Klingon Style ~ K-Pop Takes Galactic Meaning;-)

K-Pop goes intergalactic with Klingon Style;-)

Form 1 ~ MIT Alumco's Stereolith 3DP Launches!

MIT alumco Formlabs Kickstarts their 3D printer Form 1!

Lovely Rio ~ Spotlights on Brazil's Blessed City!

Nice to see the latest National Geographic piece on Brazil's Rio de Janeiro by Antonio Regalado with photos by David Alan Harvey...

And here's an earlier lovely photo by Ignazio Sciacca...

Here's related video nugget about Rio's Operations Center... Finally, another promo piece on Rio from IBM...

Moments of Science ~ Latest IgNobel Interludes!

My esteemed Harvard colleague Daniel Rosenberg (of InDemoVeritas fame) and I performed two Moments of Science at the latest IgNobels. Fast-forward to 1:11:00 and to 2:01:25 to see the goodness! Here's Daniel and me plugging in for Moment #1 -- Balancing Vibes!

And here's snapshot of me starting Moment #2 -- The Doppler!

Rafael Reif ~ MIT's 17th President Inaugurated!

The past several days have seen series of events and parties all peaking on Friday afternoon with the formal inauguration of MIT's 17th President Rafael Reif! Harvard's Drew Faust represented all the visiting academic delegates and gave a surprise gift photo of John Harvard's statue "hacked" for MIT;-)

Global Trendscape ~ Gapminder 2012 Worldview!

Mythbusting statistician Hans Rosling and Gapminder colleagues share their latest visualizations of global data! First, their interactive multi-century perspective on development and convergence...

And second, their Gapminder World Map 2012...

Sperm Cam ~ Imaging Elusive Spiral Swimmers!

Nature's Helen Shen spotlights that Light-Sensing Chip Captures Elusive Sperm Swimming Pattern...

"A new three-dimensional imaging technique has revealed spiraling movements that had previously only been inferred from two-dimensional data. [This is the] first large-scale, high-resolution recordings of human sperm in three dimensions, tracking more than 1,500 cells over several hours. Human sperm have eluded such detailed observation in the past. Their heads are just 3–4 micrometers long and can only be seen under high magnification, but the cells zoom around at up to 100 micrometers per second, ducking in and out of focus or darting out of range in an instant."

Hmm, camera shy or eggs-tremely focused?-)

Baxter ~ Rethink Robotics Unveils Handy Helper...

Rod Brooks's Rethink Robotics reveals Baxter...

"...a revolutionary new category of Robot [...] capable of applying common sense behavior to manufacturing environments. Affordably priced, versatile and safe enough to work shoulder-to-shoulder with people, Baxter robots redefine how small, mid-size and large domestic manufacturers use automation to compete with manufacturers in low-cost regions of the world."

Fire Whirl ~ Curtin Springs, Australia Tornado++

DailyMail spots Aussie Fire Whirl!

Welcome to the Anthropocene ~ Human Planet...

Thanks to Dot Earthling Andrew Revkin for his piece in NYTimes on The ‘Anthropocene’ as Environmental Meme and/or Geological Epoch spotlighting this Planet Under Pressure environmental meme promo...

100 ~ Dutch Baby to Centarian Speak Their Ages!

24oranges spots this delighter!

Bus+Train ~ JR's Dual-Mode Road+Rail Vehicle...

Alexander Lew in Wired Autopia says It’s a Bus. It’s a Train. It’s Both!

Tethys & Rings ~ NASA's Cassini Spots Saturn!

See Saturn's Bright Tethys and Ancient Rings via NASA's APOD!

Snollygosters ~ Forsyth @ TED on Political Speak

Thanks to John Mills for spotting Mark Forsyth answering What’s a snollygoster? A short lesson in political speak @ TEDxHousesofParliament...

Food Waste ~ Stuart @ TED on Global Scandal...

Tristram Stuart at TED on The global food waste scandal...

Land Rush ~ International Aquisitions in Africa...

Map Porn spots The 21st Century African Land Rush...

Political Heatmap ~ US Red-vs-Blue 1920-2008!

Timothy Hurst spots Animated Time-Lapse Map of Red-Blue America 1920-2008 at Ecopolitology...

Acoustic Levitation ~ Argonne's Sonic H2O Trap!

Neatorama spots Argonne work on Acoustic Levitation which...

"...uses two small speakers to generate sound waves at frequencies slightly above the audible range – roughly 22 kilohertz. When the top and bottom speakers are precisely aligned, they create two sets of sound waves that perfectly interfere with each other, setting up a phenomenon known as a standing wave. At certain points along a standing wave, known as nodes, there is no net transfer of energy at all. Because the acoustic pressure from the sound waves is sufficient to cancel the effect of gravity, light objects are able to levitate when placed at the nodes."

Quapter Formations ~ Flying UAV Art in Linz...

Thanks to Miss Cellania for spotting formation-flying quadrocopters...

Hula Cam ~ Imaging Delights from Burning Man!

Nice photonic joy via the Hula Cam at Burning Man!

Future Cities ~ MIT's Kent Larson @ TEDxBoston

MIT Media Lab colleague Kent Larson speaking on Future Cities and urban innovations at TEDxBoston...

What is Beautiful? ~ Lizzie Velasquez Speaks...

CNN's Dr Drew asks Lizzie Velasquez What is Beautiful? It's certainly beyond the superficial and skin-deep. Powerful example of beauty in-depth and why I loathe bullying...

Landesa's Dots ~ Girls' Education and Land Rights

Impatient Optimist Tim Hanstad notes Back to School? Not for Poor, Rural Girls in India...

"...far too many primary school aged children -- an estimated 67 million worldwide -- will never enroll in school. These children are generally the poorest of poor, for whom even a "free" education comes at too steep a price. For these families, sending children to school often means fewer hands laboring to support the family. [...] it is the poor, rural girls who most often stay out of school. Take a look at this new video that shines a spotlight on the role land ownership can play in getting these vulnerable groups into the classroom..."

Screening Day ~ Mercy Ships in Guinea-Conakry!

Excellent to read Murray Tristan Crawford's recent post about the Mercy Ships medical aid organization's Screening Day in their new service location, Conakry port in Guinea, West Africa. He writes...

"This important event is when we look for potential patients for our surgical slots throughout the next ten months. Screening day is advertised through radio, partner NGOs, churches, and other media. It usually attracts many people, numbering in the thousands. [...] My role on Monday was primarily crowd management, and we encountered much desperation as people tried to crowd their way to the front of the queue -- especially outside the gate on the road. But despite having to tell people to move or to stop pushing, I was struck that all of this apparent desperation is fueled by genuine need and poverty -- and also a very real hope. A hope that finally they will find acceptance and love and lasting healing. I saw many people with facial tumours, cleft lips, burn contractures, the flesh-eating disease Noma, and many others. I saw not only desperation, but also the hope in their faces. And it made my heart swell, for this is why we are here."

Epic!

Rimac Concept One ~ Croatian Electric Supercar

Nice wheels! CNN spots Rimac Concept One...

CineMoco ~ Camera Motor Controls by Cinetics!

Our MIT Imaging Ventures alumco Cinetics has done it again! Founder Justin Jensen and colleagues are Kickstarting CineMoco...

"...a compact motor controlled dolly and slider for video and timelapse photography. [...] The modular system delivers camera moves ranging from dolly shots to motor controlled timelapse, and you can carry it on your back."

Check it out and back them!

Participatory Chinatown ~ Gaming-as-Planning!

Thanks to new MIT Media Lab student Erhardt Graeff for pointing me to Emerson Professor Eric Gordon and colleagues and their work on Participatory Chinatown...

"...a 3-D immersive game designed to be part of the master planning process for Boston's Chinatown. [...] you'll then be tasked with considering the future of the neighborhood by walking through and commenting on proposed development sites. Every one of your comments and decisions will be shared with real life decision-makers."

Everyday ~ Noah Kalina self-photos 2000-2012...

Kottke spots Noah Kalina's 4,514 self-portraits, one taken Everyday from January 11, 2000 to June 30, 2012. It is, he says...

"A Work in Progress"

Understanding MIT ~ Creativity Hubs & Ecologies

My colleague Bob Simha and I are hosting our Understanding MIT seminar again this Fall 2012 every Tuesday afternoon 4-6pm starting next week September 11th to survey research universities and how they work, with the Institute as our live-case study. Each week, we invite a different senior academic, administrative, and trustee leader of MIT to share with us what they do to help the Institute stay vital in the short, medium, and long term -- and ask what we can do to be pro-active in improving MIT as well.

This is part of my larger action-research agenda on understanding creativity hubs and innovation ecosystems.

MIT Neurotechnology Ventures ~ Minds+Money

My MIT colleague Ed Boyden and I (with Rutledge Ellis-Behnke in Germany) are again hosting our Neurotechnology Ventures class this Fall at the Media Lab starting Thursday afternoon 6 September 2012 from 2-4pm. This course is all about envisioning, planning, and building ventures -- both entrepreneurial startups and intrapreneurial product-lines or business units -- to bring neuroengineering innovations to the world.

Compelling venture themes include Neuroimaging, Neuromarketing, Neurology/Psychiatry Screening & Diagnosis, Mood & Behavioral Influencing, Rehabilitation, Neurosurgery, Neuropharmacology, Brain Stimulation, Prosthetics, Sensory and Motor Augmentation, Regenerative Neuromedicine, Learning, Memory & Cognitive Influencing, and more.

MIT Development Ventures ~ D-Lab Action 2012

My MIT colleague Alex (Sandy) Pentland and I are again hosting our D-Lab Development Ventures class this Fall 2012 at the Media Lab, this time with special focus on frugal, DIY, and ultraffordable technologies as well as exponential innovations including mobiles, big data, and analytics.

As always, we look forward to the latest new venture concepts our students propose -- in domains ranging from Health & Wellness, Energy & Sustainability, Education & Creativity, Commerce & Financial Services, Civic Engagement and beyond -- and we try to help the most motivated teams and promising ideas actually start and thrive!

Filament Eruption ~ NASA Spots Solar Whiplash!

io9 points to NASA SDO imagery of recent Solar Filament Eruption...

Blue Moon ~ Simon Smith's NASA Photoshot...

NASA APOD spots Blue Moon photo by Simon Smith...

Good time to wink at Neil!

Kuroshio Sea ~ Kids spot Churaumi Aquarium!

Rion Nakaya of The Kid Should See This spots video of Kuroshio Sea main tank at Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium captured by Jon Rawlinson. It's older video at this point but still lovely mesmerizing;-)

Modular Apartments ~ NEAPO's 5-Story Buildup

Finnish modular construction firm NEAPO just shared images of their latest project, a five-story residential apartment building...

"38 apartments with total floor area of 2,508 m² constructed of large modules, the size of the entire apartment. The prefabricated modules as well as the lift shafts are delivered to site as single elements. The building consists of 38 apartments (modules), the largest with a surface area of 73 square meters."

Benguela Railway ~ Angolan Infra History+Today

Moved 2 Monrovia makes a very nice and timely discovery of a vintage colonial-era 1960s promo brochure for the Portuguese-built Benguela Railway from Angola's Lobito port city to the deep interior border with the Congo, complete with background, timetables, passenger and freight photos, and route map...

Disaster Resilience ~ Qantas A380 Engine Blown

Fascinating documentaries on Qantas A380 engine catastrophe... And here's more about the Airbus A380 aeroplane...

Stretchable Electronics ~ MC10's Skin Patches+

Technology Review's David Talbot and Kyanna Sutton write about MC10 Making Stretchable Electronics which can conform to skin...

"Gold electrodes and wires just a few hundred nanometers thick are deposited on silicon wafers by conventional means, then peeled off and applied to stretchable polymers. The serpentine wires elongate when the polymers stretch, either when the balloon inflates in the heart or as the patch moves around on the skin. The electrodes measure electrical impedance to detect the electrical signals in cardiac tissue or moisture levels in the skin. The company is building on lab prototypes made by University of Illinois materials scientist John Rogers, a company cofounder. [...] In addition to its hydration patch, it is working on patches that use sensors to detect heartbeat, respiration, motion, temperature, blood oxygenation, and combinations of these indicators. MC10's skin patches can wirelessly transmit information to a nearby smartphone."

Check out embedded photos by Ken Richardson...

Flat Lens ~ Phased Array of Optical Antennas...

Cool work at Harvard SEAS on making a really Flat Lens...

"Our flat lens opens up a new type of technology,” says principal investigator Federico Capasso, Robert L. Wallace Professor of Applied Physics and Vinton Hayes Senior Research Fellow in Electrical Engineering at SEAS. “We’re presenting a new way of making lenses. Instead of creating phase delays as light propagates through the thickness of the material, you can create an instantaneous phase shift right at the surface of the lens. It’s extremely exciting.” [...] The flat lens eliminates optical aberrations such as the “fish-eye” effect that results from conventional wide-angle lenses. Astigmatism and coma aberrations also do not occur with the flat lens, so the resulting image or signal is completely accurate and does not require any complex corrective techniques. The array of nanoantennas, dubbed a “metasurface,” can be tuned for specific wavelengths of light by simply changing the size, angle, and spacing of the antennas. “In the future we can potentially replace all the bulk components in the majority of optical systems with just flat surfaces,” says lead author Francesco Aieta."

(Thanks to Wired's Jakob Schiller for spotting)

DIY Toy Car ~ Cameroonian Kid Proto-Engineer!

UD spots Recycled Toy Car Made In Cameroon by DIY proto-engineer clever kid! A few more years and he'll be ready for MIT...

Patagonia ~ Lovely Southern Chilean Timelapse

Thanks to Kuriositas for spotting Patagonia timelapse...

"The film was created by Raúl Tomás Granizo, who was raised in Spain but fell in love with Patagonia -- and you can see why. He is the founder of wildglimpses, and is a freelance wildlife filmmaker and nature photographer always looking for the essence of nature. We think he has captured it supremely here!"

Pulse of Fire ~ NASA MODIS Sees Earth Burning!

DailyMail spots NASA MODIS-enabled Earth Observatory visualization of annual Pulse of Fires!

MIT 24/7 ~ Saluting our Essential Operators!

Nice Labor Day salute from MIT to our essential operators who ensure smoothly running campus systems 24/7!

Muscle Music ~ Interactive Old Spice Ad Humor;-)

Stupid funny...