Friday, August 27, 2010

Prize Roundup: NASA and TopCoder/Yet2/InnoCentive, LaserMotive Copter, Armadillo Office Space, Moon Capital, More

Laser-Powered Helicopter Demo At AUVSI Trade Show - LaserMotive

@lasermotive: Update: here's the url for our article in the Unmanned Daily News at the AUVSI trade show. http://bit.ly/ar0XoJ page 12

LaserMotive is getting a lot of interest in booth 227 at the AUVSI trade show!

We have arrived at trade show setup.
http://yfrog.com/n3szlj

Laser-powered helicopter in our AUVSI booth:
http://yfrog.com/jn4acj

Booth 227 at AUVSI is now complete!
http://yfrog.com/n4ptdaj

@pomerantz: #GLXP competitors @JUXTOPIA_JURBAN are co-hosting another Space Entrepreneurship Forum on Capitol Hill this fall: http://bit.ly/dojZ3i

@soldthemoon: Caterpillar joins the sponsors supporting Astrobotic's Moon expedition http://www.astrobotictech.com/ Their slogan: Madagascar to the Moon

Expo displays progress toward Google Lunar X Prize - Astrobotic at the Google Lunar X PRIZE Teams page

@hobbyspacer: Students program ISS robots in NASA/MIT contest: NASA and MIT are sponsoring the Zero Robotics competition in whi... http://bit.ly/bWbDxm

Office cubicle workers, feast your eyes on this one:

@wikkit: Like any job, at 7:30 on a Friday you want to go home, but it's hard to walk out without noticing that it's the on http://twitpic.com/2isgjg

@unrocket: Did first pass garage cleaning last wk. Last night made a pressure test fixture for printed motor. Hope to do static motor test 9/18.

Out of this world - My South End.com:

The competition, called the Moon Capital Competition 2010, calls architects, urban planners, artists, and engineers to submit innovative lunar concept designs for two categories of judging.

Robots explore a Lego lunar surface (photos) - CNET News

NASA Technology Innovation - Volume 15, Number 3 - Magazine for Business & Technology - This 56-pager includes the various Centennial Challenges and LAUNCH:Health in its Upcoming Events section. It also has an article "Open Innovation: A New Business Model for NASA's Space Life Sciences Directorate" on ways for this Directorate to work with external problems solvers using open innovation mediators InnoCentive and Yet2.com. Here's a descriptions of the Yet2 approach:

The posting was for a technology need seeking accurate measurement techniques for bone density and structure. Yet2.com acts as an actual technology scout by searching their network of companies, development organizations and experts for potential solutions based on the specific challenges or gaps, bringing together buyers and sellers of technologies who then establish technology development partnerships.

The Directorate also used TopCoder, the Harvard Business School and the London Business School in an approach where

competitors develop algorithms to help NASA make decisions involved with optimizing the contents of a medical supplies kit that may be carried onboard long-term space missions.