Who hasn't dreamed of being invisible? It would give you the ablilty to listen to private conversation, and you would always be the one crowned hide-n-go-seek champ. Aside from those daily niceties, invisibility technology could give us the ability to hide planes, protect coasts from tsunami waves, and even protect buildings from earthquakes. All kinds of different technologies are being developed to make people and objects invisible. But how does one make something invisible?

Humans see only a small portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, and we are "see" an object when light bounces off of it into our eyes. To mimic or create invisibility, there are several ways you can can disrupt the process of "seeing" an object.

Let's start with this simplest: camouflage. Animals, soldiers, and hunters use it everyday. Wilderness settings are relatively easy to blend into, but what if you want to blend into a more complicated terrain? You could mimic artist and extreme camouflage-er, Liu Bolin, who paints himself to blend in with his surroundings.

Check out more of Bolin's art here.

But what if you need to blend in at a moment's notice? The folks over at the Tachi Laboratory at the University of Tokyo have developed an invisibility cloak of sorts. The cloak films objects behind you and projects them onto your jacket so you will blend into any background.

Graeme Milton will be giving a lecture about cloaking at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 10, in the Aline Wilmot Skaggs Biology building. The lecture is free and open to the public, but you need to request tickets by emailing your first and last name with the number of tickets requested to office@science.utah.edu. See you there!

Become a fan of The Leonardo on Facebook or follow us on Twitter!

The Leonardo After Hours: Energy Revolution event in Logan last week was a huge success with a ton of audience participation. Thanks to our presenters and our host, The Italian Place, which supplied nourishment (energy!) for the crowd. Take a look at our recap video, with interviews with all three presenters:

If you said yes to any of those three, then the March 4 Ignite Salt Lake is for you. The most lovable group of enthusiasts you'll ever meet gathers several times a year to woo and wow a local crowd with 5-minute presentations. The catch? Each of 20 slides auto-rotates after five seconds. Stay on your toes or risk embarrassment and heckling.

The beauty of Ignite events (a global franchise from O'Reilly Media) is that the topic is up to you — the only requirement is to cover something you're passionate about. Past Ignite Salt Lake presentations have covered building an internet radio station, interface design, why cats make lousy business consultants, and, of course, zombie defense for n00bs.

Jeff Muhs, executive director at Utah State University Energy Lab, will discuss new initiatives from his lab, such as creating biofuels from algae and automated electric transportation, which will make energy mobile. Other presenters include Kevin Shurtleff, who is a member of the USTAR Technology Outreach team, and Lynsey Talbot, who is a student energy researcher at Utah State University.

It seems as though Avatar has everyone thinking about the future of mind-controlled devices...a future that may not be so far away. Mind-controlled devices can be extremely helpful to people like Pierpaolo Petruzziello, who had his arm amputated. Researchers at the University of Rome connected a prosthetic hand to his nervous system by electrodes controlled by brain impulses that move his "muscles" to precisely control his hand and fingers.

In another instance, musical artist Calvin Harris created a human synthesizer using Bare Conductive paint. The synthesizer creates a programmed sound each time Calvin slaps the hands of the models.

Educate to Innovate hopes to pique interest in STEM learning in young children. For instance, Sesame Street will focus two years of its programing on helping children become science and math literate. And an annual science fair will be held at the White House for top science fair winners from across the country. (One more local plug: check out the Salt Lake Valley Science and Engineering Fair on your way to the top.)

The MacArthur Foundation is helping to develop the Digital Media and Learning Competition, a national contest to recognize changes in the ways children learn. The open competition, which starts Dec. 14, is searching for digital media ideas that will help children develop their math and science skills. The competition has all sorts of partners we've tweeted our love for in the past, including National Lab Day and HASTAC (Humanities, Arts, Science and Technology Advanced Collaboratory). So, genuises, get those proposals ready.

Digital plant from Daniel Brown's series, "Flowers."

"The Network," dissects traces of information we leave behind after using social networks. Programers developed a section that visualizes information, such as how bloggers are feeling based upon what they say in their blogs. "Code," looks at the digital coding we use to program. Artist Daniel Brown uses mathematics to generate a fluid growth of digital images that mimics plants found in nature. Much like "Ghost Interruptions," the "Interactivity" exhibit allows visitors to interact with different works. One of the featured exhibits is the Opto-Isolator, developed by Golan Levin, which is a robotic eye that follows the viewer's eye motions.

Francis H. Brown, distinguished professor of geology and geophysics at the University of Utah, will lecture Nov. 24 about the "Geologic Control of the Age of Early Man. Graeme W. Milton, a professor of mathematics at the University of Utah, will present "Cloaking: Where Science Meets Science Fiction," March 10. Ronald L. Walsworth, senior physicist at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, presents the final lecture "The Search for Earth-like Planets Around Other Stars," April 7.

We often see examples of science inspiring art but the Dana Centre in London is finding ways where art inspires science. The Dana Centre, which opened in 2003, caters to an adult audience. The Centre hosts free monthly events where people can discuss and learn about current science issues. It even has different event styles to suit your learning needs, including "Vent Your Views," "Artistic License," "Test Lab," and "Face to Face."

But please do drool over electromagnetic forming with me. There are folks out there with the gear, the time and the wherewithal to shrink coins. As for motive, what's better than "because I can"?

Hackerbot Labs in south Seattle (sample mottos: "Like prom night, for your warranty" and "Trespassers will be used for scientific experimentation") and Intellectual Venture Labs posted a couple of video gems on the coin shrinking process.

A massive electrical current creates a magnetic current in the coil, which creates an opposing magnetic field in the coin. The two fields cause the coin's material to contract and compact -- no volume or weight is lost, but the coin is smaller in diameter and thicker.

Become a fan of The Leonardo on Facebook or follow us on Twitter!

Bonneville Speed Week -- a collection of the craziest, fastest, most surreal races in the state -- starts this weekend. You've seen the Salt Flats in movies and photo shoots, but this lunar world takes on an entirely different milieu when covered with hundreds of DIY dragsters, a bevy of multi-colored umbrellas and the friendly faces of Speed Week's followers.

The Salt Flats are home to several land speed records, made possible by Utah's high desert altitude, and the extremely flat surface that is inhospitable to plant life and other barriers to a racer's ultimate goal. The Salt Flats are no secret (memorialized by an article in The New York Times here, a star turn in "The World's Fastest Indian," and regular features and photos in regional news media), but that makes them no less fascinating.

One of the best things about Speed Week is the DIY culture among racers. The majority of enthusiasts work solo or in small groups to perfect their home-grown cars, dragsters, motorcycles and other vehicles. Trial and error, a dauntless enthusiasm for the Flats, and near-obsessive tendencies combine for one amazing weekend of race after race.

This video from the 2007 races gets really good around the 2:00 mark (it's not ours, so please pardon anything strange -- like, say, the intro song lyrics). It gives a true sense of the DIY culture and life-long ambitions of racers to participate in Speed Week.

But this is the one that held me captivated at my desk -- a handlebars-eye-view of a motorcycle hitting 229 mph on a five-mile course. Once it gets going, you can watch the miles fly by and see the spectators distantly to the left of the course. And be sure to listen to the accompanying audio for the whine of the gears as the drive accelerates through the course.

So if you head out this weekend, be sure to strike up a conversation or five with the racers -- it's been my experience that they'll gladly geek out with you about their projects. You might even pick up a few tricks for the drive back to civilization. Just don't forget your sunblock.

Adding to the list of gadgets that you never knew you needed in life is this Chalkbot, a machine that "prints" road chalk messages for the Livestrong Foundation and Nike.

It's making the rounds of France during the year's biggest bike race -- check out the photo gallery. The content of the uniformly heart-warming messages show a deep concern for cancer victims and survivors. Beyond that, though, the mechanics of this thing are pretty cool.

Aside from the canisters of chalk and the hydraulic release system, it looks like there's a pretty beefy internal tech system. It would be interesting to see whether the text messages are translated directly to the road chalk or if they go through a human screener first.

The Leonardo experimented with SMS art during BODY WORLDS when Brooklyn-based artist Paul Notzold created "The Only Certainty: Death and TXTs," a flash skeleton projection that changed positions and thought bubbles based on text messages from visitors.

As The Leonardo susses out its exhibit plans, the staff are talking more about how to interest visitors with what happens inside the museum beyond just a static, "typical" museum experience. When we try different applications, workshops and exhibits, one thing we keep coming back to is stop-motion animation.

In a workshop back in February 2008, we did a short stint with some stop-motion animation cameras. These were a HUGE hit with visitors of all ages, to put it mildly, both back then and in a few events since then. And it appears that the art form is making a bit of a mainstream come-back as well. It's been great to uncover little gems, and to see animation become a creative vehicle in ways that the Wallace and Gromit of my childhood didn't quite capture.

This run-away YouTube hit by Oren Lavie is incredibly whimsical. Guaranteed* to melt your insides. (*almost)

Finally, I love this designer's interpretation of a deadline (and it's a bit how I feel at the moment with the Arts Festival installation rapidly approaching!).

Museum hopping in San Francisco can be exhilarating and exhausting. Fortunately, a couple of staff members made it to the city by the bay last weekend to check out a few choice science and art museums. Among other trip highlights was a trip to the California Academy of Sciences sustainability exhibit, a visit to the Cal Academy's famed living rooftop and the chance to play with the butterflies in the rain forest globe.

Another great highlight of the trip was a visit to the SubZERO Festival in San Jose. The festival, run by the folks at Zer01 (who also do a tres cool biennial), was an eclectic collection of street art, low-tech displays, audience interaction, and performance. One thing that caught our eye was a video installation by Eric Dorf, who filmed people's reactions to popular ads and edited them together.

The result is a strangely mesmerizing mosaic of Madison Avenue and mouths. The video we saw at subZERO was slightly modified from this YouTube clip, but you'll get the general idea from this version. We tip our figurative Leo hat to Dorf for his creative mash-up that stopped us in our tracks and kept us engaged, focused and interested with all the distractions of a street fair happening around us!

Muhs, who was at one point an energy and science policy advisor to the U.S. Senate, recently testified before Congress about the plausbility of using algae to capture and recycle carbon-dioxide emissions and create oil in the process. Muhs is also a USTAR researcher.

In theory, algae farms can be anywhere there is enough sunlight for the plants, and part of Muhs' research is optimizing sunlight absorption and thus increasing the amount of fuel produced. Other biofuel researchers are exploring creative placements for algae ponds -- next to wastewater treatment plants (the, ahem, natural organics in the wastewater can be part of the algae "food"), in shallow desert pools in the sunny southwestern United States, or next to coal plants where algae could convert waste carbon dioxide to biofuel.

You may remember the Continental Airlines test flight this January with half a tank of conventional jet fuel and half a tank of algae- and jatropha-produced biofuel. Continental joined Air New Zealand and Japan Airlines, among others, in testing biofuels as an alternative to conventional jet fuel. Even though large-scale algae fuel production is likely still several years away, the promise of this biofuel has caught the attention of the airlines, Congress and R/D communities throughout the country.

So, please, join us Wednesday, June 3, at the Salt Lake City Public Library for a discussion about how the hated pond scum of yesteryear could become the future of fuel. (To register for Lunch with Leo, visit its web page. The event is open to the public, and the $25 fee pays for your meal.)

We spend a lot of time around here thinking about interactivity, how to engage visitors and what The Leonardo could use to get people excited about learning. Back in February 2008, The Leonardo ran a month-long workshop in South Towne mall where one of the emphases was on sound and music. Visitors -- especially teenagers -- were enthralled by the composition and general tinkering they could accomplish with GarageBand, LogicPro, a midi keyboard and a couple of iMacs.

Fast forward to the AAM conference in Philadelphia last month, and a session about gestural computer interactives. Among the many interesting things in that session was a tidbit about Ocarina, an iPhone and iPod touch application that turns your hand-held device into a musical instrument.Ocarina is the brainchild of a Stanford assistant professor, who has also created an iPhone orchestra -- members "play" their phones and amplify the sound by speakers attached to the back of their hands.

Ocarina (named for an ancient flute-like instrument) has a global setting as well, giving players a chance to listen to what people are doing with the application all over. The original application has a "Zeldrian" tone setting, and Wang has figured out how to play Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" on the iPhone. You can also check out a free trial of the company's leaf trombone that's worth your time for the memories of junior-high band class, if nothing else.

Although Wang doesn't come out and say it, Ocarina tweaks familiar technology to allow entry points to those unfamiliar with an instrument, and it has great potential for getting people interested in music, technology and sound.

NASA isn't exactly a local group, but it has been fascinating to watch from afar their Hubble Space Telescope repair mission.

Atlantis Shuttle launch on Monday, May 11

I'm currently watching video feed of the Atlantis Space Shuttle crew positioning a robotic arm to repair the telescope. There are no orchestral swells on the soundtrack, but the real-life drama beats anything you could manufacture on a cinema screen.

"InterPlay: AnARTomy" features two dancers, poetry, a host of sketch artists, and digital animators, and requires nearly a dozen computer systems to compile live video feeds from four other universities. The video feed of the sketchers and performers in other locations --Indianapolis, Indiana; Fairbanks, Alaska; Long Island, New York; and Cardiff, Wales -- are projected and "mixed" on a large screen behind the dancers. InterPlay is the work of Jimmy and Beth Miklavcic.




During the year-long development process, the Miklavcics meet with participants via open-source video conferencing software. Then, the "telematic" performance is woven into a multi-leveled, live performance and cinematic work that incorporates feeds from artists, musicians and technicians at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianpolis (IUPUI),University of Alaska-Fairbanks, Long Island University in New York, and Cardiff University in Wales (full bios of the cast and crew can be found here). The performance is designed specifically for viewing at the University of Utah Intermountain Network and Scientific Computation Center (INSCC), giving Utah audiences the best seats in the country.


An operator during the performance arranges the screens dependent on what the dancers, animators and artists are doing. Digital MC Jimmy Miklavcic manipulates the relationships between the various performances by combining the video streams into the center digital mix of the display -- all to create a dynamic, collaborative performance. "This thing is so intertwined that calling it art and technology isn't correct because they're so symbiotic in a way," Beth and Jimmy Miklavcic tell us.




Beth and Jimmy will be giving a presentation about their previous InterPlay project -- Nel Tempo Di Sogno (2007) -- Thursday, April 16, at 1 p.m. at the University of Utah's Center for High Performance Computing. They'll talk about the scene-by-scene tech requirements to pull off an InterPlay performance.