Tetra's completion of an "expert class" maze in 4.7 seconds shatters last year's best by more than a second in a half, which in micromouse terms basically makes it the love child of Carl Lewis and Michael Phelps. But what makes him so good? For that we'll have to turn to this jauntily scored interview with David Otten, a 22-year veteran of micromouse competitions. Because apparently people have been racing robotic mice around mazes since at least 1987 and NO ONE EVER TOLD ME ABOUT IT.
[Robots Dreams via BotJunkie]

An underwater robotic glider built by Rutgers University students and scientists has achieved the first underwater robot crossing, after traveling beneath the waves for 221 days.

Rutgers researchers joined some Spanish colleagues today aboard the "Investigador" ship to recover the drone, after launching it on April 27, 2009 off the coast of New Jersey. The submersible bot made its 4,591-mile journey at the slow but steady pace of 4 centimeters per second.

Named "The Scarlet Knight" for Rutgers sports — despite its fine yellow appearance — RU27 technically already claimed its transatlantic record on Nov. 14 after 201 days at sea. But the Rutgers team clinched the accomplishment after recovering the scarlet lady, and reportedly gave her a dose of champagne to celebrate.

Rutgers University alone has a small underwater fleet of up to seven gliders operating off the coast of New Jersey, with one even cruising around the Antarctic. The U.S. Navy has likewise deployed a number of drone submersibles (not to mention sea mammals), and private companies may also soon send out swarms of underwater explorers for oil prospecting.

Looks like Scarlet won't be too lonely the next time she decides to take a dip.

Popular Science is your wormhole to the future. Reporting on what's new and what's next in science and technology, we deliver the future now.

How do they do it? With a triple junction compound solar cell that uses three photo absorption layers made from elements like indium and gallium. I'll leave it to the physical chemistry geniuses among you to explain exactly what that means in the comments.

You might have heard of efficiency ratings that climb into the 40% range. Sharp even lists one in their press release. To clarify, those are different tests. Apparently there's a distinction made in efficiency ratings between concentrated and unfocused light. The more you know, right?

Don't expect to be covering your house in these soon, they're meant for use in satellites. [Akihabara via Engadget]

The current distance record, a 275-mile run completed by a Solectria Sunrise, is technically longer than the Tesla's 241-mile achievement. But the Tesla's battery showed about 38 miles worth of juice left in the battery, which, if verified, would top the Solectria's record. The Tesla roadster bested a modified Porsche 911 and several of Mitsubishi's new crop of electric vehicles.

We should note that the Tesla was driven by a company staffer, who surely knows every trick to getting the best mileage out of the Roadster. The course consists of windy mountain roads in addition to standard highway driving, so the average speed was only about 28 mph, with a high of about 56 mph. Still, a nearly 280-mile range is a serious achievement for an electric car in production. [Reg Hardware]

The new silly mark was set on a 20-inch 2007 iMac, with a 2.4ghz Core 2 Duo and 4 Gigabytes of RAM. It took about 15 minutes to open all apps, and I guess 15 more minutes to put all the windows in Exposé mode. The reader who sent this says that he "was able to talk on video chat while opening everything, even while the video froze at some times for just a few seconds." One thing he noticed: The dock can't get beyond 100 applications.

And what I still can't get is how people have the patience to collect 200 apps just to run them at once. [Thanks Hawkskater0]

For $30/month you can record all of your calls through the Cogi website or a dial-in number—up to 1000 minutes a month. These calls can be pulled up at any time in the future, and you can bookmark important points of the call along the way for quick review.

But where the service gets really cool is that you can have 15 of these bookmarks transcribed for you (unfortunately, only in 30 second chunks). Subscribers can actually have up to 30 minutes of transcription service a month parceled how they'd like. Each additional minute costs $.99.

Apparently the system uses voice-to-text software along with some level of human quality control assurance.

We figure Cogi could be pretty great or a bit mediocre, but they are offering free one-month trials so you can try before you buy. [Cogi]

The jet pack debuted last year, but this has been the first time that it has been used in such a risky stunt, with no safety measures whatsoever for the pilot. It's based on a military design made by Bell Aerosystems back in the sixties. That model wasn't good because it was too heavy, so the people at Jet Pack International—where Eric works—redesigned it using carbon fiber technology.

The result is a jet pack that weights a lot less and, therefore, has more range although not that much: About 33 seconds vs 20 seconds of the old model. I don't know about you, but making a jump over a gorge like this with just 12 seconds of overhead doesn't seem like a lot of fun to me. [Jetpack International via Denver Post and Sky NEws]

Unfortunately, the vinyl was made from the same mix as the CD, so the distortion is still there. However, it is fairly standard practice to make separate masters for separate formats, and Sheperd's analysis reveals that the analog distortion on the vinyl tracks have less clipping (although the difference is minimal) compared to the the CD version. In reality, this is probably a moot point given the fact that a hardcore Metallica fan is far more likely to to dig up GHIII tracks than buy a turntable. However, even the thought of turning to vinyl these days further illustrates the point that record labels need to re-focus their attention back on quality. [Mastering Media Thanks Michael!]

At 47 years old, Colligan has decided to attempt the record-breaking feat in order to raise money for a school in Nepal (and undoubtedly to become the greatest unicyclist of all-time). He plans on achieving this dangerous feat with his trusty distance unicycle, fitted with an off-road tire. No word on whether he will sport a wig, parachute pants and a clown nose during the attempt. You laugh, but it could help keep him warm up there. [Metro]

The flight was pretty secretive because QinetiQ are a defense contractor, and therefore there weren't any representatives from the world air sports federation there. This means that it can't be verified and entered into the record books. A Qinetiq employee seemed sure that it could go even better though, saying; "You ain't seen nothing yet." That enthusiasm is great, but just remember to invite the FAI guys next time, OK?

The Zephyr has a huge 59-ft wingspan, but weighs only 31kg, making it extremely efficient. During the flight it reached a maximum altitude of 58,000 ft, charging it's batteries during the day so that it could fly through the night. [BBC]

It was invented by Morag Hutcheon, in order to allow people to listen to 60 seconds of an album before buying it. However, this doesn't seem like it would work because you could only hear part of one track, and record stores would be a mess of noise, with all the clips blurring into one. [Pre>Vu]

Now, let's just pause a minute to think of the possibilities: high definition movie playback (like Blu-ray and HD DVD) could be carried out effortlessly; weather forecasts could crunch more numbers, leading to more accurate forecasts; most importantly, your frame rate in Battlefield would be off the charts. – Nicholas Deleon

Researchers Say New Chip Breaks Speed Record [The New York Times via Drudge Report]