Great Innovations from Japan
A while back I found about a brilliant and cute “BeetBot“. They describe it best.
Keepon is designed to interact with children by communicating attention and emotion. It has four degrees of freedom: attention is directed by turning +/-180° and nodding +/-40°, while emotion is expressed by rocking side-to-side +/-25° and bobbing up to 15mm.
In addition to his role as a BeatBot, Keepon is used in research on social development and communication. Keepon is a research platform and is not commercially available at this time.
It might only a research platform now, but damn, I want one 🙂
Update: lol! I keep watching this video and I just can’t get enough of that beetbot. 🙂
Another innovation I found on Digg this morning, that comes from Japan, is pee powered batteries.
Yes, you heard me right. They’ve created batteries that can be recharged using you own urine. 🙂
NoPoPo (Non-Pollution Power) Aqua Batteries now available in AA and AAA, but more sizes to come. “The batteries can be recharged with various different fluids using the new development which forms electric power using liquid as a catalyst.” Each battery can last up to 10 years and they do not contain any mecury or other harmful material, so it’s environmentally safe.
Now that’s innovative.
On a final note, those Japanese might be innovative, but they sure are working too hard.