If your car could talk, it might tell you to stop texting. At least that’s what one research team hopes: after paying young drivers to perform texting-like games while driving a simulator, they found that visual warnings from an in-car “coach” helped keep drivers’ eyes on the road.
For high-risk drivers, the warning system “more than doubled their time until a virtual crash,” a University of Washington press release says. That might not sound entirely reassuring. But the researchers say a similar system installed on a real car might help risky drivers avoid a crash altogether.
A team led by Linda Ng Boyle, an industrial and systems engineer at the University of Washington, first had a group of 53 drivers, ages 18 to 21, attempt to drive a simulator while simultaneously playing a matching game. As an incentive to take the game seriously, they paid drivers according to the correct number of matches they made. The riskiest drivers took their eyes off the road for between two and a half to three seconds, compared to moderate and low-risk drivers who would glance off the road for less than two seconds during their longest glances.
We’ve asked augmented reality to help us drive, overcome our phobias, and put names to faces. Now we want cookies. Researchers at the University of Tokyo in Japan have devised a headset that can replace the appearance and smell of a plain cookie with tastier varieties including chocolate, almond, orange, maple, lemon, and cheese.
The group, led by Takuji Narumi, presented its research at the SIGGRAPH conference on computer graphics at the end of last month. “Augmented gustation” is a challenge, the team says, because taste relies on so many of our other senses. We see the embedded chocolate chips. We smell the straight-out-of-the-oven scent.
The “meta cookie” project attempts to use our multiple cookie senses to create a virtual cookie variety pack. Users choose their preferred cookie, and a camera on the headset overlays an image on a plain sugar cookie and sprays the correct associated scent, be it maple or cheese. The closer the cookie gets to the user’s mouth, the more of the scent the headset cranks out. Though the test subject in the video above appears satisfied, TechNewsDailyreports that the trick did not fool everyone. One cookie remained “mostly neutral” tasting though the headset tried to conjure maple and chocolate flavors.
Perhaps researchers will next attempt to copy the cookie’s feel? Texture seems to matter: ask anyone who’s entered the crunchy versus chewy fray.
Tired of the faceless urbanites crowding their Google Street Views, computer scientists aimed to remove the pedestrians entirely. The images above show they succeeded, mostly.
The software was developed by Arturo Flores of the University of California, San Diego; earlier this summer he unveiled (pdf) the proof-of-concept. It’s built off of a previous algorithm developed in 2005 that can pick out pedestrians in urban settings. The new program removes the identified pedestrian and covers the gap using pixels from slightly ahead and slightly behind what appears to be someone walking down the street. But it only works in cities (where tall buildings give a relatively flat backdrop), can create a human smear when the photographed person walked at the same speed as the Google camera, and, one could imagine, has trouble in huge crowds–where neighboring pixel-swapping might result in blurry Frankenhumans.
But otherwise, it leaves a non-distracting, relatively “ghost free” image, a university press release says, that will further protect pedestrian privacy. When it almost succeeds, it gives users a good laugh: a post-apocalyptic cityscape including disembodied feet, ownerless dogs, and floating umbrellas.
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station have been tweeting from space for six months now, making that Twitter phenomenon officially old and busted. So what’s the new hotness? Tweets from an ISS-bound robot astronaut.
Robonaut 2 is currently cooling its heels at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, awaiting its scheduled trip to the International Space Station on November 1st. Once on board the ISS, the two-armed humanoid bot will help out astronauts with their duties; it expects to be particularly useful on tasks that are “too dangerous or boring for astronauts.” But it will also find time to tweet.
Already, Robonaut 2 has addressed some pressing questions via Twitter with answers like these:
“Robots are non-gender by design. I’m an it.”
“No, no relation to Hal. Don’t know if I’d want to admit to having him on my family tree if I was. Def. don’t condone his actions”
Fans can get much more information from the first robot astronaut during its “twitterview” tomorrow. Send a question marked #4R2 and Robonaut will begin answering them at 10 am CST.
Although money may not grow on trees, it can spew from an ATM–at least if you’re computer security expert Barnaby Jack. He demonstrated recently at a security conference in Las Vegas how to get an ATM to spit money for minutes on end. Jack purchased the ATMs online, and says the tools required to hack them cost less than $100, according to Technology Review:
“After studying four different companies’ models, he said, “every ATM I’ve looked at, I’ve found a ‘game over’ vulnerability that allowed me to get cash from the machine.” He’s even identified an Internet-based attack that requires no physical access.”
Scientists are eyeing the future of solar technology–specifically, fly eyes. Turns out those bubbly-looking spectators might be just the ticket to more-efficient solar cells, researchers from Penn State University say.
Blowflies have peepers that would help solar panels collect light more efficiently, and creating these fly-eye molds was a feat in itself, according to Discovery News. After plucking the corneas from blowflies,
Sure, public transportation is cheaper, better for the environment, and conducive to livable cities. But today we’ll celebrate another of its fabulous features: It can be visually awesome. Case in point: A visualization of the movement of the San Francisco Municipal Railway, also known as Muni. The video is based on June 2010 data harvested from Nextbus, which uses GPS and software to predict and follow vehicles such as shuttles and buses.
Researchers at Antarctica’s McMurdo Station may face annual average temperatures of minus .4 degrees Fahrenheit and drifting snow of depths around five feet–but at least they have easy access to cash. Since around 1998, Antarctica has had an operating ATM.
The blog NeedCoffeeDotCom interviewed a Wells Fargo representative about the challenges of keeping an Antarctic ATM working. According to a vice president in the ATM banking division, David Parker, there are actually two of the machines in the remote McMurdo Station, but one serves exclusively as a back-up that can be “cannibalized” for parts in case the other fails. The machine recycles the station’s limited cash supply, since–beyond chucking dollar bills at penguins–there aren’t many things to do with cash outside the snug walls of McMurdo.
Add one more job to the list–along with vacuuming floors and assisting in surgeries, now robots can try on clothes for you. The company Fits.me is developing a robotic torso for online shoppers that can morph to match shoppers’ body dimensions, creating virtual fitting rooms on clothing websites.
Men can try a demo version of the product on the company’s site. After entering measurements such as neck and waste size, and selecting from three torso types, the site displays what you might look like in a particular shirt. The torso doesn’t morph in real time; instead, the site pulls from a database of pictures–2,000 body size combinations, the company reports, systematically showing users if pinstripes in small, medium, or large will make them look fat. Shirt sellers Hawes and Curtis is already testing a version of the system on their site.
As reported by the BBC, the company next hopes to develop a version of the torso for women. Maarja Kruusma a professor of biorobotics at the University of Tallinn who helped the company develop the system, told the BBC that it’s a difficult task. Women’s clothing comes in more intricate styles, and their torsos are more complicated to model, she says:
“You can’t just take a male mannequin and put breasts on it. That doesn’t work.”
Notice anything weird in this picture from a BP website of Gulf relief photos? We’ll give you a hint: Look at the the upper left. That’s right; there’s a control tower in the window of a flying helicopter.
As directed by the blog Gizmodo, take a closer look at the high-res version. A screen on the cockpit clearly indicates “Check Status / door open / parking brake / ramp open.” Meanwhile, the photo’s caption on the BP site reads: “View of the MC 252 site from the cockpit of a PHI S-92 helicopter 26 June 2010.” If not this relief helicopter, something sure is up.
Discoblog is DISCOVER's compendium of quirky, funny, and surprising science news from the edge of the known universe. It's written by Veronique Greenwood and Valerie Ross. Email tips and suggestions to vgreenwood [at] discovermagazine [dot] com.
If your car could talk, it might tell you to stop texting. At least that’s what one research team hopes: after paying young drivers to perform texting-like games while driving a simulator, they found that visual warnings from an in-car “coach” helped keep drivers’ eyes on the road.
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station have been 
Although money may not grow on trees, it can spew from an ATM–at least if you’re computer security expert Barnaby Jack. He demonstrated recently at a security conference in Las Vegas how to get an ATM to spit money for minutes on end. Jack purchased the ATMs online, and says the tools required to hack them cost less than $100, according to 
Scientists are eyeing the future of solar technology–specifically, fly eyes. Turns out those bubbly-looking spectators might be just the ticket to more-efficient solar cells, researchers from Penn State University say.
