Last summer, a blueberry farm in Oregon was desperate to solve its bird problem. The year before, the farm had lost more blueberries to hungry birds than in any previous growing season, with robins and starlings devouring 25 percent of its crop.
At the start of this year’s growing season, the 168-acre farm installed six Agrilaser Autonomics—which are automated laser guns mounted on a pedestal—and aimed them at its blueberry bushes. The devices shoot a steady green laser beam that sweeps across the bushes from side to side. Birds seem to mistake the sweep of the laser for a predator’s approach, and take flight whenever it comes near.
Bird Control Group, the company that manufactures the lasers, says the devices have reduced the number of birds on the blueberry farm by 99 percent, from an average of 1,500 birds to just a handful. The farm estimates it has saved about 262,500 kilograms (578,713 pounds) of blueberries, worth US $99,733, as a result.
Jonathan Rothberg, a entrepreneur who prides himself on drastically disrupting the biomedical industry every so often, has typically big claims for his new product. The Butterfly iQ, a cheap handheld ultrasound tool with AI smarts tucked inside, will 1) revolutionize medical imaging in hospitals and clinics, 2) change the game in global health, and 3) eventually become a consumer product that will be as ubiquitous as the household thermometer, he says.
Today, Rothberg’s startup Butterfly Network unveiled the tool and announced its FDA clearance for 13 clinical applications, including cardiac scans, fetal and obstetric exams, and musculoskeletal checks. Rather than using a dedicated piece of hardware for the controls and image display, the iQ works with the user’s iPhone. The company says it will start shipping units in 2018 at an initial price of about $2,000.
But that’s just the beginning, Rothberg tells IEEE Spectrum. He expects to bring the price down on the handheld gadget, and is already looking ahead to radically new products. “In the next two years we’ll release a patch that uses ultrasound to monitor patients, and a pill you can swallow to look at cancer from within the body,” he says.
Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We’ll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next two months; here’s what we have so far
20 videos.
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Image: Caltech via YouTube
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Click link below to enjoy 20 videos (Caltech’s Cassie is featured in video #8):
Dustin Shillcox fully embraced the vast landscape of his native Wyoming. He loved snowmobiling, waterskiing, and riding four-wheelers near his hometown of Green River. But on 26 August 2010, when he was 26 years old, that active lifestyle was ripped away. While Shillcox was driving a work van back to the family store, a tire blew out, flipping the vehicle over the median and ejecting Shillcox, who wasn’t wearing a seat belt. He broke his back, sternum, elbow, and four ribs, and his lungs collapsed.
Through his five months of hospitalization, Shillcox’s family remained hopeful. His parents lived out of a camper they’d parked outside the Salt Lake City hospital where he was being treated so they could visit him daily. His sister, Ashley Mullaney, implored friends and family on her blog to pray for a miracle. She delighted in one of her first postaccident communications with her brother: He wrote “beer” on a piece of paper. But as Shillcox’s infections cleared and his bones healed, it became obvious that he was paralyzed from the chest down. He had control of his arms, but his legs were useless.
At first, going out in public in his wheelchair was difficult, Shillcox says, and getting together with friends was awkward. There was always a staircase or a restroom or a vehicle to negotiate, which required a friend to carry him. “They were more than happy to help. The problem was my own self-confidence,” he says.
A few months after being discharged from the hospital, in May 2011, Shillcox saw a news report announcing that researchers had for the first time enabled a paralyzed person to stand on his own. Neuroscientist Susan Harkema at the University of Louisville, in Kentucky, used electrical stimulation to “awaken” the man’s lower spinal cord, and on the first day of the experiments he stood up, able to support all of his weight with just some minor assistance to stay balanced. The stimulation also enabled the subject, 23-year-old Rob Summers, to voluntarily move his legs in other ways. Later, he regained some control of his bladder, bowel, and sexual functions, even when the electrodes were turned off.
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Patient No. 4: Dustin Shillcox volunteered to have electrodes and a pulse generator implanted in his spine. Photo: Greg Ruffing
Since 2004, an antenna sticks out of my head that allows me to hear the color spectrum, from near infrared to near ultraviolet. My head has turned into a music box. I can hear the sky, I can listen to my mother’s eyes and I can hear rainbows.
I don’t feel that I’m using technology, I don’t feel that I’m wearing technology, I feel that I am technology. I don’t perceive my antenna as a device, I perceive it as a part of my body, I perceive it as an organ.
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Photo: Butterfly Network
James' World 2 