Lexus' New Hoverboard Is Cool, but Will It Fly?

Nicknamed the "Slide," this flying skateboard might be tested in public for the primary time on Wednesday (Aug. five), the company introduced this week in a quick video published on YouTube. The video suggests the smooth board floating over what appears to be everyday cement in a skateboard park, main some hoverboard lovers to speculate that, at long ultimate, someone has produced a flying skateboard that you can genuinely experience in a halfpipe or down a sidewalk.

however, if you thought Lexus' new toy could flip you into Marty McFly from "returned to the future component II" (the only with the epic hoverboard chase scene), assume again. Lexus' Slide cannot simply hover over regular cement.

in the Slide

The Slide makes use of magnetic levitation, or maglev, to preserve itself (and its rider) soaring above the floor, according to the business enterprise's website, which states that the board is based on "liquid nitrogen cooled superconductors and permanent magnets" to function.

because it makes use of superconductors, which might be substances that could behavior energy with 0 resistance below a sure temperature, Lexus' hoverboard is barely one of a kind from different maglev technologies, consisting of the remarkable-high-velocity maglev trains in Japan, China and other international locations. Maglev trains are lifted off their tracks and propelled forward by using traditional electromagnets (a sort of magnet with a magnetic area created with the aid of an electrical current). The electromagnets are placed under the educate's carriage and are repelled by using different magnets embedded within the train music. The interplay between the two sets of magnets is what permits the train to defy the force of gravity and live "afloat" within the air.

however the superconductors in Lexus' hoverboard paintings a chunk in a different way. They produce a powerful electric modern while cooled to a sure temperature, and the strong electrical modern-day that the magnet produces in turn creates a strong magnetic area that repels the magnetic area created via other magnets that is probably positioned close by. This repelling force is what continues the hoverboard inside the air.

To keep the superconductors inner their hoverboard working, the parents at Lexus cool them to frigid temperatures the use of liquid nitrogen. in the YouTube video, you could see a white, smokelike substance pouring out of the hoverboard. this is water condensation, or fog, produced while liquid nitrogen hits the air around the superconductor.

What you don't see inside the video Lexus published ultimate month are the magnets below the hoverboard that repel the superconductors. All you spot under the board is what looks as if everyday concrete. but there may be more to that concrete than meets the eye, consistent with the skateboard specialists at El Patín, a Spanish skateboarding website.

one of the website's participants went over to the skate park that Lexus built in Cubelles, a municipality in Barcelona, which is wherein the enterprise is allegedly going to debut the hoverboard subsequent week. The El Patín creator said in a blog post that the park is "now not exactly what it appears."

Hidden magnets

The Cubelles skate park is made from sheets of plywood and a very skinny layer of concrete, in keeping with El Patín. In other phrases, it's not a actual skate park, however it is made to appear like one.

As Lexus referred to on its internet site, the hoverboard works the use of both superconductors and "everlasting magnets." within the specifically built skate park, those everlasting magnets are laid out like a tune and are hidden under the wood and concrete surface of the park's ramps and different surfaces, according to El Patín. This hidden track creates the illusion that the hoverboard is shifting freely across the skate park, much like a regular skateboard. however honestly, the board can best pass over the magnetic tune.

Its inability to hover over any surface makes Lexus' trendy tech toy a piece useless to everyone who doesn’t have access to a specifically magnetized skate park. but, this is not the primary time a employer has built a hoverboard which could handiest be utilized in very precise locations.

In December 2014, the innovators behind the Hendo hoverboard reached their Kickstarter funding purpose. but, their futuristic skateboard best works while placed over a copper floor. The Hendo hoverboard incorporates 4 electromagnets that exchange their magnetic fields and induce a repelling magnetic area in the copper floor under the hoverboard, Eric Palm, deputy director of the national high Magnetic field Laboratory at Florida state university, advised live technological know-how in December.

Hendo's hoverboard can be making its public debut at a in particular created, copper-covered "hover park" in October, in keeping with the agency that created the board. So, you won't be cruising down the sidewalk at the Hendo board any time soon, either.

in case you need a hoverboard that can be utilized in a more herbal putting (i.e., everywhere aside from a one-off skate park strewn with magnets or copper), then you may want to talk to Catalin Alexandru Duru, who built a prototype hoverboard that lifts off the ground the usage of two propellers. This adventurous inventor lately made it into the Guinness e book of worldwide facts for longest hoverboard flight when he flew his prototype board 905 toes (276 meters) throughout a Canadian lake.

Malicious program Bots! those Insect-inspired Robots Can soar on Water

Swarms of robots stimulated by water-hopping insects may want to in the future be used for surveillance, search-and-rescue missions and environmental tracking, researchers say.

extra than 1,two hundred species of animals have advanced the capacity to walk on water. those include tiny creatures inclusive of bugs and spiders, and larger beasts together with reptiles, birds and even mammals.

whereas fairly huge animals, such as the so-called "Jesus lizard," ought to slap water with enough force and speed to hold their heavy our bodies from going underneath, insects referred to as water striders are small sufficient for their weight to be nearly absolutely supported by way of the surface anxiety of water — the equal phenomenon that makes water droplets bead up. In 2003, scientists created the primary robots that mimic the water strider, that's capable of floating on top of, and skating across, the floor of water. [The 6 Strangest Robots Ever Created]

but till now, one water-strider feat that researchers couldn't give an explanation for or reproduction become how the bugs can jump from the surface of water, leaping simply as high off water as they could off solid ground. as an example, water striders amassed from streams and ponds in Seoul, South Korea, with bodies a 1/2-inch (1.3 centimeters) lengthy can leap greater than three inches (8 cm) high on average, co-lead take a look at writer Je-Sung Koh, a roboticist at Seoul countrywide college and Harvard university, informed live technology.

Now, scientists have solved the thriller of how these bugs accomplish those wonderful leaps, and the researchers have built a robot able to such jumps.

"we have discovered the secret of leaping on water using robotics technology," co-senior have a look at writer Kyu-Jin Cho, director of the Biorobotics Laboratory at Seoul national college, told stay technological know-how. "herbal organisms deliver lots of idea to engineers."

using high-velocity cameras, the researchers analyzed water striders leaping on water. They observed that the insects' lengthy, superwaterproof legs multiplied gradually, in order that the surface of the water did now not retreat too fast and lose touch with the legs. using a theoretical model of a flexible cylinder floating on top of liquid, the scientists found that the most pressure the water striders' legs exerted was continually just below the maximum pressure that water's surface anxiety could resist.

The scientists also located that water striders swept their legs inward to maximise the amount of time they might push against the surface of the water, maximizing the general force for their leaps. furthermore, the shape of the tips in their legs had been curved to adapt to the dimples that fashioned at the water's floor whilst the legs pushed downward, thereby maximizing the floor tension the legs skilled.

next, the scientists developed lightweight robots product of glass-fiber-strengthened composite materials that, in overall, weighed handiest sixty eight milligrams (zero.002 oz.) — a bit greater than the load of three adult houseflies. using a leaping mechanism inspired by fleas, the robotic ought to leap about 5.five inches (14 cm) off the surface of the water — about the length of its body and 10 times its frame's height.

"Our small robot can soar on water with out breaking the water surface, and can jump on water as high as leaping on land," Cho said.

The researchers advised that, to this point, the robotic can soar most effective once, and it lands randomly. inside the far future, the scientists want to construct a robot that can not handiest leap repeatedly and land in a controlled manner, but additionally deliver electronics, sensors and batteries.

"this would be a really tough venture, for the reason that weight of the body needs to be truely lightweight for it to leap on water," Cho said. "it would be outstanding to feature a swimming conduct as well."