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Science Fiction in the News Articles
Related to material in The War of the Worlds
by H.G. Wells

This marvelous novel is one of the classics of science fiction; it can still send a chill down your spine more than one hundred years after publication. The Martians invade a pre-WWI Earth - how can they be stopped? (BTW, even though the book at left has a cool cover, you can read this classic for free here.)

Science fiction in the News articles describe real-world events that relate to the ideas and inventions in sf novels and movies. Select a news article:

Active Denial Technology: Directed Energy Weapons
   Active Denial Technology disables enemy soldiers or crowds with a painful beam of electromagnetic energy that inflicts a disabling, burning pain over the body by triggering heat receptors in the skin.

Active Denial System Has Researchers Worried
   The 'Sheriff' Active Denial System (ADS), due to be implemented in Iraq by 2006, has some scientists and researchers expressing concerns.

Octarms - Robotic Tentacle Bot From Mars!
   A robotic tentacle funded by DARPA proves adept at manipulating irregularly shaped (ie natural) objects; just like the Tripod tentacles from War of the Worlds.

Snake-Arm Robots From OCRobotics Reach Out
   Nifty snake-arm joy-stick controlled robot can find its way into a variety of tight spaces.

Snake-Arm Robot In A Plane
   No, really. There are snake-arm robots in planes - not on planes, but in them.

Martians Could Kill Life On Earth, Says Scientist
   A prominent UK scientist apparently believes that it is possible that Martian water harbors life - maybe dangerous life.

Active Denial System Heat Ray Warming Up
   Raytheon finally gets this nonlethal crowd-dispersing weapon out in public view.

DIY Snake Arm Robot Prototype
   Neat little snake arm robot prototype done by a student; what have you been doing for your robotics projects?

Carbon Nanotube Muscles
   This technology provides an amazing increase in force per unit area of standard (i.e., human) muscles.

Airborne Laser Destroys Missile
   Ray gun fans, rejoice! A successful test of the Airborne Laser Testbed has been accomplished.

Still Dreaming Of Tentacle Arms
   Beware the 'long, flexible, glittering tentacles...'

Festo Biomimetic Bionic Handling Systems
   Oh, those guys at Festo are doing more than just dreaming about tentacle arms!

Robotic Tentacle Manipulator
   HG Wells described snake-like tentacle manipulators in his 1898 classic War of the Worlds. And what does this device look like if you turn it upside down?

Festo Bionic Handling Assistant Video
   Terrific video presents Festo's robotics work, as described by the engineers who created it.

Marvin Minsky's Tentacle Arm Video
   Even in 1968, it was time to 'Beware the 'long, flexible, glittering tentacles...''

Biomimetic Artificial Muscles
   The robots of tomorrow may have super-strength, thanks to this research.

Crabster CR200 Robot Prowls The Deep
   'The handling-machine did not impress me as a machine, but as a crablike creature...'- H.G. Wells, 1898.

Crabster Robot Deployed At Korea's Sewol Ferry Disaster
   Remote-controlled robots helping out in time of need.

PoseiDrone Tentacled Undersea Robot Like HG Wells'
   'Its motion was so swift, complex, and perfect that at first I did not see it as a machine...'- HG Wells, 1898.

US Navy Laser Ready For Use
   Fifty years from cartoon to reality. Thanks to a lot of engineers and visionaries.

The Martians Are On Their Way!
   'Dense clouds of smoke or dust, visible through a powerful telescope on earth...'- HG Wells, 1898.

Pneumatic Micro-Tentacles Kidnapping Ants
   'Long, flexible, glittering tentacles...'- H.G. Wells, 1898.

Nifty 3D Printed Flexible Robotic Finger
   'It's motion was so swift, complex, and perfect that at first I did not see it as a machine...' - HG Wells, 1898.

X125 Snake-Arm Inspection Robot Video
   '... long, flexible, glittering tentacles...' - HG Wells, 1898.

Artificial Muscles To Power UAV Drone Wings
   'The long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature...' - HG Wells, 1898.

Writhing Robotic Tentacle Uses Laser To Chop Nuke Hardware
   '... long, flexible, glittering tentacles... swinging and rattling about its strange body.' - HG Wells, 1898.

HEL TVD Laser System To Be Built By Dynetics Lockheed Martin
   'Forthwith flashes of actual flame, a bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of men.' - HG Wells, 1898

Humanoid Robot's Muscles Biomimic Ours
   'It is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature...' HG Wells, 1898.

Rippling Fin Robot Drone Swims And Walks
   '... the curious parallelism to animal motions, which was so striking and disturbing to the human beholder...' - HG Wells, 1898.

Habitable Exoplanets Can See Us, As Well
   What ever happened to 'intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes...'

Carbon Robotics: War Of The Worlds As A Metaphor For Weed Control
   'It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white flame.' HG Wells, 1898.

Tentacle Robot Gripper Recalls War Of The Worlds
   'It presented a sort of metallic spider with five jointed, agile legs, and with an extraordinary number of jointed levers, bars, and reaching and clutching tentacles.' - HG Wells, 1898.

Away Rude Mechanicals! I Want Self-Sensing Variable-Stiffness Artificial Muscles.
   '... it is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature.' - HG Wells, 1898.

Iron Beam Laser Under Development To Shoot Down Missiles With Lasers
   'It was sweeping round swiftly and steadily, this flaming death, this invisible, inevitable sword of heat.' - HG Wells, 1989.

SpiRobs Soft Spiral Robotic Arm
   'Beware the 'long, flexible, glittering tentacles...' - HG Wells, 1898

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