The device shown here can generate 10 pulses at 400 volts per second using a 9 volt battery and a PIC12F683 with a switchable clock speed. I'm not sure what is attracting these roaches exactly, but you can be sure that if they ever cross over the plate, they are as good as dead. Hit the link for info on how to make your own. [Project Page via Hack a Day]

I'm too lazy to translate the whole thing, but there's some fun anti-Chinese ribbing in one of the little conversations when his editorial department asks the writer if he's sure it's not a Chinese Vii that's attracting the roaches.

The dig's familiar to me, 'cause when I lived in a heavily Chinese neighborhood in Japan, I got to hear from locals (Japanese ones, obviously) all the time about how I'd get robbed by dirty Chinese indigents and my apartment would be bug-infested before I blinked despite my bleach-loaded OCD clean routine. Okay! Totally irrelevant personal anecdote over. [BARKS (and image) via Destructoid]

Halloy and his team corralled roaches in an area covered by two discs, a dark one and a lighter one. Communists by nature, roaches tend to cluster together, motivated by group instinct. Since they all dig the dark, they did as expected and congregated on that side of the arena. But when robotic roaches were sent in to mingle, and then started easing their way over to the light side, the real roaches followed about 60% of the time, overriding their own survival instincts to hang with the cool kids.

You may notice that the robot in the picture looks nothing like a roach. Says the NYT:

[Roaches]have weak eyes, which allowed the researchers to create a robotic roach that resembles a miniature golf cart more than an insect. In the roach world, however, looking right is not as important as smelling right, and the scientists doused the machines with eau de cockroach sex hormones.