Amputees may one day regain actual feeling thanks to Darpa and researchers at Case Western University who have created what we thought was once only possible in science fiction. As a part of DARPA's Reliable Neural-Interface Technology (RE-NET) program, CWRU's flat interface nerve electrode (FINE) system has…

You know that terrible feeling in your gut when you've eaten something you shouldn't have? Well imagine having a Roomba small enough to swallow, one that could clean up that mess inside you. That's not exactly what DARPA had in mind when it funded the creation of this penny-sized vacuum, although it certainly should…

Of the 25,000 Explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) missions conducted by the US military in Iraq, only 30 have resulted in fatalities according to Army Col. K. Reinhard, commander of the joint EOD teams operating in the theater. That's still 30 too many. And that's why DARPA's developed the most advanced EOD surrogate…

We've known for a few years now that DARPA-funded prosthetics research is yielding some pretty incredible technology. We're not talking incredible in the robotic cheetah sense. We're talking incredible in The Incredibles sense of the term. Specifically, DARPA is literally building superheroic technology that enables…

Just a few weeks after President Obama announced plans to scale back the country's drone program, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration (DARPA) announced plans to roll out a program for the rapid development and manufacture of sensors to help power unmanned aerial, land and underwater vehicles. The…

They say that success has many parents but failure is an orphan. Judged by that standard—or any other—the Internet is a success. Al Gore invented it. Tim Berners-Lee got a knighthood out of it. Everyone was using it before it was cool. But only two men have ever borne the title "Father of the Internet." One is computer…

It's not as exciting as seeing Big Dog or Petman in action, but infantry in the US Army should be happy now that DARPA's begun testing its Warrior Web support system. One day robotic exoskeletons will allow humans to easily lift and carry hundreds of pounds, but for the immediate future DARPA has set its sights on a…

Gone are the days when we could look at cutting-edge robots and at least take some satisfaction in the fact that the human body was still superior. It seems like DARPA is getting closer and closer to outdoing Mother Nature, this time with its ARM-H robot hand that's as impressively dextrous as it is cheap and durable.

DARPA-funded DRS Technologies, Inc has developed a new 1280 x 720 night vision camera with pixels just five microns across—that's reportedly just one-twelfth the size of a human hair. So. Small. The new tech isn't just way more practical, it could save the government a bundle of money, too.

Replacing fighter planes and reconnaissance aircraft with robotic drones turned out to be a far easier task for the military than replacing soldiers with bots. But DARPA remains determined to one day enlist robots for all military jobs, and among other research, it's working hard to develop a relatively low-cost set …