Top 10 concept vehicles of 2012

Welcome to the newsletter for Gizmag Emerging Technology Magazine. These are the headlines for December the 31st, 2012. Top 10 concept vehicles of 2012 Doomsday has passed without a gasp, so it looks like humanity still has a future. If the concept cars we saw during the past year are any indication, that future looks very bright. As we prepare to roll the calendars over to 2013, it's time to celebrate the finest concepts that 2012 bestowed upon the world. From voluptuous supercars, to green fuel misers, to the downright abstract and outlandish, it was a big year for concepts and design studies. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile NASA's NEXT ion thruster clocks up continuous operation world record NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) ion engine has set a new world record by clocking up 43,000 hours of continuous operation at NASA's Glenn Research Center's Electric Propulsion Laboratory. The seven-kilowatt thruster is intended to propel future NASA deep space probes on missions where chemical rockets aren't a practical option. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Bicymple looks set to hit the road via crowdfunding route Back in October, we first got a glimpse of a minimalist bicycle called the bicymple that looked to simplify the design of a product that was first brought to market in the late 1800's. To get his creation on the road, Josh Bechtel, has gone the crowdfunding route, and the project is already well on the way to meeting its funding goal after just a few days. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Weird and wonderful: the best instruments of 2012 Should you find yourself thinking about supergroups, you'll likely center on the famous names that make up the bands and not the instruments they use. Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page, for example, rather than the double-necked Gibson EDS-1275, or Cream's Jack Bruce instead of his Gibson EB-3, or Brad Wilk of Audioslave/RATM and not the custom Gretsch drumkits he uses. Being as much fans of the tech behind the hits as the talented folks who create them, we've grouped together a super collection of favorite music-making gadgets from the past year. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile SpaceX's Grasshopper VTVL takes a 40 meter hop The SpaceX Grasshopper vertical takeoff vertical landing (VTVL) testbed has successfully flown to a height of 40 meters (131 ft), hovered for a bit and subsequently landed in a picture perfect test on December 17, 2012. The Grasshopper had previously taken two hops less than 6 m (20 ft) in height, but the latest test was the first that saw it reach an altitude taller than the rocket itself, which is a modified Falcon 9 orbital launch vehicle. The flight lasted 29 seconds from launch to landing, and carried a 1.8 m (6 ft) cowboy dummy to give an indication of scale. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile TaskOne turns the iPhone into a legitimate pocket knife The smartphone is already a modern-day multi-tool, combining communications, entertainment, information access and all kinds of personalized content. But while the smartphone can multitask in the virtual world, it can't do quite as much back in the physical world. The TaskOne iPhone case changes that, giving Apple's smartphone the functionality of an old-school Swiss Army pocket knife. Like the Morgan E Pulse, it seamlessly blends cutting edge technology with retro-inspired design. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Honda to show S2000 roadster concept and many others in Tokyo The S2000 roadster served as Honda's answer to the Mazda Miata during the most recent golden age of the sporty roadster, back around the turn of the millennium. Honda ended production of the car in 2009, but it is bringing it back, if only for a short time. The S2000 Modulo Concept is a concept model that will appear at the 2013 Tokyo Auto Salon next month. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Roboy team aims to build robot toddler in nine months If robots are going to be part of our everyday lives, they'll need to fit into our homes rather than the factory floor. Few people would be comfortable living with a metal spider on tank treads, so the University of Zurich's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (AI Lab) is building a robot toddler called "Roboy." Using "soft robotics" technology that mimics the human body, the 1.2 meter (3 ft, 11 in) tall humanoid robot is part of an effort to make robots that people are more comfortable with in day-to-day situations. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile TARDIS model uses augmented reality to appear "bigger on the inside" Doctor Who. He'd be nothing but an incredibly brainy (if strangely dressed) bloke with two hearts and an attitude if not for his TARDIS. The TARDIS is a combination time machine and spacecraft that can poke into virtually any nook or cranny in the entire history of the Universe. Aside from the marvelous transport capabilities, the most notable thing about the TARDIS is that "It's bigger on the inside!" – a running gag throughout the show. Now, Greg Kumparak has produced an augmented reality model of the TARDIS that produces a remarkable illusion, making the TARDIS indeed appear to be bigger on the inside. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Electric Motion's EM 5.7 electric trials bike built for competition and leisure riding A couple of years ago, I joined the call to bring back cult 80s British TV series Kick Start to our screens. Hosted by ex-children's television presenter Peter Purvis, the popular show tested the skill of accomplished trials bike riders on obstacles ranging from a VW Beetle to slippery logs to near-vertical walls of rock. Such a return today, however, may not necessarily mean the once-familiar sound of the two-stroke engine clattering through the home theater system. After seven years at the helm of French trials bike manufacturer Scorpa, Philippe Aresten has broken loose to market his own Electric Motion trials bike. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Harvard researchers fold proteins with D-Wave quantum computer Many were skeptical when, back in 2007, Canadian company D-Wave announced that it had built the world's first commercially viable quantum computer. Now a study published in the August issue of Nature's Scientific Reports co-authored by D-Wave and Harvard researchers proves the D-Wave One is the real deal. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Review: Nikon D600 The Nikon D600 was the first full frame DSLR aimed squarely at the enthusiast market, though it was admittedly quickly followed by the Canon 6D. It packs a large sensor into a compact body and comes in at a considerably cheaper price than previous full frame cameras. But is the D600 the right first step into the full frame world for current crop sensor shooters? I recently had the opportunity to spend a bit of quality time with one to find out. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Peavey's AT-200 guitar featuring AutoTune technology now available Peavey's AT-200 electric guitar featuring Antares Auto-Tune pitch correction technology, which was launched in January 2012, has now been released. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Would Apple really make an iWatch? Ten years from now, what will mobile devices look like? Will they be lighter, thinner, and more powerful smartphones and tablets? Or will their interfaces move beyond the touchscreen? One possibility is the invisible assistant: a wearable accessory that you interact with by talking and listening. Today one (far-fetched) rumor suggests that Apple could spearhead that future early next year, in the form of the iWatch. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile 64,000 mph asteroid was fastest on record On April 22 this year, a daytime fireball was seen throughout the western United States, accompanied by a loud booming sound heard over much of California's Sierra Nevada mountains around Lake Tahoe. Scientists have now carried out a thorough analysis of the meteorite and found that it was the fastest meteor ever recorded at 28.6 km/s (64,000 mph). Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Japan frontrunner to get International Linear Collider According to Nature, Japan is the frontrunner for the planned International Linear Collider (ILC), for which Europe and the United States are also in the running to host. Scientists and engineers are already examining potential sites in the island nation for the US$7 to $8 billion machine, which is intended to complement the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. The head of the global design effort for the ILC, physicist Barry Barish, presented finalized blueprints at a ceremony in Tokyo earlier this month. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Maps provide "most detailed look ever" at how the brain organizes visual information How does our brain organize the visual information that our eyes capture? Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, used computational models of brain imaging data to answer this question and arrived at what they call "continuous semantic space" – a notion which serves as the basis for the first interactive maps showing how the brain categorizes what we see. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile New collagen scaffolding technique to benefit tissue engineering Collagen is the main component of connective tissues and the most abundant protein in the human body. Biocompatible and biodegradable, it is an excellent material for making scaffolding for tissue engineering. The trouble is, conventional techniques disrupt the fibrous structure of collagen and weaken the end product. Tufts University researchers are aiming to change this with a new technique for fabricating collagen structures that avoids disruption and retains collagen's strength. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile zSpace display simulates motion parallax for more immersive 3D A new interactive 3-D display developed by Californian startup Infinite Z can track hand and eye movements in real time to let users manipulate virtual objects in three dimensions in a highly intuitive way. The zSpace display could bring a new level of realism to computer-aided design, virtual reality simulations, and even gaming. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Cycloramic app spins your iPhone right round, baby, right round Panoramas are all the rage. In the past year, both Apple's iOS 6 and Google's Android 4.2 added panoramic photography. You can even buy accessories that take interactive 360° videos. But a new app called Cycloramic takes a much simpler approach: it shoots panoramic videos by (literally) taking your iPhone 5 for a spin. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile i-Transport robotic vehicle gets wheelchair-bound on their feet Constantly being talked down to is bad enough, but wheelchair users also have to deal with the problem of accessing items that are often located out of their reach. A research team from Taiwan's National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) has developed the "i-Transport" robotic vehicle that is designed to get wheelchair users on their feet so they can carry out conversations eye to eye and grasp hard-to-reach items. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Cushion-coated iSAVE-SC1 electric vehicle is a soft touch It might not win any beauty contests, but this electric vehicle developed by students at Hiroshima University would be my pick if I had the choice of which car I was going to be involved in an accident with. Instead of relying on interior airbags to cushion the driver during a collision, the iSAVE-SC1 is essentially a drivable cushion that should soften the blow for driver and pedestrian alike. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile You are receiving this email because you signed up for our daily newsletter at http://www.gizmag.com. 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