Watch a robot swarm “bloom” like a garden

The Swarm Garden: An array of modular robot agents that adapt to changing conditions for living architecture. Researchers at Princeton University have built a swarm of interconnected mini-robots that “bloom” like flowers in response to changing light levels in an office. According to their new paper published in the…

Meet Veronika, the tool-using cow

Veronika uses sticks to scratch herself, suggesting scientists have underestimated cow cognition Far Side fans might recall a classic 1982 cartoon called “Cow Tools,” featuring a cow standing next to a jumble of strange objects—the joke being that cows don’t use tools. That’s why a pet Swiss brown cow…

Ocean damage nearly doubles the cost of climate change

Ignoring the blue economy has left a multi-trillion-dollar blind spot in climate finance. The global cost of greenhouse gas emissions is nearly double what scientists previously thought, according to a study published Thursday by researchers at the University of California, San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography. It is the…