August 27, 2012Good Morning,
NASA coincidentally finds a 12-inch-wide dinosaur footprint on the grounds of one of their facilities. Check out the first article for the details on this bizarre, chance find.
Until Next Time,
Erin
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Dinosaur footprint found at NASA facilityGREENBELT, Md. - A look underfoot has found a dinosaur footprint at a NASA facility in Maryland, which mostly looks outward toward the planets and stars, a researcher says. Dinosaur hunter Ray Stanford has found the footprint of a large spiny dinosaur called a nodosaur in the space agency's own back yard at its Goddard Space Flight Center campus, LiveScience reported Wednesday. Stanford, an amateur paleontologist, informed Goddard officials Aug. 17 of the location of the 12-inch-wide footprint showing four toes. NASA officials have not disclosed the exact location of the footprint on the facility's grounds, out of concern someone might damage or try to remove the fossilized evidence of the nodosaur, a lumbering armored beast covered with bony projections. Stanford called the location where the dinosaur roamed millennia ago during the Cretaceous period "poetic." "Space scientists may walk along here, and they're walking exactly where this big, bungling heavy-armored dinosaur walked, maybe 110 (million) to 112 million years ago," Stanford told Goddard officials.
Robot to take 'self-awareness' testNEW HAVEN, Conn. - A robot developed by scientists at Yale University in Connecticut could soon pass a landmark test by recognizing itself in a mirror, the researchers say. Such a feat would be considered evidence of self-awareness and represent an advance toward robots that can think for themselves, they said. The robot, dubbed Nico, will take the test in coming months, Justin Hart, the doctoral student leading the research, told BBC News. "It is a spatial reasoning task for the robot to understand that its arm is on it, not on the other side of the mirror," he said. While Nico has been programmed to recognize a reflection of its arm, Hart said, it still has to pass the "full mirror test," developed in 1970 and considered the classic test of self-awareness. The test is more usually performed on an animal that is allowed time to get used to the mirror and is then anesthetized while an odorless dye is applied to its face. The creature's subsequent reaction to its reflection is deemed a measure of its self-awareness, determined by whether the animal inspects the mark on its own body or reacts as if it is only on the "mirror" animal but not on itself. Only a few non-human species -- including some primates, elephants and dolphins -- have managed to pass the mirror "self-awareness" test, the researchers said.
Hovercraft sports 'Star Wars' lookMOJAVE, Calif. - A hovercraft resembling something out of "Star Wars" has intuitive controls allowing anyone to fly it without pilot training, its California-based creator says. Aerofex says it has successfully updated a hovering flying bike design with two ducted rotors instead of wheels that was abandoned in the 1960s because of stability and rollover problems, InnovationNewsDaily reported. Aerofex said the stability issue was overcome by creating a mechanical system of control bars at knee-level that allows the vehicle to respond to a pilot's leaning movements and natural sense of balance. Limited human flight testing to a height of 15 feet and speeds of about 30 mph has been carried out in California's Mojave desert, the company said. Although ducted-rotor craft can't fly as efficiently as helicopters because of their shorter rotor blades, their enclosed rotors have the advantage of a much smaller size and safety near humans, Aerofex founder Mark De Roche said. "They are less efficient than a helicopter, which has the benefit of larger diameter rotors," De Roche said. "They do have unique performance advantages, though, as they have demonstrated flight within trees, close to walls and under bridges."
Newest 'Windows on a Mac' software comingPALO ALTO, Calif. - U.S.-based VMWare has announced Fusion 5, the latest version of its software that lets Apple users run Microsoft Windows on Mac computers. Made to run under Apple's OS X Mountain Lion, and ready for Windows 8 when it is released in October, it will also run legacy programs Windows 7 and Windows XP as well, Slash Gear reported Thursday. Programmed specifically for Mountain Lion and optimized for Windows 8, it will allow users to run Windows and Mountain Lion searches both in Launchpad, and Mountain Lion's notification system will provide alerts regardless of if they're coming through Windows 8 or OS X. All editions of Windows 8 -- standard, pro, and enterprise -- will run under Fusion 5, VMWare said. Fusion 5 will cost $49.95 for a standard version, with a Professional version with extra features priced at $99.99. The other main provider of cross-OS software for running Windows on an Apple computers, Parallels, has announce a Sept. 4 release date for its next version.
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