It's the fourth day of a scientific conference in Denver—four busy February days in a huge rabbit-warren convention center with long hallways and fluorescent lighting and serious scientists giving serious PowerPoint presentations in darkened auditoriums; four days of breakthroughs and advances—nanotech to biotech, anthropology to zoology, the whole mind-spinning stew. Four days, for the assembled journalists, of making sense of it all and banging out stories on the fly—and now comes word of what could be a light interlude: Keep an eye out for the guy carrying the head. Say what? The robotic human head. The press people for the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the conference's sponsor, say the demonstration's on for tomorrow morning.

The Man Who Mistook his Girlfriend for a Robot

"Known as "sympathetic haptics" because it gives one person the ability to feel what another feels, the technology is still years away from being able to transmit the feeling of Tiger Woods's golf swing to another person, for instance."

Touch technology

" NEW YORK, Aug 3 (Reuters) - Even though nanotechnology is still in its infancy, the nano prefix is quickly growing into one of the most over-used and misused phrases in the English language."
"Nano-tex, which is majority owned by Burlington Industries Inc. (OTC BB:BRLG.OB - News) and aims to improve textiles at the molecular level, could have you outfitted in nanopants before long."
"They have already listed trademarks such as nano-care and nano-pel for their stain- and wrinkle-resistant materials."
"The environmental crusaders from Greenpeace may not be sure what nanotechnology is, but they are already against it.Greenpeace has called for a moratorium on the release of nanoparticles in commercial products until studies of potential nano pollution can be completed."

" Enthusiasts are referred to as nano reefers, which apparently has nothing to do with minuscule marijuana cigarettes."

Overused, misused nano becoming pervasive prefix

" Israeli scientists have devised a computer that can perform 330 trillion operations per second, more than 100,000 times the speed of the fastest PC. The secret: It runs on DNA."

Computer Made from DNA and Enzymes

" A Japanese toy maker claims to have developed a gadget that translates dog barks into human language and plans to begin selling the product -- under the name Bowlingual -- in U.S. pet stores, gift shops and retail outlets this summer. "

I always wanted to learn to speak dog.

Bow-Lingual dog bark translator

"You asked for it... By popular demand, we present the first-edition Spamdemic Map Poster. Printed on a sheet of 35"x23" heavy semi-gloss stock, with all the details you long to tack up on your wall and throw darts at."

The wide world of spam...

The Spamdemic Map

Atlanta (July 8,2003)—Working from their university labs in two different corners of the world, U.S. and Australian researchers have created what they call a new class of creative beings, “the semi-living artist” – a picture-drawing robot in Perth, Australia whose movements are controlled by the brain signals of cultured rat cells in Atlanta.

And they make great pets.

Researchers Use Lab Cultures to Create Robotic ‘Semi-Living Artist’