F1 DOCTORS: Formula 1 cars include all kinds of sensors and send all kinds of data back to a team of engineers who make adjustments either during or after a race to improve the car's performance. Meanwhile hospitals rely on paper charts and four-hourly observations on patients needing health care. Now the Birmingham Children's Hospital is testing an adaptive system originally designed for Formula 1 cars to monitor patients. One key factor is that the system learns what's normal for each patient. Sensors and monitors collect continuous data on heart rate, respiration, oxygen levels and blood pressure to allow doctors to make better decisions. The hospital can only afford to test the system with a few patients and must regularly delete data. It's sad when health care has to struggle to catch up with car racing. BBC details.
NICKEL JUMPERS: Robots have been able to walk on water, but a robot from China's Harbin Institute of Technology can jump on water too. The secret lies in superhydrophobic nickel feet that prevent the legs from sinking because pockets of air form around them. Two spring-loaded jumping legs send the robot around 15 cm into the air and a distance of around 30 cm. Those superhydrophobic substances sound like lots of fun. Wired has more.
SPINNING FOILS: The Bay of Fundy lies between Maine and Canada and experiences huge tides. The Ocean Renewable Power Company plans to tap into those tides with a commercial TidGen Tidal Energy Power System that will produce up to 3 megawatts. A frame is set on the ocean floor and supports rotating foils that move with the tide to power a central permanent magnet generator. Invisible, yet effective. Ocean Renewable Power Company explains. Check out the video.
REDUCE REUSE REORBIT: There are a bunch of dead satellites still orbiting the planet, but DARPA's Phoenix Program aims to recycle their parts and use them in new free-flying space systems. The plan is to send worker satellites up to harvest still functional items such as antennas and solar arrays and then to bring them to a factory satellite that can robotically operate on and build a new satellite while in orbit. The grappling arms and other instruments will be remotely operated from Earth. Let's hope satellite makers start building them with reuse in mind. io9 has the info. Video here.
PAINT PEEL: What say your military vehicles end up in the middle of chemical warfare, perhaps with nerve gas being lobbed around? How do you decontaminate the vehicles effectively? A new paint from The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory has been created to handle that. The paint's undercoat is made of a polymer that acts like a weak glue, while the topcoat is a super-absorbent silica gel that can stop nerve gas from getting inside a vehicle. The weak glue of the base allows a contaminated topcoat to be easily peeled off and disposed of. Researchers plan to also develop paints that change colour to warn of a chemical attack, and coats that can actually neutralise noxious chemicals. So now I guess someone's developing a nerve gas that contains a paint stripper additive too. The Engineer elaborates.
