Norwegian engineer Kåre Halvorsen built this robot sphere in his spare time, with six retractable, expanding legs that let it dance when it’s not rolling.
The main goal of this project was to make a hexapod robot that could transform into a sphere shape and back. In “sphere mode” the robot should be able to roll freely like a ball.
Amazing, the theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking turns 70 this weekend (Sunday 8th January), famous for writing the bestseller A Brief History of Time and numerous other books, including his latest The Grand Design. Below are a couple of short videos, one about M-theory and why such a theory would make God Unnecessary, and the second is 10 intriguing questions from Time. More great links: Stephen Hawking at 70: Fellow scientists pay tribute As [...]
China has hinted at manned missions to the moon in the past, but has now confirmed it wants to send an astronaut there – but there’s no planned time-line, but it is unlikely to happen before 2020 China has declared its intention to land an astronaut on the moon, in the first official confirmation of its aim to go where Americans last set foot nearly 40 years ago. While Chinese scientists have previously discussed the [...]
The island – essentially lava that cooled after breaking through the water’s surface – began forming this month (December 2011) between Yemen and Eritrea among the Zubair archipelago, a group of small islands that come from a submarine shield volcano.
The giant Gamburtsev Mountain Range discovered in the 1950s below the Antarctic ice, is now believed to have been formed over a billion year ago!
Scientists say they can now explain the existence of what are perhaps Earth’s most extraordinary mountains – the Gamburtsevs are the size of the European Alps and yet they are totally buried beneath the Antarctic ice.
Interesting video of what looks like a meteorite, filmed over the ancient city of Cusco, Peru.
Residents were surprised to see the object shooting across the horizon around 2 pm. (local time) on Thursday 25th August 2011.
Two 400-million-year-old fossil plants are the oldest known examples of wood. They are small herbs, suggesting that wood did not evolve to help plants grow tall.
Nasa’s Solar Dynamics Observatory has captured a massive eruption on the Sun. The event took place early Tuesday morning (7th June 2011) and sparked all sorts of fears from the end of the world to concerns the solar flare may cause disruption to communication systems around the globe, although the angle of the eruption probably means effects on Earth will probably be small.
Amazing, China plans to build a rival to the International Space Station, and aims to have it in orbit by 2020. I say amazing, as it’s less than 10 years ago that China put a human in space.
You have to wonder which country will be the first to walk on the surface of Mars?
Love the way the press pick up on the strangest of things — almost every story about Iran’s alleged ‘successful’ launch of a rocket into space mention the word ‘Monkey’!
The Kavoshgar-4 rocket, designed to carry a monkey, was launched on March 15, the country’s official IRNA news agency reported.
