Of Her and Humanoids: The Year in Robotics

Follow robotics closely enough, and every year seems like a big year. But these tipping points are often false, or at the very least over-reported, as dispatches from academic labs are confused with actual, historic deployments.

2013 was another matter. Robots became synonymous with Google. Robots stole the show on 60 Minutes. Robots were mocked, and were the subject of more mock-terror, arguably, than in any other year in recent memory. And even when they weren’t news, robots and their makers made surprising progress towards supplanting and supporting humans. Fictional bots contributed, too, as manufactured good guys (and one very charming girl) proved that even Hollywood can take a break, however brief, from vilifying machines.

From the highs to the lows, to the stories that simply did not compute, this is what robotics looked like in 2013. These trends are by no means comprehensive or ranked, but comments are enabled, so feel free to add your own picks for the year's biggest bot-related breakthroughs and setbacks.

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The year ahead: ten amazing science and technology innovations coming up in 2014

From the world's largest underground hotel to Star Wars-style holographic communication, the coming year is set to unveil an array of incredible advances in science and technology



Virgin Galactic launches. Yes, really

Despite delays in testing – the first flights were promised by 2011 – Sir Richard Branson’s dream of making money in space is nearing reality. A test flight was completed in April, and it was announced in November that television network NBC has agreed to televise the first ever public flight from New Mexico “sometime in 2014”.

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The 18 Most Futuristic Predictions That Came True in 2013

A lot can happen in a single year, especially in this era of accelerating technological and social change. Here are the most futuristic developments of 2013.

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Quantum Entanglement May Link Wormholes In Universe, Physicists Say

Wormholes — shortcuts that in theory can connect distant points in the universe — might be linked with the spooky phenomenon of quantum entanglement, where the behavior of particles can be connected regardless of distance, researchers say.

These findings could help scientists explain the universe from its very smallest to its biggest scales.

Scientists have long sought to develop a theory that can describe how the cosmos works in its entirety. Currently, researchers have two disparate theories, quantum mechanics and general relativity, which can respectively mostly explain the universe on its tiniest scales and its largest scales. There are currently several competing theories seeking to reconcile the pair.

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How Arjun Raj Reveals The Inner Workings Of Cells

Arjun Raj

University of Pennsylvania

Achievement

Revealing the inner workings of cells

Each cell in your body has the same DNA. But how a cell's genes are expressed—and how frequently—determines whether the cell will become a neuron or a cardiac myocyte or whether it's healthy or sick. Arjun Raj and his collaborators at the University of Pennsylvania invented a technique to track that gene expression and its effects.

Just as grocery store receipts show which foods are most popular, RNA molecules, which carry genetic information from DNA, reveal which genes are turned on and how often they're active. To track a specific RNA strand, Raj bathes a cell with segments of fluorescent DNA. Those segments bind the RNA in different locations, lining up along it like Christmas lights along a roof, and are clearly visible through a microscope.

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Skylon Space Plane: The Spacecraft of Tomorrow

It’s difficult not to be impressed by the towering rockets used around the world to launch spacecraft into orbit. From the colossal Saturn V rockets developed in the 1960s to the SpaceX Falcon 9, one of last year’s highlights, rockets are practically synonymous with space travel in modern culture. However, rockets are also a huge financial drain on any spaceflight, being only partially reusable. Wouldn’t it be nice if it were cheaper and more economical to get to orbit? Cue the Skylon space plane, currently scheduled to commence test flights in 2019. Read more

IBM's Cognitive Computing Software May Serve As Architecture For Brain-Like Computer

A computer that works like the human brain? It may not be that far off.

IBM cognitive computing researchers are one step closer to making a brain-like computer a reality. The team on Thursday unveiled a "breakthrough software ecosystem" that has the ability to program microchips with architecture based on the human brain.

The framework, which includes new programming language and algorithms, is just part of the process that principal investigator Dr. Dharmendra S. Modha hopes will lead to IBM's long-term goal:

"Our end goal here is literally to build a brain in a box with 100 trillion synapses," Modha told The Huffington Post. (That's about the same number of synapses within the human brain.)

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NASA Physicists Working on Warp Drive Technology For Travel Faster Than the Speed of Light

If you possess the unique combination of characteristics that allow you be both incredibly precise and focused on specific physics problems yet daydreamy enough to stare up at the night sky and wonder “What if?”, you might work for NASA, and you might also be Harold G. White, a NASA physicist who’s researching the possibilities of warp drive travel. (That is, faster than the speed of light.)

White has been researching warp travel in a NASA lab, attempting to warp the trajectory of a photon and thus change the distance it travels within a defined area. White’s team is measuring any change with a highly sensitive interferometer in a “floating” lab built on pneumatic piers to prevent earthly vibrations from affecting the tests.

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Recharge your electric vehicle in 20 minutes starting later this year

The takes-forever-to-recharge-an-EV reason not to buy an electric vehicle may not be a problem much longer. Engineers from BMW and General Motors say an electric vehicle can be 80% recharged in about 20 minutes using a new specification developed by the Society of Automotive Engineers. It calls for a single standardized connector that accepts DC fast charging, the one that will get you back on the road quickly, as well as less speedy AC and DC charging. BMW and GM got there first with Fast Charge testing signoff, but Audi, Chrysler, Daimler (Mercedes-Benz), Porsche, and Volkswagen are onboard with the same SAE DC fast charge specs. At the same time, multiple suppliers of charging equipment are signed on: ABB, Aker Wade, Eaton, and IES.

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Steven Spielberg's Movie Industry Prediction: 'Implosion' Of Film Business Model Imminent

The Oscar-winning director told students at USC's School of Cinematic Arts that the movie business is teetering on the edge, and a few high-profile box-office failures in quick succession could catalyze dramatic changes in the way studios do business, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Spielberg lamented that it's becoming harder and harder for even brand-name filmmakers to get their projects into movie theaters. To wit: "Lincoln," which was a critical and commercial success for the director, nearly ended up on HBO, he told the audience. Unestablished talent, meanwhile, has run into trouble getting their projects greenlit at all, because their ideas are "too fringe-y" for studios.

Spielberg continued:

That's the big danger, and there's eventually going to be an implosion — or a big meltdown. There's going to be an implosion where three or four or maybe even a half-dozen megabudget movies are going to go crashing into the ground, and that's going to change the paradigm.

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The Big Bang Wasn’t the Beginning

What if the Big Bang wasn’t the beginning of the universe, but only one stage in an endlessly repeated cycle of universal expansion and contraction?

So suggests mathematical physicist and string theorist Neil Turok. He thinks there may be many universes, at once interpolated but separate, like a mixture of gases. These universes are attracted to each other; every few trillions of trillions of years, they collide, explode, expand and contract, then repeat the sequence all over again.

I recently spoke with Turok, winner of the first TED Prize of 2008, for an upcoming Wired News Q&A. Here are some outtakes from our conversation:

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Multiverse-Universe Debate: Cosmologists Weigh One Reality Vs. Many At World Science Festival

NEW YORK — Whether you believe our universe is unique or one of many coexisting realities, there's a scientific model that backs up your views. Cosmologists on both sides debated the issue June 1 here at the "Multiverse: One Universe or Many?" panel at the World Science Festival.

"Is the multiverse idea something that's implied by deficiencies in existing cosmological theories, or is it something some scientists need to help them explain certain unresolvable problems in existing theory?" journalist John Hockenberry asked, acting as moderator to scientists Andreas Albrecht, Alan Guth, Andrei Linde, and Neil Turok, who took the stage at New York University's Skirball Center for the Performing Arts.

The possibility of a multiverse is raised by the theory of cosmic inflation. This idea posits that the universe grew exponentially in the first fraction of a second following the Big Bang, expanding even faster than the speed of light. Some versions of this theory suggest that certain areas of the universe expanded faster than others, creating separate bubbles of space-time that might have developed into their own universes. [5 Reasons We May Live in a Multiverse]

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Google Buys Quantum Computer for Artificial Intelligence Lab at NASA

To some of us, wicked fast quantum computers seem like the stuff of theory and some far off future. Not so if you work at Google or NASA. In a sign the technology is creeping closer to practical use, Google, NASA, and the non-profit Universities Space Research Association (USRA) recently announced formation of the Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab and seeded it with a brand new 512-qubit D-Wave Two quantum computer.

Quantum computers promise to be orders of magnitude faster than classical computers and far better at the “optimization problems” associated with machine learning—improving not only Google search but perhaps ushering in the kind of “creative problem solving” humans associate with intelligence.

Each D-Wave quantum computer is housed in a 10’ featureless black cabinet. Inside the box, an apparatus hangs from the ceiling like a high-tech stalactite. A niobium chip resides in the tip and is cooled to a tiny fraction of a degree above absolute zero, at which point it becomes a superconductor. But apart from being colder than deep space, the way the computer itself functions differs from the classical model.

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Dream Chaser New Concept of Operations

Sierra Nevada Corporation's Space Systems is pleased to announce that we have been awarded $212.5 million as part of NASA's Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) Program. "This award will allow our Program to continue to make great strides in the development of the Dream Chaser Space System. We want to express our appreciation to all of those that have provided great support in our efforts," said Mark Sirangelo, Corporate Vice President and head of SNC's Space Systems.

To celebrate this award, SNC is pleased to release our new Dream Chaser Space System Concept of Operations video which illustrates our primary mission of delivering crew and critical cargo to and from the International Space Station.

For information about SNC's Space Systems, including more information on SNC's plans forward, visit: http://www.SNCSpace.com. For more information on NASA's CCiCap Program, please visit: http://www.nasa.gov/commercialcrew

Chinese physicists create first single-photon quantum memory, leading to quantum internet

A lab in China is reporting that it has constructed the first memory device that uses single photons to store quantum data. This is a significant breakthrough that takes us further down the path towards a quantum internet, and potentially quantum computing as well.

As it currently stands, we already make extensive use of photons — the bulk of the internet and telecommunications backbone consists of photons traveling down fiber optic cables. Rather than single photons, though, these signals consist of carrier light waves of millions of photons, with the wave being modulated by binary data. These pulses are never stored, either; when they reach a router, they’re converted into electrical signals, and then stored in RAM before being converted back into light.

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Scientists create human stem cells through cloning

(Reuters) - After more than 15 years of failures by scientists around the world and one outright fraud, biologists have finally created human stem cells by the same technique that produced Dolly the cloned sheep in 1996: They transplanted genetic material from an adult cell into an egg whose own DNA had been removed.

The result is a harvest of human embryonic stem cells, the seemingly magic cells capable of morphing into any of the 200-plus kinds that make up a person.

The feat, reported on Wednesday in the journal Cell, could re-ignite the field of stem-cell medicine, which has been hobbled by technical challenges as well as ethical issues.

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Warp Drive Feasible? Relativity Loophole Means 'Star Trek' Device Might Actually Work, Physicists Say

Decades after the original "Star Trek" show had gone off the air, pioneering physicist and avowed Trek fan Miguel Alcubierre argued that maybe a warp drive is possible after all. It just wouldn't work quite the way "Star Trek" thought it did.

Things with mass can't move faster than the speed of light. But what if, instead of the ship moving through space, the space was moving around the ship?

Space doesn't have mass. And we know that it's flexible: space has been expanding at a measurable rate ever since the Big Bang. We know this from observing the light of distant stars — over time, the wavelength of the stars' light as it reaches Earth is lengthened in a process called "redshifting." According to the Doppler effect, this means that the source of the wavelength is moving further away from the observer — i.e. Earth.

So we know from observing redshifted light that the fabric of space is movable. [See also: What to Wear on a 100-Year Starship Voyage]

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Does Google Glass Violate Community Standards?

Like any truly revolutionary technology, Google Glass is redrawing social boundaries. And society is so worried about its implications, that two communities have taken steps designed to keep Glass in its place – with a third trying to keep it off the roads.

Efforts to impede Glass — $1,500 frames that display recent smartphone and Google account communications, receive phone calls, send texts, take photos and video, show maps, and deliver search results — could cut into what promises to be a huge business for Google.

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Terrafugia unveils self-driving, self-landing hybrid flying car

A sleek new concept has popped up on the Terrafugia website. It's an artist's rendering of what Terrafugia is dubbing "the practical realization of the dream of countless visions of the future." And we're hard-pressed not to agree. The concept is of a new flying car, dubbed the TF-X, a hybrid gas-electric flying car.

With that said, the fact that this flying car concept is a hybrid hardly does the proposed vehicle justice. Also included in the vehicle's design is a vertical takeoff mechanism and a fully automated flight program. That's right: this car is not only the world's first flying hybrid, it's also self-driving and self-landing. While Terrafugia states that "you always have the final say if its safe to land," the TF-X is fully capable of handling the entire landing process without you.

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World on the verge of a new industrial revolution: Mass 3D printing

As potentially game-changing as the steam engine or telegraph were in their day, 3D printing could herald a new industrial revolution, experts say.

For the uninitiated, the prospect of printers turning out any object you want at the click of a button may seem like the stuff of science fiction.

But 3D printing is already here, is developing fast, and looks set to leap from the labs and niche industries onto the wider market.

“There are still limits imposed by the technology available today,” said Olivier Olmo, operational director of Switzerland’s EPFL research institution.

“But I’m certain that within 10 or 20 years, we’ll have a kind of revolution in terms of the technology being available to everyone,” he said.

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NASA-funded fusion rocket could shoot humans to Mars in 30 days

A research group at the University of Washington, funded by NASA, is about to build a fusion-powered rocket. This rocket, if it can be successfully built, could propel a manned spacecraft to Mars in just 30 days — compared to NASA’s estimate of four years for a Martian round trip using current technology.

The UW team, led by John Slough, have spent the last few years developing and testing each of the various stages of a fusion rocket. Now it is time to bring these isolated tests together to produce an actual fusion rocket. To succeed, Slough and co will need to create a fusion process that generates more power than it requires to get the fusion reaction started — a caveat that, despite billions of dollars of research, has eluded some of the world’s finest scientists for more than 60 years. Fusion is an ideal method of rocket propulsion, as fusion fuel has immense energy density — something on the scale of 7 million times more dense than conventional rocket fuel. The weight (and expense) of fuel is one of the biggest barriers to space travel.

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Stephen Hawking: Space Exploration Is Key To Saving Humanity

LOS ANGELES -- Stephen Hawking, who spent his career decoding the universe and even experienced weightlessness, is urging the continuation of space exploration – for humanity's sake.

The 71-year-old Hawking said he did not think humans would survive another 1,000 years "without escaping beyond our fragile planet."

The British cosmologist made the remarks Tuesday before an audience of doctors, nurses and employees at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he toured a stem cell laboratory that's focused on trying to slow the progression of Lou Gehrig's disease.

Hawking was diagnosed with the neurological disorder 50 years ago while a student at Cambridge University. He recalled how he became depressed and initially didn't see a point in finishing his doctorate. But he continued to delve into his studies.

"If you understand how the universe operates, you control it in a way," he said.

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How Parallel Universes Actually Work, Scientifically

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Genome research: discovery as an everyday event

The study of DNA is a fast-moving adventure that becomes more astonishing with every passing discovery

On Tuesday, US researchers confirmed the mixed ancestry of that icon of the American range, the Texas longhorn: its DNA came from cattle from Europe and the Middle East, and from the Indian subcontinent. On Wednesday one team of researchers published the genetic sequence of the mountain pine beetle, a voracious pest that has so far destroyed more than 15m hectares of forest in North America, and another did the same for the western painted turtle, an air-breathing creature that can survive four months under water. On Thursday, Nature Genetics reported on the genetic "spelling mistakes" identified in 100,000 patients with breast, ovarian and prostate cancer, and today the journal Science tried to identify simple principles that might connect more than 140 genes so far associated with the growth of tumours.

What is startling about such research is how ordinary it has become. The structure of DNA was revealed 60 years ago . It was more than 20 years before anyone understood how to decipher the genetic code, and more than 30 years before anyone dreamed of compiling the entire 3bn-letter sequence of a human being. When the Human Genome Project was completed in April 2003, it was hailed as biology's equivalent of the moon landing. Ten years on, what began as costly, painstaking and uncertain science has become commonplace.

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NAS: By 2050, it’s possible to cut car petroleum use by 80 percent

After years of inaction, the US government managed to cut a deal with automobile manufacturers that would see the first significant increases in average fuel efficiency in many years. It's part of a plan that would see the average fuel economy clear 50 miles-per-gallon by 2025. Although that may seem like a large leap, it will still leave the US' efficiency standards well below those of other industrialized nations.

A new report by the National Academies of Science looks well beyond these goalposts. It looks at what it would take to get a 50 percent reduction in petroleum use by 2030 and a full eighty percent drop by 2050. To make matters a touch more challenging, it also looks at what it would take to get an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from our light-duty vehicle fleet. The answer is that no single technology is going to be capable of all of this, which means success would require a mix of technologies on the road at the same time. According to the report, none of it will come close to happening without a concerted policy push.

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Should the Constitution Be Scrapped?

When James Madison and his fellow statesmen drafted the Constitution, they created our system of government, with its checks, balances and sometimes awkward compromises. The laws of the United States are based on this document, along with the Bill of Rights, and for more than 200 years, Americans have held it sacred.

But Georgetown law professor Louis Michael Seidman says that adherence to the Constitution is both misguided and long out of date. In his incendiary new book, On Constitutional Disobedience, the scholar who clerked for Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall argues that giving up on the Constitution would improve American political discourse and government, freeing us from what he describes as an “intergenerational power grab” by the Founding Fathers.

Why would we stop obeying the Constitution?

This is about taking the country back for ourselves. There’s no reason to let folks who have been dead for 200 years tell us what kind of country we should have. The United States that the Founding Fathers knew was a very small country huddled along the Eastern seaboard. It was largely rural; large parts of it were dependent on slave labor, and there was nothing like modern manufacturing or communication. Many of the most important drafters of the Constitution, including Madison, owned other human beings. Virtually all of them thought that women should have no role in public affairs. I don’t mean to say that they were not farsighted for their time, but their time is not our time.

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Obama seeking to boost study of human brain

The Obama administration is planning a decade-long scientific effort to examine the workings of the human brain and build a comprehensive map of its activity, seeking to do for the brain what the Human Genome Project did for genetics, The New York Times reports.

The project, which the administration has been looking to unveil as early as March, will include federal agencies, private foundations, and teams of neuroscientists and nanoscientists in a concerted effort to advance the knowledge of the brain’s billions of neurons and gain greater insights into perception, actions and, ultimately, consciousness.

Scientists with the highest hopes for the project also see it as a way to develop the technology essential to understanding diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s, as well as to find new therapies for a variety of mental illnesses.

Moreover, the project holds the potential of paving the way for advances in artificial intelligence.

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This Is What the First Lunar Base Could Really Look Like

We have seen many concepts, but this is the most realistic plan yet for humanity's first Moon Base. It will be more efficient and cheaper to build than any other alternative, as it uses 3D printing to quickly transform raw lunar soil into habitable domes.

Also? It looks awesome.

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NASA: Jupiter’s moon Europa ‘most promising’ place to sustain life

US astronomers looking for life in the solar system believe that Europa, one of the moons of Jupiter, which has an ocean, is much more promising than desert-covered Mars, which is currently the focus of the US government’s attention.

“Europa is the most likely place in our solar system beyond Earth to possess …. life,” said Robert Pappalardo, a planetary scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

“And it is the place we should be exploring now that we have a concept mission we think is the right one to get there for an affordable cost,” he continued.

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