Liquid Cool

Three years ago, I saw a brief article on PBS about something called ferrofluid, a liquid that hardens when magnetized. The application it was being used for at the time was hydraulic shocks. The stiffness of the shocks was variable and determined by the amount of current being run through the ferrofluid inside them.

To explain this tactilely, remember playing with oobleck, a mixture of water and cornstarch, as a kid? When you squeeze a handful of it, it's solid, but then let it go and it oozes through your fingers. Apparently you can run across the surface of a pool full of this mixture: "A pool filled with non-newtonian fluid"

You can even make some of your own ferrofluid, but be careful! I read through the directions, and not only do you expose flammable materials to heat, but the operation looks very similar to a meth lab. When you explain to the police that you're simply making a flammable liquid magnet, you'll change instantly from a suspected drug dealer to a suspected terrorist. Yippee!

At first, this video just looks like bubbles in oil. But wait until he removes the Ferrofluid reservoir.


Also, there are all sorts of modular or configurable robots being designed. These robots assemble and disassemble themselves depending on the application. This is by far the creepiest one I've seen so far: