Mantis – a two ton turbo diesel hexapod you can drive

Welcome to the newsletter for Gizmag Emerging Technology Magazine. These are the headlines for April the 8th, 2013. Mantis – a two ton turbo diesel hexapod you can drive The term mad scientist gets thrown around quite a bit, but in the case of one Matt Denton it most certainly applies. His company, Micromagic Systems, has been working steadily over the past four years to design and build a walking robot that's big enough to carry a human passenger. The resulting beast is described as "the biggest, all-terrain operational hexapod robot in the world." Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Ford injects the pickup truck with next-generation technologies For decades, the pickup truck has been the redneck-jock of automobiles – big, strong, dirty and not necessarily all that smart or refined. With the Atlas Concept, Ford envisions a future where the pickup truck adds a dose of technology and refinement. Consider the Atlas Concept that infuriating jock that managed to get straight As while playing a sport every season. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile SOSCharger keeps phones juiced even when there's no electricity When there's a natural disaster or bad storm, power outages are almost guaranteed. This can be an annoyance during a minor storm, but during a more serious disaster, a lack of power can mean not being able to get in touch with friends, loved ones, and in the worst of situations, help. The SOSCharger is designed to combat this by allowing users to keep their phone charged with a simple hand crank. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile B9Creator personal 3D printer bests its competition With so many personal 3D printers hitting the market, it can be difficult to decide which one is right for you. Over the years we've seen plenty of attractive options, but few have matched the price-performance of the B9Creator, a Digital Light Processing (DLP) projector-based 3D printer that was created by Michael Joyce of South Dakota. After a successful crowd-funding campaign last year (where the original B9Creator was launched to the tune of more than US$500,000), he's back with an upgraded kit that irons out some of its issues. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile The new Jeep Cherokee gets official After more than a decade, the Jeep Liberty has announced its retirement and appointed its predecessor its successor. The new 2014 Jeep Cherokee trades the hard-lined edge of the XJ for a more consumer-friendly small-crossover design. Jeep promises that it offers plenty of capability for those that want it but in a more refined, practical package than ever before. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Improving hot water heating efficiency ... with cold water Apart from heating and cooling the house, water heating is one of the biggest energy drains in the average home. But what if you could literally use cold water to create hot water? That's just what San Diego inventor Hal Slater claims to have done with the creation of a water heater system that promises to improve water heating efficiency by as much as 50 to 100 percent. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile If IKEA made a bike, it might look like the Sawyer There was a time when wooden-framed bicycles were quite the oddity. While you still don't see them much in stores, it's now not that unusual to come across models such as the Lagomorph or Renovo's duo bikes on the internet. The Sawyer, however, is a little different – it's a lowrider cruiser bike, that's quite obviously built from flat sheets of beech plywood. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Hennessey Venom GT claims fastest production car run of 265.7 mph After the pomp and civility of the New York Auto Show, it's nice for automotive manufacturers to take a break, get some air, break 265 mph, hit the spa, etc. And so it would be that on a bleak Californian airstrip, that some brave individual in a very much modified machine would hurtle himself down an airforce grade runway to a speed of 265.7 mph (426.7 km/h), making the Hennessey Venom GT the fastest production car on the planet. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Review: BMW's K1600GTL, featuring headlights that look around the corners The BMW K1600GTL is a luxury mega-tourer. It falls into that category of bikes that has next to zero relevance to me at this point in my riding life cycle, as I've got no current plans to circumnavigate Australia or have a crack at the Saddlesore 1000. And yet I've actually been hanging out to get my hands on one of these things, because it features what I'd call the single coolest innovation I've seen on a motorcycle since I first put aside my prejudices and felt just how good the Piaggio MP3 tilting 3-wheeler is to ride. It's the second coolest thing I've thrown a leg over this week. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Phinergy's metal-air battery could eliminate EV range anxiety Israel-based company Phinergy claims to have developed metal-air battery technology that promises to end the range anxiety associated with electric vehicles. The company's battery currently consists of 50 aluminum plates, each providing energy for around 20 miles (32 km) of driving. This adds up to a total potential range of 1,000 miles (1,609 km), with stops required only every couple of hundred miles to refill the system with water. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile World's largest solar-powered boat returns to the oceans in the name of science The MS Tûranor PlanetSolar, the world's largest solar-powered boat, took to the seas once more on Thursday – this time, in the name of science. Equipped with unique instruments, the Tûranor will carry a team of scientists who will monitor the air and water of the Atlantic Ocean's Gulf Stream, a current which influences the climates of North America's east coast and Europe's west. The goal is to gain understanding of the processes which regulate climate. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Detroit Electric unveils "fastest pure-electric production car on the market" High-performance electric cars have been around for some years now, but despite the fact that Detroit and the electric car go back a long way, no all-electric supercars have been built in the Motor City. That is, until now. After giving us a bit of a tease last month, Detroit Electric has taken the wraps off its Limited-edition SP.01. According to its maker, the SP.01 is not only the "first pure electric sports car" to come out of Detroit, but it's also reportedly the fastest, and the first to be fully integrated with a smartphone. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Bracelet uses social network to protect civil rights activists Fighting for human rights is a noble undertaking, but it's also extremely dangerous in places where that fight isn't about simply arguing over abstractions. Aware of the very real possibility of campaigners being beaten, kidnapped or murdered, Civil Rights Defenders in Stockholm has launched the Natalia Project. Named after Natalia Estemirova, a human rights activist who was abducted and murdered in Chechnya in 2009, it's based on an electronic bracelet that sends a pre-programmed text alarm if activated or forcibly removed. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile EWICON bladeless wind turbine generates electricity using charged water droplets Wind energy may be one of the more sustainable sources of power available, but the spinning blades of conventional wind turbines require regular maintenance and have attracted criticism from bird lovers. That might explain why we've seen wind turbine prototypes that enclose the blades in a chamber or replace them entirely with a disc-like system. But researchers in the Netherlands set out to eliminate the need for a mechanical component entirely and created the EWICON, a bladeless wind turbine with no moving parts that produces electricity using charged water droplets. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Students set sights on human-powered submarine speed record Students at the University of Warwick have announced their intention to build a human-powered submarine to compete at that highlight of the human-powered submarine events calendar, the European International Submarine Races in 2014. The team of engineering students hopes that their vessel, already named HPS Shakespeare, will beat the current speed record for a single-seat human-powered sub. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Shades of Terminator as PETMAN tests hazmat suit Back in late 2009 Boston Dynamics revealed it was working on a humanoid robot that would test protective clothing for the military. Having already amazed the world three years earlier with the lifelike balancing capabilities of its quadruped BigDog, this would be the company's first bipedal robot. It was an ambitious project, but it appears the work has paid off. The robot's eerily realistic body movements are made all the more convincing now that its mechanical nature is hidden by a chemical protection suit. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Subaru introduces its first production hybrid Most auto companies have at least a hybrid or two within their line-ups, but through the 2013 model year, Subaru remains the exception. That will change come 2014, when the automaker adds the all-new XV Crosstrek Hybrid to its line. The new crossover gets some extra electricity to add efficiency, but maintains Subaru's well-established utility and all-conditions versatility. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Apple patent reveals futuristic iPhone with wrap-around AMOLED display A new release by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) might just provide a glimpse of the future of Apple's popular iPhone handset. The filing details an "electronic device with wrap around display" and includes a number interesting design features, paramount among which is its curved display and transparent housing. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Review: ShaveTech USB travel razor I like to pack light when I travel. If possible, I even try to only bring a carry-on bag on flights. Therefore, I welcome anything that allows me to carry less stuff. The ShaveTech USB-powered razor is just such an item – it has most of the functionality of a full-sized electric razor, yet it's about the size of a smartphone. Over the past several days, I've had the chance to try the thing out. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile EyeFly 3D screen protector film adds an extra dimension to your mobile device The EyeFly 3D screen protector film, brought to consumers by Nanovue, promises to turn regular screens in mobile devices into glasses-free 3D displays. The product, originally nano-engineered by the Temasek Polytechnic (TP) and A*STAR's Institute of Materials Research and Engineering's (IMRE) in Singapore, is not the first of its kind of the market, but Nanovue claims it offers considerable advantages over competitors. The film has no perceivable influence on screen brightness, works both in portrait and landscape mode and, most importantly, does not distort regular 2D images. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Philips 22-W LED is first Energy Star 100-W equivalent bulb ... but why? Philips has announced that its 22-watt LED lightbulb is the first 100-watt tungsten equivalent bulb to have been awarded Energy Star certification. Often referred to as the A21, which is actually just one of several standard forms for light bulbs that this bulb happens to conform to, Philips' 22-W bulb puts out "nearly" 1,800 lumens for an efficacy of about 82 lumens/watt (lm/W). It's a fine spec, but not too dissimilar to the competition, which raises the question of why Philips' product has been singled out. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Review: Photojojo's Pocket Spotlight Never before have I so wished that I could use a device for taking photos of that device. That was certainly the case with Photojojo's US$30 Pocket Spotlight, however. It's simply a tiny battery-powered array of 32 LED bulbs, that provide a source of soft, even light as an alternative to the harsh light of a flash. While serious photographers will already have proper lighting systems of their own, it's a nice tool for all the point-and-shooters out there. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Epiphany Eyewear: the not-as-smart glasses you can pre-order today Are you pulling your hair out waiting for Google Glass to launch? One company has an alternative that you can pre-order right now. There is, however, a big catch. Actually, make that several big catches – as the device's limitations might be too numerous for you to bother. Read on Desktop or Read on Mobile Special promotion for Gizmag readers Open Source Security Tools: A Practical Guide to Security Applications Written with the harried IT manager in mind, Open Source Security Tools is a practical, hands-on introduction to open source security tools. Seasoned security expert Tony Howlett has reviewed the overwhelming assortment of these free and low-cost solutions to provide you with the "best of breed" for all major areas of information security. Read More You are receiving this email because you signed up for our daily newsletter at http://www.gizmag.com. If you would like to switch to our daily newsletter, click here If you no longer wish to receive this newsletter please click here to unsubscribe. COPYRIGHT GIZMAG (C) 2013