Robot 'race' to fix damaged Fukushima nuclear plant

Japanese company Mitsubishi has unveiled a radiation-resistant robot aimed at cleaning up the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Other firms, among them Hitachi and Toshiba, have also rolled out their own remote-controlled bots recently.

The plant was damaged during the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

Robots are already working inside the plant, but none has been specifically designed for this kind of work.

One UK expert said that working inside a nuclear reactor was "a challenge for robotics".

Dubbed MEISTeR (Maintenance Equipment Integrated System of Telecontrol Robot), Mitsubishi's "tankbot" is about 1.3m (4ft) tall and has two arms with seven degrees of freedom each, able to hold loads of up to 15kg (33lb).

The robot is equipped with various tools and has electronics hardened to withstand radiation.

But Jeremy Pitt, deputy head of the Intelligent Systems and Networks Group at Imperial College London, said it was still a challenge for a remotely controlled machine to successfully replace humans in such harsh conditions.

"Operating in extreme environments requires a remarkable range of human skills that might otherwise be taken for granted," he said.


"Fundamentally, instead of programming a robot to follow a precise series of actions, in open environments the requirement is to programme it to improvise.

"This requires a fusion of conscious reasoning mechanisms, like learning, with subconscious sensing mechanisms."

Different design
Although currently there are several robots inside the plant, they have not been designed to repair a nuclear reactor.

For instance, the devices made by Qinetiq, introduced at Fukushima immediately after the disaster, were built to search for mines, said the firm's spokesman Mark Clark.

Using machines not made for such conditions was "always a compromise", he said, and better robots were needed.

"The operational environment within a large complex such as a power station poses high demands on these robots, which they were never designed to accommodate.

"If you are wishing to operate robots 24/7 inside a debris-filled power station in a radioactive area, it is much better to design the custom robot from the outset to meet specific tasks."

For instance, Toshiba says its robot has a wireless network that can be controlled in high radiation, looking for a better signal when reception is weak.

Mr Clark explained that the biggest problem associated with robots deployed into such zones was maintenance, because if repairs were needed, it would be difficult for humans to get anywhere near.

The solution would be to fix everything remotely, or while wearing heavy protective clothing.

To simplify the task, robots made to work inside a reactor would have to be "stripped of all unnecessary items", he said.

"If nuclear robots start leaking hydraulic fluid, they send an alarm before they fail so they can be quickly recovered. Others have the capability to shed or drop off parts of their manipulators so if they get caught up in debris they jettison the trapping section of robot, thus freeing them from the obstruction.

"Most nuclear robots operate on power provided by a trailing umbilical. This means there are no batteries to change and no refuelling issues to contend with."

Governments 'too inefficient' for future Moon landings

     Harrison Schmitt rushes across the lunar surface in search of important geological specimens. But just as the science got going the Apollo missions were scrapped.

     One of the last men to set foot on the Moon has said that private enterprise will be the driving force for a return to the lunar surface.
     Harrison Schmitt told the BBC that governments are "too inefficient" to send humans back to the Moon.
     Mr Schmitt's comments come on the 40th anniversary of Nasa's last manned mission to the Moon, Apollo 17.
     The veteran astronaut said that companies would soon embark on a new commercially driven space race.

Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote

Government is too inefficient to make the costs come down to make another Moon landing economic. It will be an entrepreneurial effort”

Harrison Schmitt
Apollo 17 Astronaut
Speaking to the BBC World Service's Discovery programme, he said that he felt that private firms could make a return on the huge investment needed to set up extra-terrestrial mining operations by garnering a new source of fuel called helium-3. The gas is similar to the helium used to blow up balloons, but has properties that some scientists believe make it the ideal fuel for nuclear fusion reactions.

"The economy of space and economy of settlements of the Moon will be supported by helium-3. When you have a reason to build rockets and spacecraft and mining machines, costs will come down," he told BBC News.

Mr Schmitt's comments come in the year that a group of billionaires, which include the film director James Cameron and Google's chief executive, Larry Page, unveiled plans to mine asteroids using robotic probes. It was also the year that Elon Musk's firm SpaceX successfully delivered cargo to the International Space Station using its Dragon freight capsule on top of a Falcon rocket. So could the private sector take the next giant leap for mankind and send people back to the Moon? Harrison Schmitt believes that there is no other way.


Government is too inefficient to make the costs come down where it would be economic. It will be an entrepreneurial effort," he told the BBC.

Richard Nixon, the US President in 1972, had announced earlier that year that Apollo 17 would be the last mission to the Moon for the foreseeable future. Its launch on December 7 was a bittersweet moment for those involved in the US space programme and for all those who had followed their incredible exploits. Among those watching the launch was John Logsdon, now a professor at the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University.

Melancholy


"There was an undertone of melancholy. We had done those wonderful missions and that was the end of it."

The event was the first night launch of the powerful Saturn V rocket. For a moment night turned to day as the fire from its five F1 engines bathed the Kennedy Space Center with an incandescent glow. Then, as Apollo 17 surged upward like a fiery angel, darkness.

Back on Earth, the Watergate scandal had broken, President Nixon was making plans to begin a Christmas mass bombing campaign on the Vietnamese and the US was riven with conflict and protest.


Very expensive

"There was no compelling reason to keep going with a very expensive programme," according to Prof Logsdon.

"We did it as a geopolitical act of competition with the Soviet Union to demonstrate the superior technological and organisational power of the US. It had very little to do with exploring."


Of course that never happened. Successive US Presidents have tried to match President Kennedy's inspirational challenge to Nasa and the nation more than 50 years ago:

"We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organise and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win."

Since then Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, both Presidents Bush and the current administration have matched neither their predecessor's rhetoric nor the financial support for such an endeavour. So the big question is whether anyone will ever set foot on the Moon again?

Continue reading the main story
“
Start Quote

We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard”

John F Kennedy
US President 1961-1963
Prof Christopher Riley, a space historian at Lincoln University, is pessimistic.

"I suspect in my lifetime I have seen the last footprint on the Moon. It is very difficult for governments to do that kind of adventure at this time in the economic cycle."


International effort

First among the countries with the motivation and resources to send an astronaut to the Moon is China. It already has ambitious plans to send robotic explorers to the Moon next year. Those missions may prompt an Apollo-type effort by China to demonstrate its own technological power by sending an astronaut to the Moon.

Prof Logsdon believes that it would be far better for the next attempt at a Moonshot to be an international effort.

"One of the great political challenges of the next decade is whether China can be incorporated into the global space effort or whether because of a combination of its own intentions and the fact that they are not being welcomed - it puts them in a position where they choose to go it on their own."

For many who watched in awe as Nasa sent mission after mission to the Moon, a return to the lunar surface is not only possible but inevitable. It's a view that's implicit in the plaque left by the Apollo 17 astronauts which anticipates many more daring adventures.

"Here man completed his first exploration of the Moon - December 1972. May the spirit of peace in which we came be reflected in the lives of all mankind."

Chelsea basks in the glory

ONE of the young stars of a new Aussie film showed it off to her family and friends at a special screening at Hoyts Warringah Mall on Tuesday night.

Peninsula actress Chelsea Bennett, 13, had a major supporting role in the new Australian comedy, Mental, which stars Toni Collette, Rebecca Gibney, and Anthony LaPaglia.

She plays one of LaPaglia's tearaway teenage daughters who are looked after by a nanny (Collette) when their mother (Gibney) is committed to a psychiatric hospital.

"It really was an amazing feeling."

Chelsea has seen the film several times but never tires of it.

"I like watching it over and over," she said.

"I get to see how I and the other girls act, and to hear people's reactions. People were just cacking themselves at this screening."

MENTAL

-Rated: MA15+

-Director: PJ Hogan

-Opens nationally October 4

Fred Crawford 'blood signature' legend challenged

An Ulster Covenant signature believed to have been written in blood almost certainly wasn't, according to a test carried out on behalf of the BBC.

The forensic science test was carried out by Dr Alastair Ruffell of Queen's University, Belfast.

Dr Ruffell said that it was almost certain that it was not blood but added there was a margin of error because "this material has been uncontrolled for 100 years".

Major Crawford's signature is still a rich red colour today.

Unconvinced

For the test, carried out for the BBC's Knowledge and Learning team, Major Crawford's signature was injected with a small amount of Luminol.

This substance reacts with iron in blood's haemoglobin to produce a blue-white glow.


"Some years ago we did a test in the Colorado desert where they put some blood on some rocks and we went back ten years later and we were able to find the blood using the Luminol test," said Dr Ruffell.

"The iron in the blood degrades very slowly."

Major Crawford played a key role in the resistance to Home Rule by smuggling more than 25,000 rifles and millions of rounds of amunition from Germany to Larne, County Antrim, to arm the newly-formed Ulster Volunteer Force.

Duggan marksman 'saw gun in hand'

The police officer who shot Mark Duggan in north London has told a court he was "absolutely 100%" sure the 29-year-old was holding a gun.

The marksman, identified only as V53, said he could make out the shape of the gun, which he said Mr Duggan was holding in his right hand.

V53 was giving evidence in the trial of Kevin Hutchinson-Foster, 30, at Snaresbrook Crown Court.

Mr Hutchinson-Foster denies giving Mr Duggan an illegal handgun.

Previously the court heard that on 4 August 2011 officers followed the minicab Mr Duggan was in and saw it stop at a house in Leyton where Mr Hutchinson-Foster is alleged to have given him a gun in a cardboard shoebox.

'Shoot to stop'

He added: "August 4 will always be in my head.

"It's very clear, even now."

The officer, who has 15 years' experience, said he was aware that criminals sometimes use a sock to conceal a handgun.


Kevin Hutchinson-Foster denies providing Mr Duggan with a gun
He said there was a black sock covering the firearm Mark Duggan was carrying.

Officers were trained to "shoot to stop" and Mr Duggan was shot after he left the minicab, he added.

'I'm hit'

"I'm thinking he's going to shoot me or one of my colleagues so I fire a second round of my MP5.

"This has hit him on his right bicep.

"Mark Duggan then fell to the floor. I then closed the suspect down."

The gun was no longer in his hand and V53 said he heard another armed officer, identified only as W42, say "I'm hit, I'm hit".

V53, who was the only team medic present, said his fellow officer was his "primary concern".

V53 then turned his attention to Mr Duggan and gave CPR for 15 minutes until paramedics arrived at the scene.

W42 told the court the impact of the bullet hitting the radio "knocked the wind out of me".

"It was as though I was kicked fully in the side, in the upper ribs area," he said.

NRL: Bulldogs' Kris Keating to make Cecil Hills proud in grand final

BULLDOGS halfback Kris Keating will play in the biggest game of his career this Sunday when he lines up in the NRL grand final.

Keating's Canterbury side will face the Melbourne Storm in the season decider, leaving him 80 minutes away from a premiership.

It has been a remarkable turnaround for the Cecil Hills footballer after he languished in the NSW Cup during the first four rounds of the season.

But with injury ruling first-string halfback Trent Hodkinson out for the season, Keating has been able to cement a starting spot and has been pivotal to the Bulldogs' success.

Even great Andrew Johns is impressed.

"If someone said at the start of the year that Kris Keating would be a grand final half you'd laugh at them," Johns said after the Bulldogs' win over Souths.

"No one talks about him much but he's doing his job really, really well."

KRIS KEATING

LIVES: Cecil Hills
JUNIOR CLUB: Cabramatta Two Blues
SCHOOL: Westfields Sports High School
CITY ORIGIN: 2010-11

Huyton’s Longview Primary school writes to parents over drug deals and smoking cannabis outside school gates

PARENTS were caught allegedly doing drug deals and smoking pot as they dropped their children off at Longview Primary School in Merseyside.

Police are now probing the “disturbing incidents” witnessed in view of young pupils attending the school in Huyton.

Amanda Casey, headteacher of the 300-plus pupil school which caters for children aged three upwards, sent off a letter making an impassioned plea for the “minority” of parents responsible to “put the reputation of our school and the children’s needs first”.

“The fact that both of these events took place very close to our school, when there are children around, causes me a great deal of concern.”

She adds in her letter: “It is the responsibility of everyone at Longview to ensure that the environment both in and around the school is one which is both safe and makes our children feel proud.”

One dad said: “I am shocked at what’s gone on and the parents should be ashamed turning up to school and doing drugs in front of the children.

“If they are smoking drugs at the school gates I worry about what sort of home life their children will have.”

Today a Knowsley council spokesman said: “The school received reports of alleged drug activity taking place close to the school.

“This information has been passed on to the appropriate agencies. The welfare and safety of our pupils is our priority and prompt action was taken.

“Whilst incidents of this nature are extremely rare they are taken very seriously.”

A spokeswoman said it included offering to send in officers to give children presentations on the dangers of drug use.

Alzheimer’s and dementia awareness knocks at “the door of thought”

Medical mysteries that require massive amounts of money for research are dampening people’s patience, faith, and hope. World Alzheimer’s Day and Dementia Awareness Week knock at the door of thought regarding such mysteries.

How often do we hear these sorts of remarks after being forgetful, “argh, I’m having a senior moment!”? We laugh and sometimes nod in agreement as if to say that we have these moments too. But why do we have to accept forgetfulness as part and parcel of growing older?

It’s such an unfair, indiscriminate sentence, just when folks of riper years are looking forward to enjoying life to the full. No-one wants to lose their happy memories and their independence. And they don’t have to. Protection and prevention require action. Experts say that prevention is the most powerful medicine in the fight against dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

Those challenged with the onset of this illness could be tempted to lose hope altogether if they relied on reports that drugs being trialled have not yet been able to change the course of the disease. Some folks are so frightened of being given false hope that they just give up the fight.

"Prevention is very important, more than any drugs we have or plan to develop," said Serge Gauthier, director of the Alzheimer's Disease Research Unit at McGill University in Canada.

It’s encouraging to hear of successful drug-free therapies, in light of the findings that drug dependency and side effects can cause great harm.

According to a report on Alzheimer’s Research UK’s website, researchers at a German university have found that, “Drug-free therapy staves off cognitive decline in dementia: ... practice in ‘daily living activities’ such as gardening, cognitive stimulation exercises and a ‘spiritual element’ such as a group song or a discussion about a topic such as happiness.”

The spiritual element associated with healing should not be overlooked. Hope takes on a whole new dimension when we think of ourselves as more than brain and physicality. Or when we look to a higher power to give us optimism.

Some sufferers find spiritual therapies such as meditation and prayer to be highly effective for healing.

Doctors like Larry Dossey MD, for one, has seen results in patients who used prayer as part of their therapy [expanded info link found on my blog www.health4thinkers.com / search the title of this article].

Eric Karran, research director at Alzheimer's Research UK says, "Finding a medicine for a chronic disease is far, far more complicated than, say, putting a man on the Moon.”

Sydney resident Carey Arber is a health blogger, focusing on consciousness and wellbeing, in particular spirituality in health care. She is a practitioner of Christian Science and representative to the media and government in ACT & NSW. Twitter: careyarber Blog: www.health4thinkers.com Photo credit: Flickr. By Magnus A.

Craig Arnold to climb ice cap in support of Black Dog Institute

IN HIS first adventure race, Craig Arnold's team dropped out on him two days into the 10-day race and he finished last.

But while the 2005 race through the Australian desert was incredibly tough, it became the starting point of many such adventures for the Dee Why resident.

He has since done several, including the Adventure Racing World Championships in Scotland in 2007.

The 30-year-old former gymnast is preparing for his toughest one yet  a 40-day expedition crossing the Patagonian ice cap in Southern Chile.

It will be the first time he has done a race for charity.

Mr Arnold will raise awareness and money for the Black Dog Institute after realising how common the issues of anxiety and depression are among young people.

Last year he started speaking to school students through the Young Men's Christian Association about his goals and how he achieved them.

``I realised that many young people didn't know how to cope with challenges,'' he said.

Mr Arnold spoke about the importance of having good relationships and of how exercise can help build up mental strength and resilience.

``Kids came up to me after and said `thank you so much, that really helped','' he said.

``It was a bit of a wake-up call knowing that you can make such a difference.''

He leaves on September 27, and hopes to raise $5000.



How to donate

Go to everydayhero.com.au/craig_arnold

THE STATISTICS

>Suicide is the leading cause of death among 14 to 25-year-olds in Australia.

>1 in 4 Australians live with a mental health issue.

 >Depression is estimated to be the No.1 disability in the developing world by 2030.

Arrests after man found stabbed in Easingwold van crash

     Four people have been arrested after it emerged a man found dead in a van crash in North Yorkshire had been stabbed.

     Police said the 36-year-old, from Luton, was in a van which hit two bollards on Long Street in Easingwold in the early hours of Sunday.

     A murder inquiry was launched after it was established he had died from stab wounds and not the collision.

     A 20-year-old woman and two men, aged 21 and 25, are also being questioned on suspicion of assisting an offender.

     A 26-year-old man was arrested in the early hours of Monday on suspicion of murder.

     North Yorkshire Police has urged anyone with any information to come forward.