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POPSCrash Avoidance Robotic Car Inspired by Flight of the Bumblebee
The LRF detects obstacles up to two meters away within a 180-degree radius in front of the BR23C, calculates the distance to them, and sends a signal to an on-board microprocessor, which is instantly translated into collision avoidance. "The split second it detects an obstacle, the car robot will mimic the movements of a bee and instantly change direction by turning its wheels at right angles or greater to avoid a collision," explained Toshiyuki Andou, Manager of Nissan's Mobility Laboratory and principal engineer of the robot car project. "The biggest difference to any current system is that the avoidance maneuver is totally instinctive. If that was not so, then the car robot would not be able to react fast enough to avoid obstacles," Andou said. "It must react instinctively and instantly because this technology corresponds to the most vulnerable and inner-most layer of our Safety Shield, a layer in which a crash is currently considered unavoidable," he added.
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POPSWhy The Danish Bumblebee Can Fly "Tax rates... there is no evidence that these are adversely affecting the ability of these countries to compete effectively in world markets, or to deliver to their respective populations some of the highest standards of living in the world. World-class educational establishments, an extensive safety net, and a highly motivated and skilled labour force.”
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POPSBare Bee It's really well done and quite funny. Now you know what a bare bee bum (try saying that 10 times quickly) looks like. :D
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POPS Scientists Research Disappearance Of Bumblebees Thorp, an emeritus professor of entomology from the University of California at Davis, found one solitary worker last year along a remote mountain trail in the Siskiyou Mountains, but hasn't been able to locate any this year He fears that the species — Franklin's bumblebee — has gone extinct before anyone could even propose it for the endangered species list. To make matters worse, two other bumblebee species — one on the East coast, one on the West — have gone from common to rare. Honey Bee Die-Off-Alarm Beekeepers http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2007/02/05/bees_ani.html?category=animals&guid=20070205144500
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POPSThreats to Bumblebees Fly Under Radar But if bumblebees were to disappear, farmers and entomologists warn, the consequences would be huge, especially coming on top of the problems with honeybees, which are active at different times and on different crop species. Bumblebees are responsible for pollinating an estimated 15 percent of all the crops grown in the U.S., worth $3 billion, particularly those raised in greenhouses. Those include tomatoes, peppers and strawberries. Demand is growing as honeybees decline. In the wild, birds and bears depend on bumblebees for berries and fruits. There is no smoking gun yet, but a recent National Academy of Sciences report on the status of pollinators around the world blames a combination of habitat lost to housing developments and intensive agriculture, pesticides, pollution and diseases spilling out of greenhouses using commercial bumblebee hives.
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POPSThousands of hyphens bite the dust First kids didn't have to learn to tie knots, thanks to velcro, then they didn't have to learn to add because they have calculators, then they didn't have to make those long trips to the library to use the encyclopedias, and now this? No more struggling over whether or not to put in a hyphen? Talk about a good life! Seriously, didn't English teachers get way to bent over such trivial trash? I struggled over these odd little hyphen things and am grateful that they are willing to step up and modify the English language to reflect how the majority uses it.