RAF Tornado fighter jets have flown with parts made using 3D printing technology for the first time, defence company BAE Systems has said.
The metal components were used in test flights from the firm’s airfield at Warton, Lancashire, late last month.
The parts include protective covers for cockpit radios and guards for power take-off shafts.
It is hoped the … Read More → "RAF jets fly with 3D printed parts"
Anybody with a massive collection of books has dealt with a time when a pile of books came tumbling down around their head, perhaps when they were transitioning the volumes between bookshelves or moving in to another house, but artist Alicia Martin has made the crashing waves of written words into an artform with her turbulent book installations.
via Neatorama</ … Read More → "Turbulent book installations by Alicia Martin"
America loves tattoos. From tribal designs to tramp stamps, this country can’t get enough ink. Last month, a Pew study showed that tattoos grace the bodies of nearly 40 percent of Americans under 40, a massive number of customers in a $1.65 billion industry. Like any industry, however, the tattoo industry must innovate.
Though most of the attention surrounding the race to commercialize connected eyewear has focused on Google Glass, a lesser known player has been quietly toiling away. At CES this week, Washington-based company Innovega will be showcasing its first fully-functioning prototypes of iOptik, an augmented reality system which projects a heads-up display onto contact lenses.
via Gizmag</ … Read More → "iOptik augmented reality contact lens prototype to be unveiled at CES"
… Read More → "Artists create the illusion of a hovering tree"Artists Mario Shu and Daniel Sterling made a tree look as if it were cut in two and magically hoveringby wrapping the trunk in plastic sheeting and painting the tree like the landscape behind it.
via Laughing Squid
They also performed a version of an experiment first conducted by Stephen Hawking in 2012, who sent out an invitation to a party after he’d already thrown it. Not surprisingly, no one traveled back in time to attend after they’d received the invitation. The Michigan Tech team decided to use Twitter hashtags instead. They asked people to tweet with #ICanChangeThePast2 and #ICannotChangeThePast2, then searched for messages including those tags that would have been sent before they put out the call to the would be time travelers. Unfortunately, none of their work turned up … Read More → "Researchers turn to Twitter in the search for time travelers"
The actual gameplay behind pogs has long been attributed to the classic Japanese game of Menko (above), which has been popular since the Edo Period (between 1603 and 1867) and also centered on players attempting to flip the cards or pieces of their opponent. Much like modern pogs, the original Menko playing pieces were roughly the size of milk caps and featured images of Japanese cultural icons, like wrestlers and warriors. These pieces weren’t made out … Read More → "The weird history of pogs"
Though identical (or “monozygotic”) twins account for only one birth in every three thousand, geneticists have been baffled attempting to find ways to tell twins apart forensically; regular DNA fingerprinting doesn’t show any difference between the two individuals. This, obviously, can create some complications when it comes to forensic evidence and even paternity testing.
But a new study published in Forensic Science International: Genetics … Read More → "Science finally able to tell the genetic difference between identical twins"
UK-based designer Clive Roddy has made a series of laser-cut wooden rings with tiny landscape dioramas sprouting out of them. They come in three flavors: trees, houses, and mountains, and they are interchangeable.
via Laughing Squid
Continue reading </ … Read More → "Laser-cut wooden rings that feature mini dioramas"
Packing peanuts are environmentally toxic, wadded paper is imprecise, and bubble wrap—despite its fun—is an inefficient time waster. Enter ExpandOS, a new paper board packing material that can outshine styrofoam.
The ExpandOS system is comprised of a customized paperboard sheet material and an expander machine that rapidly cuts and folds the sheets into three-dimensional triangular structures. The ExpandOS sheets come in … Read More → "High-tech 3-D cardboard could make bubble wrap obsolete"
