science

Harvesting Humidity: Frozone Might Say That's Cool

What does this video have to do with anything you wonder? 

A designer based in Austria, Kristof Retezár, has invented a device to extract humidity from the air that, in turn, creates water that is drinkable. The Fontus is a device that can attach to your bike, typically where you would normally put a water bottle, and it will generate water while you are riding. This device can be hugely helpful to cyclists that do long distance rides that there are very few places to stop for more water. Not only that, can you imagine the implications of such a device in arid communities? 

The device is solar-powered and has a condensator that functions like a cooler and is connected to hydrophobic surfaces that repel water. Simply put, the device works similar to what happens to a can of soda when you take it out of the fridge into a warmer climate. It takes in air, the surfaces get cold, and you get condensation which is collected. 

It can produce about .5 liters of water an hour if conditions are optimal. The other downside to the device is that there is not currently a filter for harmful contaminants that could be hiding in the air, so if the area is heavily polluted, you could be drinking smog. 

Retezár hopes that further development of the Fontus will help to fight the water crisis. The Austrian government has stepped in to help fund the technical development phase and he plans to use crowdfunding in March to mass produce it. He is hoping to have this device on the market in nine to ten months. 

Source

Livescience.com

Robot Overlords

A team of researchers built computer algorithms to mimic infant research studies and then tested them on robots to see if they could learn in a similar fashion. 

Similar to the way children learn, they taught robots to move their heads by mimicking a human moving its head. These are very basic operations but the long term research could have a major impact on AI technology. 

Full articles available

http://www.popsci.com/robots-could-learn-same-way-babies-do

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0141965