Researchers at the University of the West of England have snagged a grant to fund the building of a whole new type of robot -- a non-silicon, biological plasmobot, built using plasmodium, a vegetative type of slime mold. The mold, which is commonly found living in forests and gardens, is, according to researcher Andy Adamatzky, a "naturally occurring substance with its own built in intelligence," which is capable of carrying out complex tasks, like figuring out the shortest path between two points -- all on its own. The aim for the plasmobot will be for it to sense objects, span them in the shortest way possible, and carry tiny objects along pre-determined routes, controlled by light and electromagnetic fields. The plasmobot should also be capable of complex "number crunching power," enabled by parallel inputs and outputs. Long-term uses could include using the bots within the human body to deliver drugs to specific targets. Though much of this is still purely theoretical (and extremely complicated), we look forward to the day when we're all covered in mold, don't you?

Filed under: Robots

English scientists set out to build first biological robot using mold originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 16:18:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Hardware, Multimedia, iPhone, iPod touch

Last night I received an email from a friend who was irate. He's been using his iPod touch as a portable video solution with a dock and video out cable. The iPod and the cable got along famously until he updated to iPhone OS 3.0.1 OS 3.0 [sorry, there isn't a 3.0.1 for the iPod touch]. Now, the iPod refuses to recognize it. Same cable, same dock, same iPod.

We looked around and found that he's not alone. There's a thread on Apple's Discussion Boards reporting the same thing. It's affecting both the iPod touch and the iPhone. Apparently 3.0 is specifically designed to reject 3rd party cables, strictly on the premise that they fail the "Made by Apple" test. One poster on the discussion board notes that the original Apple Component AV cable and dock work fine. Sure, you could restore and downgrade, but that seems silly.

Of course, no company has a responsibility to support 3rd party devices, so my friend is out of luck. But we're sympathetic. If you're affected by this issue, all we can say is it's probably time to pony up for a cable from Apple.

TUAWiPhone OS 3.0 breaking video out originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It's sort of interesting that China is where all the Android action seems to be going down lately, but here we are, staring at the LG GW880 -- essentially the company's first Android phone. Of course, "Android" in this case means China Mobile's custom WiFi-less OPhone platform, which means we'll probably never see this guy outside of the Middle Kingdom, but it's a fair look at what LG's handset designers think an Android set should look like: 3.5-inch WVGA touchscreen, 256MB RAM, GPS, and a five megapixel camera. Honestly? We're hoping LG has grander plans for those other Android phones it has planned for this year -- we'll just have to wait and see. Hit the read link for a few more shots in the meantime.

[Via Slashphone]

Filed under: Cellphones

LG GW880 leaks out, runs Android on China Mobile originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Odds and ends, MobileMe

Update 2:30p ET 9/1: We've heard more from the theft victim; see the latest news on this crime story here.

We're getting our share of crime stories lately, and today's is really a jaw dropper. I'm going to be sketchy on details and locations because there is an investigation underway.

Here's what we have so far. An East Coast man had his house broken into with 2 Macs and one PC stolen, along with some other household items of value.

One of the Macs was a laptop, and our victim bought a new MacBook Pro to replace it, and used a Time Machine backup to restore all his files. The crime was reported to police, who said they had no leads, but there had been a string of similar burglaries in the area for quite some time.

When our victim (we'll call him Jim) sat down at his replacement laptop last night, he saw one of his missing computers come up as a share via the Back to My Mac feature of MobileMe. He clicked on the share, and explored the files of his stolen machine. You can guess what comes next. Taking a chance, he clicked on screen sharing, and saw that someone was using his Mac, checking lottery numbers on a web page.

Jim didn't want to take control of the Mac, so he just watched, fascinated. Later, when activity on his missing computer stopped, he went to the network panel and grabbed an IP address, and took a screen shot of it.

This morning, he saw someone applying for a job online using the stolen laptop, and Jim now has the Social Security number, address and phone number used on the job application. Jim speculates it is possible the machine has been sold to someone and that is who was applying for the job. Or it could still be with the crooks.

He's contacted the police, and we don't know how this saga ends yet, but we'll let you know how it all works out. So far we've got a pretty smart victim and some really dumb crooks. Jim says he is sure he'll be renewing MobileMe when it's time.

Details at 11.

[Thanks to 'Jim' for sharing his experience with all of us]

TUAWAn incredible stolen Mac story without a final chapter originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Canon's seemingly imminent EOS 7D DSLR may still not be fully official just yet, but there's certainly no end to the leaks these days, with the camera's complete video specs only the latest to surface. Assuming this latest rumor is on the mark, it looks like you can expect to get your choice of 24, 25 or 30 fps video at full 1080p, or 50 or 60 fps at 720p, along with an external mic, full manual controls (though not continuous focus, it seems), some in-camera editing options and, of course, and HDMI out port for some big screen viewing. What's left to know? A price and release date, for starters -- but hopefully Canon itself will clear those details up (and confirm the rest) before too long.

Filed under: Digital Cameras

Canon EOS 7D video specs get detailed originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Rumors, Wireless, Odds and ends, iPhone

Gene Munster, the Piper Jaffrey senior research analyst who usually hits the nail on the head when it comes to Apple forecasts, thinks that Apple will move to multiple U.S. carriers within the next year. He believe that this will happen next summer, which has been the time when Apple has introduced new models of the iPhone.

Munster noted that having multiple carriers in a market has helped Apple to achieve greater success in terms of market penetration. He pointed to France as an example; originally, Apple inked an exclusive arrangement with Orange. When it moved to a multi-carrier deal, Apple's market share in France jumped to about the 40 percent range. In the U.S., the iPhone's market share is only in the mid-teens.

Many industry pundits expect the next iPhone carrier to be Verizon, since they are beginning a transition to a new, iPhone-compatible 4G network (LTE) in the next year. This would make the transition rather simple for Apple, since they wouldn't have to design an EV-DO iPhone, but instead just use the current hardware design.

Update: Per TUAW reader Ben C., the Verizon 4G transition is not expected to be completed until 2013. In addition, a CDMA-based iPhone would need to be deployed for Verizon. Thanks for the correction and explanation.

[via LoopInsight]

TUAWGene Munster: iPhone on multiple U.S. carriers in 2010 originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Desktops

Intel rumored to be launching new Core i5, i7 processors September 8th originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 31 Aug 2009 13:54:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The worldwide leader in flash memory cards, SanDisk Corporation has launched its new tiny and stylish Sansa Clip+ MP3 player, which features outstanding sound quality, FM radio, voice recorder and long battery life, fully compatible with SanDisk slotRadio, slotMusic as well as any microSD card pre-loaded with music, thanks to its new microSD memory expansion [...]

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