Technology

New Digits of Pi

piA computer scientist at Yahoo has used “cloud computing” to find the most distant digits yet of pi’s decimal expansion.

This new approach to networking machines and processors, allowing them to act as one super-computer rather than, say, 100 individuals, allowed this record-setting calculation to be in 23 days when, under normal circumstances, it would have taken nearly 500 years.

Apparently a similar approach at Google resulted in verifying that every configuration of the Rubik’s cube can be solved in 20 moves or less.

By patrick honner, ago

Meet the Egg-Bot

egg-botThis is pretty awesome:  an assemble-yourself perhipheral that allows you to draw on spherical/ellipsoidal/other objects:  the egg-bot!

http://egg-bot.com/

Plug it in to your USB port, render your drawing in a freeware illustration program, and voila!  And it’s open-source:  both hardware and software.

There are so many interesting things that could be done with the egg-bot:  sketching grid lines on ellipsoids to illustrate parametric surfaces, investigating how projection affects map-making, graphing closed-curves on golf balls, or maybe just creating the greatest Easter Eggs in human history.

By patrick honner, ago

3-D Printing

3d PrinterThe NYT has an interesting article about the increased use of 3D printers in commercial applications.  Nowadays, companies are using the technology to build custom furniture, low-cost prosthetic limbs, and even housing components.

Basically, the geometry of the object is laid-out in software (like Autodesk), and the “printer” then translates the design into reality by extruding layers of hot plastic, one after another, building the object up essentially by printing one cross section at a time.

It seems that the process is becoming more commonplace and less expensive, opening the door for a wider array of commercial uses.  I’ve seen students using this technology, and it is a pretty remarkable advance.  I believe you can even have a custom-designed plastic guitar built! 

By patrick honner, ago

Real-Life Transformers

folding robotsThis is an absolutely mind-blowing idea:  robotic “paper” that can fold itself into an arbitrary three dimensional object.  Be sure to watch the short video accompanying the article.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2010/programmable-matter-0805.html

Tying (or folding?) all of the physics and engineering together here is the mathematics of origami.  How can you fold a square sheet into a boat?  A plane?  A tetrahedron?  A super-intelligent robotic giraffe?

By patrick honner, ago

What is the Hardest Word to Guess in Hangman?

hangmanIn 2007 Jon McLoone used Mathematica to create a Hangman game pitting the computer guesser against the human word-selector.  As his daughter became old enough to play against the demonstration, and old enough to get frustrated with the computer guesser always winning, she asked her dad the obvious question:  to beat the computer, what are the best words to choose?

Surprised that he had not considered such a good question himself, McLoone set about playing 15 million games of Hangman (automated, I imagine) using every word in the dictionary and arming the computer with a number of different letter-guessing-strategies.  The word that the computer failed to guess the most often was somewhat surprising.

So what kinds of strategies make the best guesser?  And to counter that, what kinds of strategies should the word-selector employ?

By patrick honner, ago
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