Robot Plane Can Find Thermals to Stay Aloft

by Jay Garmon in Innovation

on October 17, 2005, 6:46 AM PDT

Robot Plane Can Find Thermals to Stay Aloft

Gliders can go great distances for free, by riding high on spiraling columns of warm air called thermals. NASA recently tested an autonomous UAV that extends its range and flight time by finding and riding thermals. This post originally appeared on an external website

Gliders can go great distances for free, by riding high on spiraling

columns of warm air called thermals. NASA recently tested an autonomous

UAV that extends its range and flight time by finding and riding

thermals.

This post originally appeared on an external website

By Jay Garmon

The Trivia Geek, known to some by the mysterious alias "Jay Garmon," is an online community entrepreneur trying his luck with some promising Internet startups. To get the real skinny on his wacky business ideas--and his amateurish sci-fi short stories--read his blog, JayGarmon.net. It's like Jay without editorial oversight or decent engineering support. \ \ Jay is also the diabolical mind behind TechRepublic's Geek Trivia newsletter, a former contributing editor of TR's Geekend blog, and until March of 2008 was a project manager for TR site feature development. \ \ In a previous life (read: fresh out of college), he was an ad man, toiling away for low pay and less respect as a copywriter and producer of print ads, radio spots, and TV commercials. No, you've probably never seen his work. Be thankful. \ \ Between his ad days and his life as a TechRepublicist, he worked briefly as a Web developer, mostly using (shudder) FrontPage and SQL Server to build rickety and poorly conceived database-driven Web sites. He was self-taught, and it showed. He's also dabbled in proposal writing, though he wouldn't recommend that as a career choice. \ \ Today, when he's not trying to build the next Internet media giant, Jay reads some comic books, plays tabletop RPGs, helps run a local sci-fi con, tries to launch a career as a fiction author, watches a lot of sports, and keeps his wife and daughter happy. The last part is easiest.

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Robot Plane Can Find Thermals to Stay Aloft

Robot Plane Can Find Thermals to Stay Aloft

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The 10 best agile project management software for 2023

1Password is looking to a password-free future. Here’s why

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