simulation
Science
Volunteers Wanted For 520-Day Pretend Trip To Mars
7:00PM Rosa Golijan | The European Space Agency is looking for volunteers to spend 520 days isolated in a Moscow facility where they’d simulate travelling to, living on and coming back from Mars. Not bad, except the pretend travel lasts 250 days each way. More »
Design
Soyuz Chair Transforms Lay-Z-Boys Into Cosmonauts
1:20AM Mark Wilson | Sitting in the typical recliner has become the weeknight sex of the furniture world—a comfortable task for your body while your mind focuses on TV. The Soyuz Chair hopes to break the mundanity with vintage Soviet space craft design. More »
Vehicles
Volvo Wind Tunnel Has Road Simulator Minus Annoying Backseat Kids
10:20AM Jesus Diaz | Here’s the new Volvo in-house wind tunnel simulator, a 28 million dollar facility that is the first in its class to have a road simulator. In theory, it will allow the Swedish manufacturer to precisely test the effect of road changes and airflows all around the car to make cars more fuel efficient. Strangely enough, Tim Walker, the aerodynamics expert at Volvo Cars, doesn’t mention other possible uses, like drying the hair and bodies of a multitude of lusty valkyries and/or vikings just out of the shower: More »
Vehicles
24 Hour Air Traffic Around the World Blows Minds, Eyeballs
11:30PM Jesus Diaz | Here’s a video displaying all commercial air traffic in the world during a 24-hour period. Seriously, I’m moving to New York City tomorrow and seeing the flight density in this computer simulation scares me a bit. Thankfully, it’s a big planet with plenty of space to fly. But then, pilot friends tell me that sometimes they get close enough to wave at each other, so maybe it’s not as big as to accommodate the 7.4 billion passengers that will travel by air in 2020. [Zhaw via Dark Roasted Blend] More »
Gadgets
iBird Avian Flight Simulator Makes You Feel Like Icarus
12:00PM Adrian Covert | The iBird Flight Simulator was easily the most creative demo at Microsoft’s Research Summit yesterday. Also developed in conjunction with NYU (like the UnMouse Pad), it uses a USB controller with dual retractable, pulley-style cords, the iBird tracks your movement in 3D space.. The iBird then relays that information back to the computer and offers visual feedback in the form of a projected 3D world where you become a bird that flaps, leans and speeds up. More »
Science
Fight Hurricanes with Gigantic Hurricane Simulators
5:30AM Mark Wilson | It’s the sort of thing you’d expect ordered by Wile E. Coyote from an ACME catalog. But instead, it’s a product for the Hurricane Research Centre to prepare for the devastating natural disasters. Six giant gasoline-powered fans drive winds at well over 160kph in a wall of moving air that’s large enough to engulf an entire single-story building. Read on for a shot of the quarantined destruction: More »
Gadgets
SimSail Land Sailing Simulator Offers Full-Sized Boats For Landlubbing Wannabes
6:00AM Jack Loftus | Philippe Kahn and his ambitious Pacific Cup sailing trip from San Francisco to Hawai’i got me all inspired this week to go sailing, but there’s one problem: I suck at sailing. In fact, the last time I went sailing was in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic, where I almost got smashed on the reef that protects the beach there. So you’ll excuse my excitement today over the SimSail, a full sized “land yachting” simulator for two. It’s not quite the same thing as sailing on the water, and it’s certainly not even remotely close to what Kahn’s up to these days, but for me, at least, it’s a start. More »
Design
REMY Biometric Blanket Wakes You with News on Your Snooze
8:25PM Gizmodo US Edition | Designer Dasha Anokhina has created a concept that takes Glo pillow’s design to a new level: REMY is a whole dawn-simulating alarm blanket. The system monitors your sleeping movements with a bedside camera. Then, near your chosen alarm time, the blanket begins to light up with an image representing your sleep pattern, waking you as if the sun was rising. And if you’re really into self-analysis, it even saves your sleep data to a USB stick so you can review it later. Could make for interesting viewing, if you’re as much of a nighttime revolver as I am. [Yanko Design] More »
Games
Motion Pro II Racing Simulator in Action, Still Cause for Divorce
4:50AM Jesus Diaz | Remember yesterday’s drooltastic Motion Pro II racing simulator? Here’s how it works and how much it costs. We talked with Chris Considine—CXC Simulations head honcho—who tells us that yes, people actually buy these things even if they cost more than a car: the Motion Pro II starts at US$25,995, but he said that a client spent US$45,000 on one, after add-ons. See the complete shopping list—and high definition pictures from a real system—after the jump. More »
Games
