385: I Just Wanted an Industrial Arm

Jeremy Fielding spoke with us about mechanical engineering, robotics, robot operating system, YouTube, and solving problems.

You can find all of Jeremy’s links on his main site: jeremyfielding.com but here are a few short cuts:

Jeremy’s Industrial arm punching video

Elecia’s typing robot

Jeremy had a neat way to go about solving a problem. He called it Dr. FARM:

  • D Define the problem

  • R Research other solutions, partial solutions, terminology

  • F Function: what do I want it to do?

  • A Appearance: what should it look like?

  • R Risk: is anyone going to get hurt in manufacture and function?

  • M Model: prototype the design

AR3 Open Source Control Software and a version with ROS MoveIt

365: Barbed Wire Fence and Great WiFi

Cy Keener spoke with us about sensors, Arduinos, ice, and the crossover between art and science.

You can see some of his field work and gallery installations at his site: cykeener.com and on his vimeo channel. Cy is an art professor at the University of Maryland (bio, youtube)

Cy’s advisor at Stanford was Paul DeMarinis (pauldemarinis.org, Stanford page).

Arduiniana: a blog of useful Arduino libraries

We also talked about some custom sensors by Lovro Valcic of Bruncin (bruncin.com).


298: In the Cow Case

Eric Brunning (@deeplycloudy) returns to talk about doing science in the field in this crossover episode with the Don’t Panic GeoCast’s John Leeman (@geo_leeman). 

Eric is a Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas Tech University specializing in storm electrification and lightning. We spoke with Eric on 268: Cakepan Interferometry about lightning and using baking goods as measurement devices. Eric was also on GeoCast 134: Launching Balloons out of a UHaul.

We spoke with John about his Phd research in 169: Sit on Top of a Volcano. The previous Don’t Panic GeoCast crossover was with John and Sridhar Anandakrishnan in 206: Crushing Amounts of Snow. John’s company is Leeman Geophysical.

The paper was Reconstructing David Huffman’s Legacy in Curved-Crease Folding by Erik D. Demaine, Martin L. Demaine and Duks Koschitz. Elecia is working her way through Erik Demaine’s Phd thesis on the same topic as well as Jun Mitani’s excellent book Curved-Folding Origami Design. Geology also has folds.

For 3D printed origami, Eric mentioned Henny Seggerman’s twitter @henryseg.


268: Cakepan Interferometry

After many bouts of lightning round, we finally got our lightning questions answered by Eric Brunning (@deeplycloudy). Eric is a Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas Tech University specializing in storm electrification and lightning .

You can hear some of Eric’s field adventures by listening to his episode of the Don’t Panic Geocast show.

The Wikipedia page for lightning will lead you down many strange pathways. Though the Wikipedia Lightning Energy Harvesting page may convince you that it isn’t feasible (though some math might as well, as discussed on this show).

For more about lightning interferometry, check out Michael Stock’s in-depth site.

You can hear lightning on Jupiter if you listen to the right bands.

Neat video of the Milky Way in radio waves reflecting off the moon

Elecia really enjoyed The Cloudspotter’s Guide by Gavin Pretor-Pinney.

169: Sit on Top of a Volcano

John Leeman (@geo_leeman) spoke with us about geophysics and associated technology.

John is one of the hosts of the Don't Panic GeoCast (@dontpanicgeo, iTunes). Some episodes you may like:

John is teaching a course at Penn State called Techniques of Geoscientific Experimentation. The information and textbook is online! It uses the SparkFun Inventor's Kit.

John has a website with a blog. He has some Cheerson CX-10 tiny drone posts (my favorite, also Alvaro's repo and my posts). John also has a consulting company: Leeman GeoPhysical.

Python! Lots of Python was discussed. 

Contest! Contest ends October 1st and now there are more books! In addition to the ones Bob Apthorpe is sponsoring, John's consulting company will sponsor: Earthquake Storms: An Unauthorized Biography of the San Andreas Fault by John Dvorak and The Soul of A New Machine by Tracy Kidder.