Audi Autonomous TTS
Audi is working hard on a car that doesn’t require the driver to anything except sit there and watch the scenery go by. It’s called the “Autonomous Audi TTS,” not the catchiest of names, and it’s “intended to explore the best capabilities of current and future driver assistance technologies.” (Pics and video)
 

Captured on film

Obsessed with cameras much?  While you can probably deny it, the owner of this vehicle – the Camera Van – can’t.  Literally decked in thousands of cameras, it’s what the Google Street View cars would have looked like if their designers had some panache.  Or were clinically insane.  Either will do.
First created by [...]

“Whoa dude! Clean your lens or something”
The photos we have this week are guaranteed to hit you from left field. In fact, that’s where we keep all the things we want to hit you with – left field. If you are ever interested in going to left field, just turn around, you’ll find it on your blind [...]

Cool Rider
Now you can have all the fun of a Segway without looking like a dork. Notice how the Cool Rider is positioned to be a much more stylish conveyance, ridden by a suave gentleman with an insouciant sunglasses-wearing air.
 

Rabbitsfoot Mussel
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is out with its annual list of proposed candidate species, or “candidate notice of review.” That is, plants and animals that the agency says may be designated as endangered unless conservation measures are taken to protect them.

Today, the world comes to an end. Well, in theaters, anyway. 2012 has us thinking about the apocalypse ’round these parts (so uplifting, we know), and that led us to wondering about all the crazy technology that’s all around us — technology that at one point or another caused widespread fear that it was all [...]

Sleep Box
Russian architects Arch Group have designed a booth for taking a quick nap in busy urban environments.  Called Sleepbox, the units could be rented for between fifteen minutes and several hours.  The architects envisage them installed at train stations, airports and shopping centres.  (Pics)
 

Xray
To mark its centenary, in June the Science Museum in London had its curators select the 10 objects in its collection that had made the biggest mark on history. These then went to a public vote to find the most important invention of past centuries. Visitors to the museum and online voters cast nearly 50,000 [...]

It was tiny music to the ears, but their cuteness was overwhelming
Each week the photos that come across our desk are both amazing, weird, mysterious, strange, and wonderful. And those are just the photos that people have take of me.  A great photo is an inspiring piece of culture. It has a way of capturing [...]

Home farming
Philips Design recently completed a design probe looking at the future of food.  The project investigated how we might eat and source our food 15-20 years from now. the probe looks at social trends occurring today and extrapolates them to project possible futures.  The research led the designers to create three projects which solidified [...]

Leonard DaVinci’s masterpiece Mona Lisa
The secret behind Mona Lisa’s enigmatic smile has been explained by scientists who believe it changes depending on which part of the eye sees it first.  One of the charms of the world’s most famous painting is that she appears radiant one moment and then serious and sardonic the next.  Now [...]

Baby Tesla’s favorite holiday was always Halloween
The only difference between daytime and night time is sunshine. Well, that and vampires and other creatures of the night that never come out during the daytime because the sunshine will cause their face to melt. Some people would actually look better if they let their face melt, but [...]

ROPID
A new, even cuter, Japanese robot has hit the scene called ROPID. Developed by Tomotaka Takahashi of Robo Garage at Kyoto University, the tiny robot can respond to voice commands and actually has a mouth that moves when it speaks. (Video and pics)
 

Featured Invention at the Colorado Inventor Showcase 2009
Clear Magna Stor is a unique organizing system for many of your unususl storage needs. They have been field tested for over three years on the roof of a tool van, as well as in workshops, offices, craft areas, kitchens, sewing rooms. There are virtually an unlimited range of [...]

Photo Manipulations are always very interesting to watch because – and that’s what is important – they give a realistic view of an unreal picture. Erik Johansson, a 23-year-old computer engineering student, from sweden has a sense for good ideas for manipulations.
1. First of all we would like to thank you for taking the time [...]

The grueling 150-mile (240km) Sand Marathon (Marathon des Sables) takes place near Ouarzazate in Morocco. Around 700 dedicated competitors from around the world take on the course over 11 long days. (Pics)
 

Somehow judgement day feels different when you’re a highly trained cow
The reason why we spend time putting together this weekly assortment of “life beyond the edge” photos is because creativity is inspiring. Ingenuity has a way of unleashing the inner trolls in each of us and replacing them with the kinder, more gentler turbo-gnomes [...]

South Korea’s super skyscraper
A new super skyscraper has just been announced for South Korea and will tower over all other buildings in Asia when it is complete in 2014. From a global perspective, Lotte Super Tower 123, designed by Kohn Pederson Fox, falls just short of taking the title, and will be not the tallest [...]

Lighthouse in a storm
Some of these photos are facinating, some are disturbing, but all tell a story. (pics)
 

Cows are both the cause and the victims of today’s obesity problem
Last week we started down a different path, but somehow we ended up on the path we were meant to be on anyway. So we’ve concluded that there are no different paths. Every “new” path is merely our destiny wrapped in new clothing, secretly [...]

Dolphins have been filmed playing an impromptu game of football… using a jellyfish as an improvised ball.  A team of marine biologists were astonished to see a dolphin swim under a jellyfish and with a quick flick of its tail shoot it out of the water. (Pics and video)
 

Barack Obama
Before they were regulars in front of the camera on The Hill, most politicos practiced posing during their schooldays. We’ve rounded up our favorite yearbook pictures, including Barack Obama’s disco suit and Joe Biden’s dreamy gaze.
 

The pale halo-shaped cloud was hovering over Moscow on Wednesday
In what could have been a scene from the film Independence Day, a luminous ring-shaped cloud could be seen hovering over the city of Moscow last week.  The pale gold ‘halo’ could be seen above the Russian capital city’s Western District on Wednesday, and was captured [...]

The pit crew worked furiously to get Bossy ready to roll again,
but as everyone knew, cow repair was not an exact science

Andy Warhol once said, “Before I was shot, I always thought that I was more half-there than all-there – I always suspected that I was watching TV instead of living life. Right when I [...]

While we’ve all heard of diseases, seen someone with a disease, and had a disease personally, it’s unlikely that we’ve encountered a rare disease. In the non-medical world, people use and interchange disease to mean infection, sickness, illness, or something similar. In the medical world, a disease is an abnormal condition that impairs bodily functions [...]