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DARPA Goes Robtic
The U.S. military is funding research for a mind-controlled prosthetic arm that is surgically implanted into the user’s body.
“This is the most advanced arm in the world,” Johnny Matheny, who lost his left arm to cancer in 2008 and demonstrated the robotic arm for DARPA, said in a statement. “This one can do anything your natural arm can do, with the exception of the Vulcan V. But unless I meet a Vulcan, I won’t need it.”
Matheny showed the arm during Demo Day for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the military’s research unit, which was held Wednesday at the Pentagon. The device was developed at the Research and Exploratory Development Department at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.
The robotic arm is attached to a piece of metal that is surgically implanted into the bone of the user’s arm in technique called osseointegration. Matheny is the first person in the U.S. to have undergone the procedure, according to the U.S. Army.
The Army called the system a “true man/machine interface.”
The mind-controlled aspect of the arm comes into play via the nerves and muscles in what remains of the user’s arm. Those tissues send signals to the robotic arm, which responds to them as a real arm would.
“This is part of the Revolutionizing Prosthetics Program, where we set out to restore near-natural upper extremity control to our military service members who have lost limbs in service of our country,” said Dr. Justin C. Sanchez, director of the Biological Technologies Office at DARPA, in a statement. “The goal is to control the arm as naturally as possible.”
The robotic arm, according to Sanchez, has the same size, weight, shape and grip strength as an adult biological arm.
Source-http://www.thegurureview.net/aroundnet-category/darpa-shows-off-mind-controlled-robotic-arm.html
USA In Danger Of Cyber Experts Shortage
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Leading cyber experts warned of a shortage of talented computer security experts in the United States, making it extremely difficult to keep corporate and government networks safe at a time when attacks are on the rise.
Symantec Corp Chief Executive Enrique Salem told the Reuters Media and Technology Summit in New York that his company was working with the U.S. military, other government agencies and universities to help develop new programs to train security professionals.
“We don’t have enough security professionals and that’s a big issue. What I would tell you is it’s going to be a bigger issue from a national security perspective than people realize,” he said on Tuesday.
Jeff Moss, a prominent hacking expert who sits on the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Advisory Council, said that it was difficult to persuade talented people with technical skills to enter the field because it can be a thankless task.
“If you really look at security, it’s like trying to prove a negative. If you do security well, nobody comes and says ‘good job.’ You only get called when things go wrong.”
The warnings come at a time when the security industry is under fire for failing to detect increasingly sophisticated pieces of malicious software designed for financial fraud and espionage and failing to prevent the theft of valuable data.
Moss, who goes by the hacker name “Dark Tangent,” said that he sees no end to the labor shortage.