Explorer

Canada's RADARSAT program has a long history, going back to experimenting with radar sensors onboard the Convair 580 aircraft, which is now in the collection of the Canada Aviation and Space Museum.

The term “bug” is another way of saying something is wrong with our computer or software, but where did the term come from? While many attribute the reference to computer scientist Grace Hopper, this article from Curiosity explains that it dates back to Thomas Edison’s private journals.

Last summer, the Canada Science and Technology Museum offered up access to its collection so that researcher Jennifer Thivierge could study “keypunch girls” — the women who punched holes in data cards and fed them into machines or tabulators, starting in the 1950s. The University of Ottawa’s Gazette writes about her findings, and what they say about gender discrimination within the field of computer science.

Since its invention in the 70s, the Rubik’s Cube has entertained, challenged, and frustrated users around the world. Last month, a pair of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology devised a robot capable of solving the popular 3D puzzle in an astounding 0.38 seconds. Read the full story – and watch a video that shows the robot in action. http://news.mit.edu/2018/featured-video-solving-rubiks-cube-record-time-0316

Since the deciphering of the honey bee ‘waggle’ in the 1920’s by Karl von Frisch, researchers have been measuring the dance-like form of communication that allows bees to convey direction and distance to a food source. While this observation process was initially manual and time-consuming – requiring humans, protractors, and stopwatches – techniques have evolved with technology. Recently, a team from the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the Free University of Berlin, Germany

Engineers are constantly taking cues from nature when designing new technologies, and the robotic tentacle arm created by German robotics company, Festo, is a great example.