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“DEVASTATING DAMAGE EXPECTED.” By the time the National Weather Service issued this ominous alert on the morning of Aug. 28, 2005, Hurricane Katrina had morphed from a relatively weak Category 1 hurricane to a Category 5 tropical monster – and was spiraling straight toward New Orleans.The city would be “uninhabitable for weeks … perhaps longer,” the weather service warned. Half the houses would lose their roofs. Commercial buildings would be unusable, and apartment buildings would be destroyed....

View full post on YoutubeMotorcyclists can be just as stirred by the auditory experience as they are by the thrill of moving through space on two wheels. So while the Polaris-owned Indian Motorcycles company is busily reinventing the 101 year-old brand, they teased audiences at last week’s Long Beach International Motorcycle Show with an audio clip evoking the barking glory of the engine that will power their future bikes.The choppy song of the (presumably) air-cooled, common pin v-twin is an auditory battle cry against the Harley-Davidson Motor Company, which was founded just two years after the periodically defunct but soon-to-be revitalized Indian brand....

Media Platforms Design TeamJust in case you’re wondering how impactful the launch of a new video game can be, consider that Mercedes-Benz built this concept car expressly to showcase the virtual car it designed for Gran Turismo 6. Video games are serious business.This concept isn’t a running prototype and doesn’t stand a chance for production. But just look at those proportions—this is by far the sexiest car we’ve seen at the show this year....

Media Platforms Design TeamInternational Space Station Commander Barry “Butch” Wilmore holds up the first object made in space with additive manufacturing or 3-D printing. Wilmore installed the printer on Nov. 17, 2014, and helped crews on the ground with the first print on Nov. 25, 2014. (Photo Credit: NASA) 3D printing is officially out of this world: astronauts aboard the International Space Station used the new onboard 3D printer to print a replacement part, creating a faceplate for the printhead....

We know all about the troubled and controversial development of the F-35. But now, one military think tank is suggesting that the U.S. Navy would be better off forgetting the billions invested in this plane entirely. A new report by the Center for New American Security suggests that the Navy should cancel the F-35C, its carrier-borne version of the Joint Strike Fighter, and replace it with killer drones.Retired U.S. naval aviator Captain Jerry Hendrix, author of the report, argues that the range of current carrier strike aircraft, and the upcoming F-35C, are insufficient for modern threats....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe GearNVIDIA has given 3D a reboot, turning the classic red-and-blue lenses of the 1950s into futuristic eyewear for piloting a virtual shuttle pod. But cool glasses aren’t the only thing you’ll need to bring 3D to your home. NVIDIA’s 3D technology requires two other components. The first is a 120 Hz LCD monitor like the 22-inch FuHzion by ViewSonic. The 120 Hz speed creates flicker-free viewing, greatly reducing stress on the eyes....

Media Platforms Design TeamUnscrewing a sensor and replacing it is pretty straightforward. You might need this special socket to clear the wires.Twelve years and more than 100,000 miles have passed under your trusty commuter and the Check Engine light has never, ever, winked at you … until yesterday, when it coincidentally anticipated your state inspection appointment at the end of the month. Rats! The car will never pass the emissions test with that light on....

Media Platforms Design TeamSure, robots candrive carsclean floorsperform surgeriesgo to wartop technophiles acknowledge and , and . But as the promises of science fiction give way to the realities of daily inconvenience, even that near-term innovations will fall short of full-on robotic butlers—but they will make our live a little easier.The latest breakthrough in gee-whiz convenience: the rise of the robotic parking garage, a machine that stores (or retrieves) your car—unmanned—in 90 seconds, all the while ensuring that you’ll never be on the receiving end of an attendant’s Ferris Bueller-esque joyride....

We’ve all seen those crazy climber selfies. Daredevils like Ivan Kuznetsov have perfected the make-your-palms-sweat art form on Instagram. There’s a subreddit devoted to terrifying variations on it. Plug “crazy climb” into YouTube and you’ll find more examples than you can bear to watch. It’s a world-wide phenomenon, but Russia seems to harbor the bulk of practitioners. And it’s begging them to stop with a pretty hilarious safety campaign.To be fair, hanging off a roof while taking picture of yourself is incredibly dangerous....

Media Platforms Design TeamFor The Amazing Spider-Man, out July 3, director Marc Webb wanted actor Andrew Garfield and the film’s stuntmen to do Spidey’s signature web slinging for real. Figuring out just how to pull that off fell to stunt coordinator Andy Armstrong, who has overseen action in Galaxy Quest, Thor, and many other films. His solution: Put the actors in the air with customizable, one-of-a-kind rig systems. Before he built anything, Armstrong had to perfect the physics....

MIT WEEK: OTHER ARTICLES IN THIS SERIES* MONDAY: MIT Fights for Clean Power With Holy Grail of Fusion in Reach* TUESDAY: Turning Disabled Into Gamers, MIT Spreads Robot Rehab* WEDNESDAY: With Electric Scooter, MIT Hopes To Rev Up Practical Transport* THURSDAY: Crash-Proof UAVs Fly Blind at MIT’s High-Tech Aerodrome* FRIDAY: MIT’s Efficient Nanowire Storage Could Replace Car Batteries* TIME MACHINE: Classic PM Cover Tracked MIT’s Early Solar PowerCAMBRIDGE, Mass. – It sounds like nirvana for nerds: playing a video game while strapped to a robot whose only job is to get you a higher score....

Media Platforms Design TeamTwo computers programmers created this perfect “fixed it for you” response to a Barbie project that showed the blonde heroine as unable to learn programming languages.The original book, Barbie: I Can Be a Computer Engineer, sounded like a good idea at the time. It saw the former dentist’s assistant, police officer, and aerobics instructor try her hand at a computer science degree. Rather than building her own app and launching a startup, though, Barbie found herself in a familiar “I’m just a girl” world where she manages to riddle a computer with viruses just by touching it before settling in as a designer (while men around her do all the coding work)....

UPDATE, 9:44 AM ET: Touchdown!Media Platforms Design TeamUPDATE, 9:33 AM ET: The parachute has successfully deployed, and the Soyuz should touch down in about 10 minutes.Expedition 43 astronauts Samantha Cristoforetti of Italy, Anton Shkaplerov of Russia, and Terry Virts of the U.S. return home today after 200 days in space. They’re scheduled to touch down at 9:43 AM Eastern. Watch it live here:View full post on IframeThe trio was supposed to come home in May, but couldn’t because of a Russian equipment failure....

Media Platforms Design TeamSprint just announced its first Wimax phone, the HTC Evo. And boy is it a duesy. Yes, it has Wimax, but it also beams out a mobile WiFi hotspot to up to 8 devices, can run flash and has an 8-megapixel(!) cameraphone that also shoots 720p HD video.Of course, these are all features absent on the current iPhone. This isn’t surprising, considering Apple’s famously stingy approach to feature rollouts....

Now that Google’s developer conference is over, it’s Apple’s turn. The Cupertino fruit company’s World Wide Developer Conference kicks off with a keynote on June 8th where we’ll see what’s on the menu for Apple’s software this year, including new versions of iOS and OS X. Here’s what to expect. They keynote is happening right now! Follow our live coverage right here.iOS 9 It’s virtually 100 percent that we’ll get an announcement for iOS 9....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe Beatles: Rock Band: $60 for game, $250 for limited-edition instrument bundleThe much-hyped new Rock Band release eschews a scattershot set list for a fine focus on the Fab Four. The result: a cross-generational romp through music history that’s sure to get some unlikely family members to pick up plastic instruments and drum, strum and sing along with the most beloved band of all time. Call it catnip for Beatlemaniacs, and probably the most pleasing game of the holiday season for people who aren’t into Modern Warfare 2 or Halo....

Media Platforms Design Team1) Future Vehicle Technologies (FTV) eVaroThe eVaro was the hot rod of the X-Prize group at SEMA. The sleek, two-seat-tandem three-wheeled vehicle is said to top 130 mph, have an electric range of 125 miles and charge up in around 3 hours. The twin electric motors are powered by lithium-ion batteries and are said to launch the car to 60 mph in 5 seconds. Unlike some, FTV has brought all of its componentry development as well as the construction completely in-house....

Media Platforms Design TeamGetting out of the car and squatting down to open a garage door yourself is mostly a thing of the past. And for all the wonders of just sitting there in the driveway while your garage door opens itself, there are some tradeoffs. A hacked kids’ toy from Mattel can also open your garage door, for instance. OpenSesame is a project by Samy Kamkar—the same guy who built that Master Lock-cracker—that uses the now discontinued “Radica Girltech IM-ME” texting toy to fool electronic garage doors into opening up....

Being President comes with advantages, like 1.02 million Twitter followers (and counting!) since Barack Obama since his first tweet from his new personal account today. But it also has its downsides, like being stuck using a positively ancient BlackBerry phone for security purposes. Which is why it’s curious that Obama’s inaugural @POTUS tweet came from an iPhone. (He better have two-factor authentication on). The fact that Obama’s tweet was coming from an unauthorized phone came by way of Charlie Spiering, who pointed it out in a tweet referencing an interview in 2013 where the Commander-in-Chief bemoaned his lack of options....

Media Platforms Design TeamAt first glance, BMW’s Active Tourer Outdoor concept makes a fair amount of sense for bicyclists. Take a compact car, add relatively cavernous cargo space, line it with ruggedized materials, throw in an hybrid powertrain, and the end result is—as the name suggests—the Ultimate Driving Machine for cyclists—offering them a perfect car for zipping up to isolated, windy mountain roads.It’s even got a fold-out rack that allows for storage of two bikes in the back with plenty of room to spare....