Radio Shack now sells Arduino boards. According to Wikipedia, Arduino is a popular open-source single-board microcontroller, descendant of the open-source Wiring platform, designed to make the process of using electronics in multidisciplinary projects more accessible. The hardware consists of a simple open hardware design for the Arduino board with an Atmel AVR processor and on-board input/output support. The software consists of a standard programming language compiler and the boot loader that runs on the board.
Here's what the kit looks like:
They are promoting this product by showcasing different projects DIYers are creating with it.
For decades, academic and industry researchers have been working on control algorithms for autonomous helicopters — robotic helicopters that pilot themselves, rather than requiring remote human guidance. Dozens of research teams have competed in a series of autonomous-helicopter challenges posed by the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI); progress has been so rapid that the last two challenges have involved indoor navigation without the use of GPS.
But MIT's Robust Robotics Group — which fielded the team that won the last AUVSI contest — has set itself an even tougher challenge: developing autonomous-control algorithms for the indoor flight of GPS-denied airplanes. At the 2011 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), a team of researchers from the group described an algorithm for calculating a plane's trajectory; in 2012, at the same conference, they presented an algorithm for determining its "state" — its location, physical orientation, velocity and acceleration. Now, the MIT researchers have completed a series of flight tests in which an autonomous robotic plane running their state-estimation algorithm successfully threaded its way among pillars in the parking garage under MIT's Stata Center.
Additional footage courtesy of: Adam Bry, Nicholas Roy, Abraham Bachrach of the Robust Robotics Group, Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Special thanks to the Office of Naval Research under MURI N00014-09-1-1052 and the Army Research Office under the Micro Autonomous System Technologies program.
NASA's ultimate goal is to send humans to Mars. And when we get there, we'll be driving a vehicle with 3D-printed parts. In this video, NASA engineers talk about developing and testing a next-generation rover designed to support humans on other worlds, such as asteroids and, eventually, Mars — and how 3D printing helps. http://www.stratasys.com/Resources/Case-Studies/Aerospace-FDM-Technology-Case-Studies/NASA.aspx
The US military has designed drones so small that they are starting to look like tiny insects. These are used to get into areas that they normally wouldn't be able to reach. These secret insect drones are said to help the fight against terrorism/terrorists and help protect us.
Ya, they look cool and could also make a fun toy but is this something that could cause concern in the future?
People in the New York and Washington DC area have been reporting strange sightings of what were describe as tiny
machines hovering around different gatherings like the antiwar rally in Lafayette Square last month. A student swore these were not real bugs.
The FBI, CIA and other various government organizations have all denied such claims of having mini spy drones at work.
I guess if we generally trust our government they would only be used to help keep our nation safe. After all, if government organizations really wanted to spy on us, I'm sure they can find less expensive ways.
This video is a demonstration of two robots, the 160g Tailbot (a 4 wheeled robot) and the 8.1kg XRL (a RHex hexapedal robot), using their inertial tails to perform aerial self righting behaviors. This work was presented at CLAWAR 2012, and the paper can be found here: http://kodlab.seas.upenn.edu/Aaron/CLAWARTails