Desert of the Mind

A couple months ago I stumbled across Fab@Home and knew right away I needed to build one of those machines - basically a 3D printer that lays down layers of silicone to build an object. Well, plans change, and I ended up building a CNC router instead, but it was close enough and my craving was nonetheless satisfied.  Continue reading »

If you still spend your Friday nights staring at an untuned TV in hopes of spotting a signal from an alien world, you haven’t yet discovered the Stardust@Home project.  For the past year and a half volunteers have been sifting through microscopic pictures of tiny portions of aerogel plates retrieved from the Stardust spacecraft trying to find evidence of collisions with interstellar dust.

Admittedly, I have spent a few hours doing this, and being a naturally lazy guy, I immediately started pondering ways to automate the search.  Continue reading »