Robotic Whiskers Sense Shape and Texture

An AC writes,"NewScientistTech has a story about robotic whiskers capable of sensing shape and texture in a similar way to those belonging to rats and seals. The 'bending moment,' or torque, exerted at the base of each whisker is used to extract feature information. The artificial whiskers could be used on interplanetary rovers, or allow underwater vehicles to track moving objects by their wake. Check out the slightly creepy video of them stroking a sculpted face."

Comments

Re:Moo

[PresidentEnder]

While I myself am a christian, to simply state your beliefs as fact and deride others without making logical arguments only drives people away from the very beliefs you want to convince them of.

Biomimetics

[Garrett Fox]

(Deist) Thomas Paine's The Age of Reason argued that Nature is the only reliable scripture!

Actually there's a whole field of "biomimetics" that recognizes that evolution has solved a lot of engineering problems already, giving us clues into things like ideal shapes for sails (birds' wings) and durable macro-scale materials (beehives). The trick to that field is in figuring out what aspects of nature to imitate; for instance, the Wright Brothers studied birds but didn't feel compelled to build a true "ornithopter" or glue feathers on their Flyer. Nature has to operate under a very different set of constraints: no foresight, no metal smelters, etc.. One description I read somewhere was to imagine a human having to design a car that grows from motorcycle to sedan size and is capable of self-driving, self-fueling, and reproduction! So, we're not just "looking to nature," but figuring out what parts of it are worth stealing.