Gadgetory

welcome to what the future on today's show what to expect from billionaire Space Bros Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos in 2019 and beyond an amphibious robot with a unique way of getting around and finally we take a look at how one company is using simulations to teach their robot dog new tricks let's get into it SpaceX launched 21 Rockets in 2018 that's roughly 20% of all rocket launches worldwide it's also the only company to have recovered and reused its rockets a critical step towards making space travel more accessible and affordable so what's next for the pioneering space corporation even bigger rockets of course must eventual goal has long been to help make mankind and interplanetary species that means transporting large amounts of people and machinery to the moon Mars and beyond to accomplish this SpaceX has been working on the starship formerly known as the big Falcon rocket musk said the rocket will be able to bring 100 metric tons of cargo to the surface of Mars as long as it has a chance to refuel in Earth orbit first a test model of the starship rocket has been built at the SpaceX launch site in Boca Chica Texas this test model will reportedly be used for vertical takeoff and landing tests in March of this year the stainless steel skin is heavier than other rocket materials but must says it's the right choice for the starship because of its resistance to extreme temperatures the orbital version will be taller with thicker skin and is aiming to launch in 2020 another major player in the privatized space race is Jeff Bezos his Blue Origin the company hasn't launched anything into orbit yet but its goals aren't any less ambitious its new Shepard rocket named after the first American in space Alan Shepard is a suborbital tourist vehicle capable of taking up to six people into space Bezos said he hopes the first tourist flight will launch in 2019 though to be fair he said the same thing about 2018 beyond that blue origins new Glenn rocket is in developed it will be capable of taking 45 metric tons into low-earth orbit and is scheduled to launch in 2021 best believe Andy and I will keep you all posted as the space race continues heating up in 2019 this amphibious robot sure has a unique way of getting around it's name is Vela and it was made by pliant energy systems funded in part by the US Office of Naval Research Belloc's can transition easily from water to land and can navigate snow ice and sand as well its undulating fins allow it to swim crawl jet or slide it can also reverse easily make quick turns and it's special fins are gentler on the environment than propellers it's not the only fin driven aquatic robot out there Festo the makers of many different animal inspired robots release this video in August of last year it's called the Bionic fin with the autonomous swimming robot is beautiful to watch but it is never shown outside of its tank and Festo doesn't mention any kind of amphibious capabilities Belloc seems to be the more versatile robot for now developers say Velux could be used for bringing tow ropes to people who have fallen through thin ice personal propulsion for divers or for monitoring coral reefs this robot dog has been learning some new tricks the animal robot made by robotic systems lab was taught to run 25% faster to run at a specific speed and to get up after falling down in a variety of positions the fall recovery technique that animal learned was successful for 100 percent of trials in any fall position these new skills were learned with the help of simulations which are faster cheaper and safer than real-world reinforcement learning the simulations are 1,000 times faster than in real time and can simulate up to 2000 animal robots at once the best part is that this method of machine learning is not robot specific meaning this technique could be a game-changer for other legged robots learning to maneuver in our fast-paced world jump down in the comments and let us know what made you say WTF this week and if you liked what you saw please like share and subscribe thanks so much for watching I'm your host Jessie URL and I'll see you next time on what the future