 820 ft.
The trucks are safe, more fuel efficient and have greatly reduced blind spots, which is
good because they still require a driver and currently they have two of these concept trucks
built.
Adrian Smith and Fredrick Larabee have discovered that some ants use their jaws to fling themselves
to safety.
Trap Jaw ants use their stingers and their incredibly quick jaws to catch prey, but it
turns out they also use their jaws to escape from predators.
Yahoo!
Scientists have found a missing link that bridges the gap between the evolution of single-celled
organisms called prokaryotes, to the more complex ones called Eukaryotes.
By extracting DNA from the sediment around a hydrothermal vent the team from Sweden found
microbes that had complex genes typically found in higher lifeforms, allowing us to
further track the evolution of complex lifeforms like you and me.
The Hovding is an airbag for bicyclists that you wear around your neck.
But you knew that if you saw Mind Blow #69, at that point it was just a student thesis,
but the device is now available for purchase.
Hovding, Mind Blow complete.
Now go save some lives, kiddo.
NailO is a bluetooth trackpad that you wear on your nail.
Developed at MIT, it can fit on your thumb and be used to access your computer while
your hands are full or discreetly control other wearable technology.
The team hopes to make the device even smaller, and integrate different sticker designs.
Finally, the Taurus Dexterous Telepresence Manipulation System is designed to revolutionize
the way humans operate remote controlled precision focused robots.
These devices precisely track your hand movements giving you full control of the robotic arms.
The entry-level solution provides hand-tracking and control over the robotic grasper.
For our customers looking for haptic capability we have input devices offering full haptic
feedback.
Meaning you're actually going to feel the forces between the robot and its environment.
I’m going to leave you with bionic butterflies, and as always, thanks for watching.