Extreme cold is merciless on machinery. Rubber seals stiffen and crack. The problems pile up as the temperature falls. Metal becomes brittle, and wires contract. Batteries stop working, adhesives stop sticking and LCD screens go black as their liquid crystal freezes solid.

A robot arm that can pick up and carry objects without touching them using ultrasonic levitation is being developed by scientists. Researchers at ETH Zurich used an array of tiny speakers that emit sound at tightly controlled frequencies and volumes in order to'grip' an object. The sound waves from the speakers create a pressure field that holds an object up - a kind of'acoustic levitation', according to researcher Marcel Shuck. Dr Shuck says the acoustic gripper will be ideal for delicate tasks such as assembling watches or microchips, where any damage from touch marks would cost money. The sound waves used to levitate an object can also move it around by having audio coming from multiple directions, the team says.

I had somebody ask me questions this week about underwater photography and videography with robots (well, now it is a few weeks ago…). I am not an expert at underwater robotics, however as a SCUBA diver I have some experience that can be applicable towards robotics. There are some challenges that exist with underwater photography and videography, that are less challenging above the water. This causes certain colors to not be visible at certain depths. If you need to see those colors you often need to bring strong lights to restore the visibility of those wavelengths that were absorbed.

Wikipedia has described A.I. as "intelligence exhibited by machines. In computer science, an ideal "intelligent" machine is a flexible rational agent that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize its chance of success at some goal." The HUM vibrator assesses it's environment and adapts to achieve a goal, and what a goal that is! It's goal is your orgasm. When I heard about the HUM vibrator I had to get in contact, I needed to learn more. I have had a number of conversations with the makers of HUM and have found them to be incredibly open and honest about their product.

That Smart Manufacturing system advises engineers each morning about any trend it has detected during the previous day, he says. "As well as highlighting any issues, the system provides options and recommendations on the best temperatures, pressures and running speeds that can help get an extra 10 tonnes or even 100 tonnes of [refined material] out each day -- and that can be worth a lot of money," says Walker. Another of the AI technology platforms in action at Shell Downstream is Salesforce.com's It is able to make predictions and recommendations by digesting operational data as it passes through the systems, for example, prioritizing the order in which maintenance tasks should be tackled. "It's helping us make faster and better decisions," says Walker.

Any robot NASA sends to harsh, distant worlds has to be tougher than garden-variety machines. Since every component has to be able to withstand extreme conditions, a team of researchers over at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory are looking at the possibility of using bulk metallic glass for their gears. Metallic glass is a metal with glass-like atomic structure -- it has low melting temp and can be blow-molded when heated. Gears made out of the material don't get brittle and won't need lubricants even in extremely cold environments. NASA says the Curiosity rover has to heat up lubricants every time it wants to move -- metallic glass gears could save precious energy when exploring alien worlds.

Elsewhere, I have suggested that there are three junctures at which any data mining project may go the most wrong: 1. problem definition, 2. data acquisition and 3. model validation (see the Data Mining and Predictive Analytics Web log). Data acquisition is a superset of statistical sampling, and the text by Lohr is highly recommended for this topic. Model validation is well explained in the literature: see, for instance, Weiss and Kulikowski. Problem definition involves understanding the business problem and mapping an appropriate technical solution to it. This may not be as simple as it sounds, and it is easy to be naïve about the best way to construct a technical solution which most naturally solves the given problem.