Archive for the ‘Massachusetts’ Category

Raytheon develops battlefield iPhone app

Thursday, December 17th, 2009

Raytheon's iPhone appBulletflight might take the cake, but Raytheon’s One Force Tracker would certainly be in the running for least likely iPhone app.

The New York Times reports the Waltham-based defense giant is developing two iPhone apps: One for situational awareness in a battlefield, and one for air traffic control. One Force Tracker maps the positions of enemies and friends in real-time, and allows for secure communication including photo and video transmission. The app could also be used by police, firefighters and other first responders.

The air traffic control app would be used to train air traffic conrollers.

Raytheon announced the app at the 2009 Intelligence Warfighting Summit conference in Tucson yesterday.

MIT students build robot prototype of Monty Burns’ sun-blocker

Wednesday, December 9th, 2009

Some researchers at MIT CSAIL had a problem with sunlight coming through their humongous Stata Center windows. Instead of squinting their way through computer monitor glare and cursing out the sun like I would have, they built a robot to climb the building’s framework and block the sun’s rays.

Sure, it sounds cute now. But wait till when they reveal their endgame: Building a large-scale version to block out the sun so all of Kendall Square can only get electric light powered by Mr. Burns’ nuclear plant. After the jump, watch video of the gigantic, evil, cartoon version of the glare-blocking robot. (more…)

MIT team pays cash for balloon coordinates to win DARPA Network Challenge

Monday, December 7th, 2009

MIT’s entry has won the DARPA Network Challenge, which had teams using the Internet to find 10 red balloons placed around the country, from Portland Ore., to Katy, Texas, to Christiana, Del.

The MIT team cleverly outsourced the search to … everyone, more or less, in a convoluted pyramid scheme that paid cash to the finder of a balloon, the person that invited the finder to the competition, the person that invited that person and a charity.

Researchers on the team used the scheme to learn about how social networks spread information.

Fenway Center expansion makes largest private solar installation in state

Monday, December 7th, 2009

fenwaycenter2

The Globe reports developer/environmental activist John Rosenthal is building the biggest private solar installation across the street from Fenway Park in Kenmore Square.

Twelve hundred solar panels will sit on the rooftops of the $500 million Fenway Center that  Rosenthal’s Meredith Management is developing. He’s also starting Here Comes the Sun LLC, a company that will sell electricity to the complex’s occupants: Apartments, offices, retail stores and a garage. Here Comes the Sun will also power the Yawkey Commuter Rail station, which will be renovated from a break in a fence in a parking lot to an actual structure of some kind.

Ben Gulak’s Uno redesign makes cycle both weirder and more normal

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

BPG Inc. photo

MIT undergrad Ben Gulak’s Cambridge-based startup, BPG Inc., has redesigned its electric unicycle — the Uno.

Gulak told Popular Science the Uno now has the ability to transform from a Segway-like configuration with two side-by-side wheels to a more recognizable motorcycle mode. The changes were made to make the self-balancing bike a safer ride.

Just in time for the holidays, BPG is taking $1,500 down payments on the bike now.

MIT Mad Science Research Center hiring “grotesque lab assistants”

Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009

Fake newspaper The Onion reports MIT’s Mad Science Research Center’s previous estimates on the debut of its corpse-reanimation technology were about 10 years off.

More New England technology news from the Onion:

Google Zeitgeist, Boston edition: I seem to be missing something

Tuesday, December 1st, 2009

Google released their list of fastest rising search terms for 2009 — nationally, Michael Jackson took the top spot. Jacko was followed by some unsurprising terms — Facebook, Twitter, Lady Gaga, Windows 7 — and some things I don’t know what they are — “tuentro,” “sanalika,” “dantri.com.vn” and “torpedo gratis.” Even searching those words just now didn’t really help. I might just need more coffee.

Local results don’t make much more sense. At No. 1, we have “BU student link,” which I figured was about BU student/accused prostitute killer Philip Markoff, but is instead an actual Boston University student services web site.

No. 2: “eCommons.” This one also has nothing to do with killing anybody, and is also a college student service web site — Harvard Medical School’s this time. We might have too many college kids around here.

At No. 3: “Gloucester Daily Times,” which I’ll bet shocked even the Gloucester Daily Times. This is the year after the 2008 Time Magazine story about the “pregnancy pact” that either happened or didn’t, and its interminable fallout.

Restaurant Week” and “BHCC” at Nos. 3 and 4, respectively, seem reasonable enough, with the recession making expensive restaurants less, and community colleges more popular. “UMB.edu” follows at No. 6, which seems a little like calling someone to ask for their phone number.

MBTA Commuter Rail,” “7News Boston,” “WBZ TV” and “Coolidge Corner Theater” finish off the list. Nothing weird there, but where’s “David Ortiz“? The guy had a season-opening slump that almost killed half the local population, and then had a positive drug test leaked. I don’t even know who you people are any more.

CSI: Kendall Square

Monday, November 30th, 2009

A first for criminal courts in the commonwealth could open up a new revenue stream for makers of thermal imagers: Massachusetts police departments. Universal Hub reports Boston Municipal Court has convicted a man of gun possession based on thermal imaging evidence.

After a foot chase through Dorchester, cops used a thermal imaging scanner to show a gun found on the chase route had been recently held. During the trial, prosecutors brought in MIT mechanical engineering student Priam Pillai as an expert on thermal imaging.

Winners = losers in business plan competitions?

Monday, November 30th, 2009

Business plan competiton season is in full swing — the MIT 100K’s Elevator Pitch Competition, and the Executive Summary Contest is getting started. Researcher/entrepreneur/business plan competition judge Vivek Wadhwa weighs in at TechCrunch, suggesting that losing business plan competitions may be better for startups than winning. Wadhwa calls the competitions a relic of the dot-com era, and compares winners to children whose parents praise them too much.

A quick scan of past winners backs up Wadhwa’s argument — the winners haven’t gone on to become huge successes, while Akamai, Harmonix and Brontes all lost.

Meanwhile, investor/entrepreneur/business plan competition judge Sim Simeonov says he disagrees with Wadhwa but adds his own criticism, saying the competitions move the target from creating a successful business to winning the competiton, and force judges to decide a winner without any kind of VC-style due diligence.

So what does all that mean for Rouzbeh Shahsavari, who recently won five grand for his nano-engineered concrete startup? Who knows? Above, watch Shahsavari possibly doom his startup by winning, and the other contestants ensure wild success by losing the $100k Elevator Pitch Contest last month.

UMass Lowell-designed robot hand opens doors for disabled

Wednesday, November 25th, 2009

Former UMass Lowell researcher Erin Rapacki has developed a robotic hand to help people in wheelchairs open doors. Rapacki designed the hand with an eye toward simplicity — it cost less $2,000 to make — but it can open 14 different types of doors.

Rapacki presented the project, which she worked on while at UMass, at the IEEE Robotics Conference in Woburn last week. In July, Rapacki left UMass for Mountain View, Calif.-based Anybots Inc., which is developing telepresence robots.

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