Robotic Logistics in 30 Minutes

Jeff Bozos' announcement on "60 Minutes" that Amazon intends to implement 30 minute deliveries in select markets by 2015 created quite the buzz over the Thanksgiving Holiday.  The idea of rapid item delivery has tremendous appeal to busy consumers, did you forget to buy a bottle of wine for the party you were invited to, order a rapid drone to bring a bottle of your choice right to your door right on time.  The, currently, science fiction sounding concept does have some rational concerns that need to be overcome, the concerns include: what is the additional cost incurred on a delivery that must have such a rapid response time, ensuring accurate item delivery, noise, legal, etc..... (insert more later, sorry a bit brain bonked right now)

In the Amazon video a special orange box is used to contain the item(s) that would be delivered from the distribution center to the consumer.  Critics have asked how Amazon will retrieve these special boxes after deliveries.  Options might include, having the boxes simply be made of a low cost recyclable material, cardboard for example, and have the price of the delivery box be part of the overall cost of rapid deliveries, another option could include a Netflix style return service, where customers are asked to send the boxes back to Amazon through the US Postal Service, this approach would allow for more sophisticated packaging.

Another concern is the transit distance between Amazon's primary distribution centers and clients.  (This part of the concept has varying degrees of roughness)  Instead of relying on a single primary distribution hub there is the potential to implement multi-roll distribution nodes.  Advanced vending machines might be one potential approach, several classes of vending machine would fill different rolls, the more traditional vending machines would still operate as a normal vending machine, selling snacks, supplies, or drinks, but with the addition of a docking node that would allow for a drone to dock with the vending machine, loading up on whatever item customers have asked for while recharging their batteries.  The second class of vending machines would serve as a corner holding center, capable of taking deliveries and holding them until clients either picked up items in person or had them delivered at a later time, via either drone or ground services.  The third class of distribution machines would be intended to work with physical retailers, they would serve as mini smart warehouses, providing access to the items in their inventory that could be carried by the robotic delivery services.  The physical store system would need to account for the cost concerns of store owners who would want to avoid having the items they sold online having to compete with Amazon's price and in the store sales price suffer as a result, to this end, Amazon could list prices so that customers were first shown the price for the rapid delivery items in their area and then given a chance to order from Amazon's logistic services (this assumes Amazon makes money on the rapid delivery service).

The network of in community delivery services would allow for rapid delivery services to integrate themselves into regional economies to the benefit of the majority of players, so long as the legal framework is there.  Ideally the underlying technology for the localized distributions nodes would be open sourced, this would help to minimize the barrier of entry forMom and Pop shops.  Additionally this could allow for users to automatically make  their wares available for consumption both locally and internationally.  

Communication with CubeSats

The final frontier is becoming more open.  Humans have gone from two players in the space game in the 1960's to a world where universities and small groups can launch their own mini-satellites into orbit by piggybacking on the delivery of much larger satellites into orbit.   These mini-satellites are generally designed to meet the Cube-Sat design specification, where the shape of the satellite must be cube like and each component cube has an edge length of 10 cm.  The consistency of the dimensions of a Cub-Sat make it easier for companies to accommodate for a known shape and volume, this is the same rational behind flat-rate boxes and shipping containers, while you may not always need the full volume you have a very clear idea of how much space you are allowed and the delivery company knows how to mail boxes that size.

Like many design choices the dimensions of a Cube-Sat have their trade-offs, while Cube-Sats can be easily launched in relatively large numbers, the small volume limits the available space for communication equipment, the less space for communication hardware, generally speaking, the lower the maximum bandwidth of the satellite.  As Cube-Sats become a more common tool of scientific exploration there is always a desire for more data from these small boxes.  One potential solution being investigated at MIT is to re-purpose an old anti-aircraft gun mount as a platform for 6 meter diameter satellite dish that will be large enough to concentrate the signal from research satellites and effectively communicate.  The challenges of overhauling this system has led to the question, instead of using a single massive communication array to contact orbiting Cub-Sats, why can't researchers use dozens, if not hundreds, of smaller dishes to communicate?  

SETI, the search for extre terrestrial intelligence has already done something similar to listen to the stars in the hopes of finding signs of alien life.  Instead of  a single massive radio antennae like the Aricebo Observatory SETI aims to use 350 antennae to create the equivalent signal capturing ability as a 100 meter radio telescope.  I would like to propose something similar, but on a smaller scale.  Instead of a single 6 meter diameter dish, with an effective collecting area of roughly 30 meters, network roughly 100 tracking dishes with a diameter of 1 meter.  Achieving the same operational surface area with a much more granular control on the effective collecting area and more critically, greater flexibility on where the platform can be deployed.  Now instead of a single use dish design solution, amateurs and professionals around the world could build their own radio arrays capable of creating data links with research satellites.

Now for the caveats, and there are many, the first is technical, would the mini-dish solution actually make sense for both uplink and downlinks.  As a data down link I am reasonably certain that this array concept could work, if the SETI design works I don't see why a smaller diameter dish array for closer signals couldn't work.  As to uplinks that is more dubious, I don't know enough about the physics of radio communication to make any real comments beyond the fact that I like this idea.  The second limitation is legal, which is also a big one, assuming the physics works out, the international community would need to establish some part of the EM band that could be used by these mini-arrays without interfering with other established orbital infrastructure.  The third is economics, while I would generally suggest that this design be open-source regardless, the scope of the market is hard to judge.  While the intent of smaller dishes is intended to lower the barrier of entry, the number of separate moving components might actually not make financial sense.  While the cost of an individual dish would be less than that of a larger tracking system, cost to own and operate the system over time is a greater concern.  Hundreds of dishes with at least 2 moving parts and sensitive electronics would require quite the maintenance effort.   Hopefully a lower cost of installing less massive infrastructure would mitigate the overall cost, the lower installation cost and the potential for economies of scale might make a technology like this viable.

A Powerful Wallet

One of the challenges for smart phone users is limited battery life.  While there are external batteries available to allow for on the go phone charging, these external chargers have two flaws aesthetic and clutter.  An external battery system is difficult to make aesthetically pleasing.  Beyond the aesthetic consideration many consumers are left with the challenge of finding space for another device to keep track of.  Personally as a male consumer, who isn't interested in getting a men's purse and has been told that cargo pants are no longer acceptable attire, I would rather limit the number of things I bring with me for a night (please note that I am simply referring to my personal experience, I feel that both men and women would appreciate a new solution).
To solve the concern of sufficient battery life in a convenient package, I would like to propose the "Power Wallet"  The Power Wallet aims to be a smart wallet for modern consumer, shaped like a standard bi-fold wallet, it would users to recharge their smart phone via an inbuilt USB power connector, all while still serving as a traditional wallet.

 For the Power Wallet to make sense it must achieve these design parameters, the volume should not exceed that of a standard wallet, it should be able to contain an assortment of currency and credit cards, all wiring elements should be able to be stored conveniently, and the wallet should be robust enough to survive regular daily use.  Ideally the design would provide minimal interference with RFID/NFC based communication standards used in many card systems.  Additional features might include, solar panels on the back of the wallet, a mini-flashlight, e-ink display (for reasons), the ability for wireless charging, and outlet prongs for the internal DC adapter(this might be pushing things).

 
The hard science limit of the design is the energy density of battery technology, for Li-Ion batteries this  value currently ranges between 250 Wh/L to 730 Wh/L. If we assume a middle value of 500 Wh/L= 500mAh/cm^3  we can then start to estimate how large of a battery we can add into the wallet.  For reasons of safety I am also going to imagine that the battery requires 2 mm of some kind of external protection, before the material of the wallet is considered.


Credit Cards have the dimension of 53.98 mm x 85.6 mm x 0.76 mm 
Starting from these baselines and a quick test of simply placing my cellphone's battery in my wallet we can assume that the Smart Wallet's internal battery could have the external dimensions of 6.4cm x 9.4 cm x 0.6 cm, making the actual battery volume 6.0cm x 9.0cm x 0.2 cm or 10.8 cm^3 continuing with the energy density assumption of 500mAh/cm^3 we can estimate the ability to store up to 5400mAh of power, or enough to fully charge a smart phone one and a half times (there are some efficiency issues to consider).  

While these numbers do sound appealing they should be taken with a grain of salt, to the best of my knowledge Li-Ion battery manufacture doesn't generally allow for company's to order batteries to volume, most of the sub-elements of the battery, referred to as cells, are cylindrical in nature, consequently the actual storage capacity of the battery system will be less.  

April 17 2014 It turns out someone was already looking into this idea, here is an article on gizmag that highlights a credit card sized back up battery.

Keeping your input dynamic

Years ago while visiting my older brother in New York City I had the good fortune of being able to visit the WIRED magazine pop-up store in Manhattan where the years most expensive technology was put on prominent display.  One technology was the Optimus Maximus keyboard, a slick piece of hardware where each key had an embedded full color display, allowing the user to dynamically define the visual profile of the key as well as the function associated with it.  Visually speaking I was incredibly impressed, but my opinion rapidly changed when I actually used the keyboard, the buttons felt too soft to the touch, which for the trade off of input flexibility might have been acceptable, if the price wasn't so incredible.  Costing well over $1,400 per keyboard, the Optimus felt like it was meshing with a very narrow consumer base.  I started to wonder if it would make more sense to create a less flashy but still tremendously flexible E-Ink version of the technology.  Each key possessing a separately addressable display module, allowing users to dynamically update the characters associated with the program being run.

The idea of integrating e-ink with input surfaces continues to evolve, what follows are a few outlines of how device flexibility might be improved.

Contemporary laptop track-pads are incredibly limiting on how they allow users to interact with their computer.  The surface area of interaction is mechanically limited to whatever segment of the computer body was defined by the design team.  When a user is predominately using their laptop as a typing device it makes sense to limit the potential of accidentally moving your cursor, but in an era where people use their computers for more than word processing the interface should evolve with the people.

Imagine a computer where the entire hand rest surface area is covered in a high contrast E-Ink display.  During "normal" operations, this visually adaptive trackpad (or VAT for the remainder of this article*) would  highlights the traditional position of the trackpad and accepts input.  The magic would happen when users open other programs, for example a photo editing suite, new icons would appear, providing rapid access to commonly used features.  For users who might need more fluid control over the sensitivity of the cursor they could define their track pad to allow for higher sensitivity at the center of the input region and lower sensitivity at the periphery or vice versa for gamers.

With the VAT occupying so much of the laptop's real estate  the physical click would also need to be improved.  One option would be to place the entire display on a slight hinge and allow for any region to be mechanically compressed for clicking to occur.  Another alternative would be to eliminate the mechanical click and instead implement haptic feedback devices through out the frame, where the screen would vibrate when it acknowledges a click or some other gesture.

 Social net working could be made more flexible with users being provided with tools to allow them to create small update windows.  These windows could do more than provide a place for you to read tweets, or the other obvious alternative of simple daily update widgets, the display could serve as an art piece, where the pattern would evolve according to any number of custom inputs and artistic themes.  As the refresh rate of E-Ink is much lower than traditional LCDs the art should attempt to embrace the limitations of the format.

Similar concepts and technologies.  The Razer Switchblade interface.  The Switchblade is a 4 inch multi-touch screen that serves as a trackpad for the Razer Blade Pro laptop.
Pros:  Having the LCD screen allows for a far more dynamic display on the input surface.
Cons:  The LCD requires more energy and is limited to a static point on the body of the laptop.

*sorry for the terrible name I couldn't think of a good one 

Nudging Asteroids

After doing my background research for Exploring Space on Potential a range of ideas came to mind on how an asteroid threatening life on Earth might be redirected to a safer orbit.  The ideas are in refinement but I thought I would put down outlines for right now.

Kicking Up Dust

One of the cool results of dust on the surface of an asteroid becoming electrically charged under sunlight, is that dust particles will accumulate in regions of shadow.  Impact craters will accumulate dusty deposits, similar to how dust stockpiles in the corners of your house (not quite in any real way but I think its a useful visual metaphor).  These large dust deposits might have potential as a "fuel" for a redirection system.  With the extremely low escape velocity found on asteroids, even ones large enough to cause a major environmental disasters hear on Earth, a small robotic system would be deployed on the surface of the target asteroid and spend its service life launching dust away from the asteroid and slowly change both the asteroid's mass and, at least minimally, the velocity of the asteroid as well.  The combined effect of losing mass and gentle application of force, over a long enough time scale, would ensure the asteroid would miss the orbital window necessary to impact on the Earth.

__Potential Means of Moving Dust

 ____Shakerbot in the craters:  The premise is relatively simple, a small robot or part of a larger robot           would wander the surface of the asteroid going from impact crater to impact crater and begin to violently shake, the energy transferred from this shaking action would cause some of the dust particulates to gain enough energy to be ejected from the asteroid.  Dust that wasn't ejected would still have the benefit of altering the rate at which sunlight was absorbed by the asteroids surface.

__________Swarm solution, many small shaker bots in craters, ruled over by a queen rover, who                                    would supply power for the shaker bots and transport the smaller robots as needed to                                  various sites of deployment

  _________Lonely bot, instead of having multiple robots the asteroid would have a single rover                                     transporting the shaker system from point to point

_________the Launcher:  this robot would be a more straight forward in design than the shaker bot,                                the design would emphasize a mechanical launcher that would scoop up dust and launch it                              into space.

_________Ablative propulsion, super heat the dust so that the vaporized material would provide a certain                     degree of thrust.  Impact craters might serve as convenient regions for material vaporization

                

________Ion Tether Drive:  By docking a conductive tether onto the surface of the asteroid it might be possible to use charge of the local dust to create a type of ion drive.  The tether would create a localized voltage gradient that dust particles could be attracted to, for this to work the pull of the tether would supply the local dust with enough additional energy to achieve escape velocity.  (this idea I have the most faith in)

Nuclear thrust Cap  Using a nuclear battery to redirect comets at extreme orbital distances into more convenient locations for future space mining.

Exploring Space on Potential

I recently read an article that proposed that ballooning spiders  propel themselves through the air by means of electrically charging silk extruded from their abdomen.  The author of the paper postulated that even a small amount of electrical charge would allow the spider to take advantage of the natural voltage gradient that occurs in the Earth's atmosphere, aiding in the spider's ability to travel tremendous distances.*  Reading this reminded me of an article I read about 6 years ago, within that article it was noted that as a result of solar wind, radiation, and the tail of the Earth's magnetic field, referred to as a plasma sheet, the surface of the Moon appears to create a natural voltage gradient.

I am curious, could the charged surface of the Moon be used in some way to power/propel micro space craft?  (Unfortunately this is one of my posts where I posit more questions than actual answers, although I find this idea too interesting to not at least spend an hour looking into)  While the voltage gradient of the Lunar surface may achieve relatively high voltages, the density of these charges may be insufficient to allow for non-microscopic space craft (although a microscopic space probe would be cool).

Imagine a swarm of small lunar explorers, the size and shape of small spiders spending their days wandering over the surface the Moon and other non-terrestrial surfaces.  Every month for six days when the moon is full in the Earth's night sky the little explorers will unwind statically charged tethers and ride the plasma eddies forever searching for critical materials to humanities exploration.

One potential application of such micro explorers could be to emphasize the discovery of deposits of regolith that contain high concentrations of critical elements like hydrogen and carbon.  By emphasizing narrowly defined sensors the robots within the swarm would hopefully be low enough cost that they could be dusted across the surface.  When a swarm encountered a deposit that it found to meet mission parameters, ex hydrogen ratios exceeding 22.5 parts per thousand (over 100x higher than background) the spiders would deactivate their tethers and wait to be noticed by overhead satellites (this is based on the assumption that a satellite's resolution might not be high enough to detect smaller deposits of resources, but could see the marker swarm in indicator mode).

Added 9/25/2013
Another potential means of utilizing this feature would be to create an extremely thin "magic carpet", the extremely massive surface area to mass would allow for as much charge as possible to support the structure.  An engineering concern for this approach would steam from the potential of the system to become tangled as a result of localized eddies in the motion of charge.  Either the structure could be made semi-rigid or small motors could be placed within the frame allowing for it to dynamically shape itself.

Regardless I hope that something like this happens as it would be wicked cool.
I feel I should say this somewhere, the rational behind a macroscopic swarm design generally stems from the additional mobility available during times where the voltage gradient is insufficient for propulsion.  It could make just as much sense, if not more so, to suggest developing microscopic swarm machines that used chemical switches to go from a roaming platform to detection marker.


*under ideal circumstances

Electrical Activity and Dust Lifting on Earth Mars and Beyond
An article that discusses various means by which dust can gain charge, including on bodies like the Moon and asteroids, it generally indicates that objects larger than 10 micrometers are unlikely to be lifted by the electrostatic force.  That being said the statements are for naturally occurring materials, not systems designed to drift along the gradient. (hey trying to be hopeful here)

Identification After Search and Rescue

A rather macabre idea that came to me a few days ago to potentially aid in more rapidly identifying human remains.  While dental records can help to positively identify a deceased individual the identification process, it is a tedious process.  One potential means of reducing the time required to identify a body, would be to implant materials in the gum line of patients creating a bar code like structure.  Such a bar code would allow forensic teams to reduce the potential number of dental registries that would need to be examined for final confirmation.  

There would be a range of social challenges of creating such implants and associated databases. Military organizations might consider it for their personnel. 

To avoid privacy concerns, no central database of the bar codes would need to be held, instead dentists could be issued a range of numbers that could be given to patients, and in the case of an unidentified body being found law enforcement could upload the all or part of the identification code and dental offices could supply the associated record(s) if they determined that one of their patients matched the identification code.

Channel Surfing on Streaming Services

One of the first world problems associated with the 21st century is the challenge of selecting what program to watch during an evening in.  Recommendation algorithms are aimed at highlighting a film or t.v. show that consumers might find appealing but they ignore a large underlying challenge for many users, the paradox of choice.  With dozens if not hundreds of options confronting users having the service provide a more streamlined interface could improve overall satisfaction.  When accessing an online service like Netflix or Hulu users would be presented with simple channel listings under defined categories, comedy, drama, action, etc.. upon selecting these channels a program within the category would appear.  Ideally the interface would follow the same methodology as Pandora where at the end of each selection users would be given the option to refine what kind of shows would appear next.  

Along similar lines users could also be provided the ability to create shared playlists of media available.  Now friends and family across the country can watch the same movie marathon.  Said playlists might also be stitched together to create full on channels.

Alternatively a media streaming service could create virtual channels where users could dynamically provide input as to what program would be selected next.

Integrating Inductive Charging Capacity into Hybrid Electric Drone Vehicles and Service Facilities

Integrating Inductive Charging Capacity into Hybrid Electric Drone Vehicles and Service Facilities

As drone aircraft become ever more present on the frontlines of modern warfare technological developments of the underlying logistical capacity will need to be (developed?) augmented to ensure our Nation’s Warfighters are receiving maximum benefit from the tools provided to them. 

Ok I should stop trying to sound sophisticated, unfortunately I have no statistics right now on how having aircraft idling on an airfield impacts their ability to rapidly be deployed for long duration missions.

The intent of this proposal is to investigate the potential productivity gains stemming from integrating an inductive charging system into the airfields and roads of facilities using drone aircraft. 

Technical Questions:

*What is the trade off with installing this system, both in costs and changes in vehicle flexibility?

                For drone aircraft does it allow for more rapid deployment?

                For non-combat vehicles, would this allow planes to utilize local power as opposed to idling the aircraft’s engines?

                                -is the rate of energy transfer great enough

                                -accounting for several variables, do the considerations of energy needed for idling make inductive transfer make sense

                                                -added weight of transfer system

                                                -emissions savings

                If an airplane’s propulsion system is hybrid electric, could the inductive energy system provide supplemental power for takeoff, hopefully minimizing the size of the electrical generators.

-Can the 60 cm maximum transmission distance be overcome?

                                -what efficiency tradeoffs exist when distance between source and drain are varied?

                -how much base load draw occurs with no recievers?

                -potential for EM interference both for communication and sensing?

                -while offsetting the potential for a percentage of fuel explosions, what are the risks to personnel that stem from these systems if they are accidentally exposed

                -operational envelope in hot environments

               -cost for installation

                                -can inductive panels be produced, allowing for rapid assembly and break down

                                http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/11/ditch-the-cord-let-the-road-charge-your-ev/

                -impact on mission flexibility for nuclear powered vessels

                              the book Wired for war talks about  the increased volume of air power that could be supplied by utilizing drone aircraft on aircraft carriers to the exclusion of manned aircraft

                             if aircraft are made able to passively re-energize on the flight deck, what is the impact on combat sorties during a given time increment

                             if there is an increase in sortie volume, would the costs make tactical sense

With respect to military applications, does an inductive power transfer airfield make sense in areas where larger scale energy infrastructure isn't available (this question is focused on airfields built for larger aircraft)

Alternative approach, integrating inductive energy transfer systems into smaller shorter range drone aircraft

ex, solar panels that can serve as landing pads at night for small quad copters/helicopters 

                      -using smaller aircraft with inductive charging, could the surfaces of convoy vehicles be transformed into roosting locations, allowing for smaller machines to move from vehicle to vehicle while minimizing exposure for the warfighter

http://www.theengineer.co.uk/automotive/in-depth/your-questions-answered-inductive-charging-for-road-vehicles/1015724.article

http://www.theengineer.co.uk/in-depth/the-big-story/unplugged-inductive-charging-on-the-road/1006269.article

http://singularityhub.com/2013/08/25/korean-road-wirelessly-charges-new-electric-buses/

Induction Power Runways

Just a quick entry as I don't have it flushed out.
For future electric and hybrid electric aircraft, would it be reasonable to create landing strips that have embedded induction coils for power transfer?
The intent of this idea would be to provide additional electricity during takeoff and to supplement whatever onboard generating system was installed.  Said power could also provide the energy needed for taxiing to and from the gate.

Better version coming in a later entry, but I wanted to leave myself some notes
http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/news/how-it-works-laser-beaming-recharges-uav-in-flight-11091133

http://www.wirelesspowerplanet.com/news/project-for-inductive-charging-of-electric-vehicles-started-at-frankfurt-airport/#more-1973

http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/16/showa-aircraft-shows-off-contactless-charging-system-world-back/

http://www.p3-group.com/en/p3-innovation-in-inductive-charging-60855.html

http://blog.cafefoundation.org/?p=5134

Infra-Red Screen

OK so my thoughts are really disjoint, I clearly know the idea I'm trying to share, but I don't know how to say it clearly right now.  So the quick version

Instead of using a green screen behind actors to aid in special effects, have surface coatings that are reflective in very particular spectra of the near infra-red.  By having the coatings occur in the near IR you can have a greater degree of flexibility when it comes to what special effects are added, as well as where they are added.  The other cool advantage, actors could work in slightly more dynamic sets, allowing them to more fully immerse themselves in their environment.

Normally when hollywood films are creating scenes where actors need to be digitally inserted into an alternative environment they will perform their parts in front of either a solid blue or green surface.  The purpose of this surface is to allow computer algorithms to know what parts of the scene need to be replaced by the alternative visuals (yes there some different details when you consider traditional film cameras from back in the day, but this article doesn't deal with it anyways so I'm not covering it*).  While blue/green screening is an incredibly powerful tools, I feel technology gives us opportunities to try a new technique.  

Quick Background  The CCD sensor in traditional video camera's have a much wider sensitivity to the electromagnetic spectrum than the human visual spectrum.  This wider spectrum of sensitivity includes the near infrared range of light, a frequency of light used in TV remotes, security cameras, and Wii controllers.  What is cool is this invisible light can convey a range of information.

Re-using Waste in Forward Operating Bases

One of the many unsexy challenges facing servicemen and women deployed in nations like Afghanistan is the disposal of the incredible amount of material waste that deployments produce.   Many smaller Forward Operating Bases (FOBs) are relegated to simply burning their waste, ranging from packaging material from care packages, to unneeded paper products, and, some of the least pleasant, human waste.   What I would like to propose is a technology that might aid in reducing the problems associated with waste disposal on a FOB.
Rocket Stoves are considered one of the most efficient means of utilizing traditional fuel sources, including, wood, grass, and dung.  The objective is to develop a product design envelope for a rocket stove that works in multiple ways to help manage waste production in remote areas.  In Figure 1 is an simple example of a rocket stove.  Fuel burns in the combustion chamber with the smoke from the fire being pulled into the larger volume chimney, the placement of the chimney promotes strong air flow aiding in the burn process, the lay out also allows for greater use of the energy produced by the burn.  (the red lines show the path of air through the system)

Figure 1:  Basic Rocket Stove

The high temperature burn produced in the combustion chamber of a standard rocket stove is most likely enough to promote a cleaner burn process than an open pit burn more can be done.  According to a 2010 US Army Corps of Engineers report the average warfighter will produce roughly one third of a pound of waste per day.  Often human waste is what is being disposed of in open pit burns.  The platform shown in Figure 2 is a preliminary concept for handling human waste.

Fig 2:  the modified rocket stove design

The first major change you should notice between Fig 1 and Fig 2 are the red radiator pips now surrounding the chimney segment of rocket-stove, the purpose of the radiator pipes is to allow personnel to take greater advantage of the thermal energy produced by the stove.  In this particular approach I assumed that the quality* of the heat produced by the rocket stove is not great enough to warrant a fully fledged steam generator .  Based on my assumption about heat quality I suggest that between the radiator pipes and the chimney section would be a network of thermo-electric generators (TEG), making the platform a true co-gen system.  The heat that is carried away from the chimney system allows for a maximum delta T, improving the performance of the TEG, this waste heat, while of a lower quality still has a great amount of value, I will emphasize the nastier sounding narrative that I believe has the greatest use.  After absorbing sufficient thermal energy from the rocket stove the working fluid will need to transfer its heat somewhere, that somewhere could be the dehydration of poop (sorry I wanted to say that for ever and this isn't a fully professional document so work with me).  Boiling water, as many home chocoletiers know, is one of the most effective ways to keep a temperature constant, human waste contains an incredible amount of water.  As the intent of this design is to reduce smell it would be silly to try dehydrating the liquid waste in an open environment consequently the dehydration chamber's off gas would be pulled into the air intake of the combustion chamber, causing the materials to be combusted into less noxious component materials. (I hope)  After the waste has been dehydrated enough it can now be more thoroughly disposed of by being utilized as a fuel source.
(I need to insert a thermal diagram of the cooling deal)


*Energy Quality relates to how easily you can get energy to change from form A to form B.  In the case of boiling water you've already changed the form once and to said steam into electricity means you are going from B to C, doing this by means of a turbine generator, is most likely not possible.

** I totally forgot to note the suggestion of having TEGs and a heat exchanger in the exhaust/intake section of the design.  Darn.  At least one other Alaskan likes the idea of a TEG in a stove exhaust.

This post was originally intended to be a section on suggesting my own take for developing a rocket stove for rural communities that would serve as a hot water heater and electrical generator for homes.  For whatever reason the narrative of a co-gen platform at an FOB felt easier to write, but both applications are viable, the only difference would be the statistics and sources I referenced.

Making Soil in Space

While doing more research into space mining, in this case thinking about refining carbonaceous chondrites I wondered if it would make more sense, at least for long term planning, to use lichen to naturally refine the water and organic molecules found in carbonaceous minerals.

The general idea is relatively simple, after finding a sufficiently large deposit of carbonaceous chondrites, either on an asteroid or a planet's moon, a balloon greenhouse is built around the mineral deposit (or the minerals are deposited inside the balloon greenhouse).  When the balloon structure is ready to be sealed off an initial feed stock of atmospheric gases and lichen colonies are added.  As time wears on the lichen will naturally break down the rock formations liberating oxygen, amino acids, carbon, and other chemicals essential for life.  The greenhouse balloon would first be ready for the gentle introduction to limited insect populations that would aid in increasing the complexity of the frontier bio-sphere.  Many years after the greenhouse was inflated, plants capable of surviving in a micro-gravity environment could join the frontier species.  Eventually the balloon would be ready to become a fully fledged complex ecosystem, either continuing on as a micro-gravity population or it could be attached to a spinning structure to allow for more terrestrial plants and animals to grow.

The rational behind choosing lichen as the colony organism stems from research done by the European Space Agency where lichen colonies were exposed to the extremes of space several times for a total of 14.6 days.  When the colonies were returned to terra-firma researchers determined they had passed the hell test with flying colors, zero fatalities and zero colony loss.  In the event that a greenhouse balloon is punctured by a micro-meteorite the loss of the contained air would not mean the end of the lichen colony.

July 15:  I should follow up with some more technical bits about temperature regulation.  On the plus side the usual 10 minutes of research seems to indicate that this idea is kind of fresh.  There is also the question, why do this soil making approach versus hydroponics?  I have no good answer, this just seemed really cool
July 15 (30 min later):  I managed to find one reference to using microbes for making refined products from lunar soil (found here)  Cyanobacteria harvested from Yellowstone's hot springs appeared to do an excellent job at breaking down lunar regolith into more useful chemical forms.  What is confusing to me is that the article talks about how the bacteria only need 3 things, (in addition to the regolith) air, water, and light, while these substances are extremely easy to find on Earth, neither water nor air are as easy to find in space, it makes me wonder about where in the colonization timeline this would make sense.  Personally I'm still pro-lichen, those little guys self regulate water needs.

I need to put less effort into proving other people have already thought of these things
http://www.cell.com/trends/microbiology//retrieve/pii/S0966842X10000430?cc=y#MainText
 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0032063397000172

Augmented Back Pack and Other Clothing

During an evening of booze and hockey in the background my friend Andrew and I started to chatting about  an idea for a hackable smart backpack intended to move the backpack from a passive container to a dynamic tool.

In an era of ever cheaper tools for embedding smart tools into watches, glasses, and t-shirts why have backpacks generally been left out of the realm of innovation.  The HackPack would serve as a dynamic platform for makers and users to have access to smart tools.  The minimum components in the HackPack would include an onboard battery, computer or microcontroller capable of bluetooth communication, and readily accessible ports for distributing data/power.  The key feature of the HackPack package is the ability for the tools of the backpack to communicate with smart phones and other devices. The basic kit could be made into a small package according to set standards and intended to augment existing backpacks.  A more consumer friendly version of this concept would come pre-built with a collection of sensors and displays to communicate with the owner.

Figure 1

In figure 1 you see a visual outline of what the HackPack's exterior could feature.  The red lines indicate the placement of EL wire intended to display simple information, ex. someone going for a bike ride at night could have their changes in direction displayed by the character display on the back.  The lights on the strap could be used to alert the user of useful information about the state of the HackPack, whether they have an appointment, etc..  In the side view of the HackPack there are 3 blue squares indicating where vibration pads could be placed in the straps of the back pack.  The pattern and intensity of the pad's vibration would communicate any number of set messages, ranging from telling a hiker where they should be looking for their next course correction, to working with a social networking app to let you know a friend is nearby.  The straps should also have simple button pads to allow users to communicate with the on board micro-controller with out requiring access to an additional tool.  These basic features would be complimented by a collection of attachment points placed on the exterior and interior of the backpack, allowing users to add speakers, electrical generators, environmental quality sensors, the limits would be the imaginations of accessory engineers.

The Spec sheet for this backpack would look something like this

On-Board Computer:  Arduino micro-controller with bluetooth shield, Rasberry Pi computer
Battery Pack:  Capable of keeping computer and accessories online for at least 24 hours and charging a standard 2100 mAh cellphone battery at least 2 times
Communication Points:  USB or 3 wire PWM compatible
Weight: 3 lbs or less for all basic kit components

Additional attachments could include.
Infrared communication system for laser tag and mesh networking
Geiger Counter
Wirelessly accessible hard-drive
Speakers
Electrical generators
Moisture Sensors
Video Camera
Projectors
RFID/NFC sensors for keeping track of interior elements (this idea was taken from here)


http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/phorce/phorce-the-worlds-first-smart-bag
battery and tells you how much battery life is left via bluetooth

http://www.talk2myshirt.com/blog/archives/4197 weight sensing pack

http://gajitz.com/green-to-go-sustainable-multi-talented-electronic-backpack/ artsy fartsy deal

http://www.ubergizmo.com/2010/05/aniomagic-weight-sensitive-backpack/ weight sensing

http://www.treehugger.com/renewable-energy/energy-generating-backpack.html energy generating backpack

http://www.treehugger.com/gadgets/rechargeable-led-backpack-totes-your-stuff-keeps-cyclists-safe.html  illuminated pack

http://www.digitaltrends.com/lifestyle/new-smart-clothes-will-be-able-to-adjust-to-your-moods/ smart clothes

http://thinkmag.net/think/tag/smart-clothes/ more smart clothes

http://healthinformatics.wikispaces.com/Smart+Clothes

Cool Ben Heck design hack for making a turn signal backpack attachment
http://www.engadget.com/2013/07/30/ben-heck-bicycle-turn-signal/


Smarter Jacket
Dynamic EL wiring that "knows"  when the user wants to be seen and when not

bluetooth accessible for easy finding

Bag Bowl Water for your Dog where ever you need it

Making sure your pet remains well hydrated on a hot day can be a difficult affair, doubly so if you want to pack light for a simple walk around town.  For those fortunate enough to live in neighborhoods that have pet watering stations this isn't much of a concern, for the rest of us, I suggest "Bag Bowl" (totally not TM).  The basic idea came to me while taking my sister's dog for a walk around the Boston Commons.  While there are water fountains it's a little difficult to get a 50 lbs puppy to the fountain's level and I think people would complain if the pup, Georgia, licked the fountain.  My temporary solution was to take a spare waste disposal bag and fold it into a shape that Georgia could drink from.  This worked rather well but it had some faults, namely the weird hand configuration I needed to fill the bag.  The "Bag Bowl" would serve as a light weight frame to support a dog's waste bag, unused of course, for when you wanted to fill it with water or food.  

(Drawings to come)

I realize that it would probably make more sense to have some kind of pouch deal that had a pocket for the poo bags separately, but I like the idea a bit when I came up with it this afternoon and wanted to update my blog.

Orbital Rings as a Means of Altering Asteroid Trajectories

Guys seriously guys, I love the idea of mining space.  I mean not like a little serial, I'm being super serial.  Like super duper serial.   

Space resource utilization is something that has started to move from the fields of speculative fiction, to the early stages of corporate development, firms like Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries are starting to put tangible efforts into advancing the goal of many futurists, moving humanity beyond our earthly bounds.  One critical challenge of space mining developments stem from the need to minimize the energy required to extract a given unit of mass from a celestial body. What this introductory outline would like to propose is a unique means of which to alter the course of a given asteroid or comet to a location that would be useful for future human use, including but not limited to one of the Earth's five Lagrangian Points, Lunar orbit, or high orbit around the Earth.  In the Wandering Across Asteroids article I discussed one potential approach for modifying the orbital trajectory of an asteroid enough to eliminate potential threats to human civilization on Earth, by means of having a large walking robot to serve as a gravitational tug.  I would now like to suggest creating a child design of the gravitational tug walker and the orbital ring concept.  

Totally Not to Scale Front View

The rationale behind building an orbital ring around an asteroid is very similar to the logic of using the walker approach.  The system would allow for the dynamic application of a significant enough mass near the center of gravity of an asteroid to alter the orbit.  Placing the gravity tug relatively close to the surface of the selected asteroid would be achieved by building and/or deploying a magnetic levitation (maglev) track  at slightly above the maximum radius of the asteroid.  The maglev track allows the counter mass to rapidly position itself along any point of the circumference. The more rapid the ability to reposition the greater the degree of control of the asteroid.  The major differentiation between using an orbital ring versus a walker style close proximity gravity tug stems from the number of moving components required for motion (once the system has been deployed).  A walker would have any number of moving components while an orbital ring, and how ever many cars riding on its track way, could have as few as zero moving parts. * 




*The asterisk here is to let me quickly say that while zero moving parts is nice and all, there is no guarantee that doing so would actually make any real engineering sense, seeing as there are a range of unknown variables that still need to be accommodated. 

Research Stuff


Kinetic Impact Analysis using traditional launch means
http://www.princeton.edu/sgs/publications/sgs/archive/15_1-Koenig-Chyba.pdf

ESA call for deflection ideas
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/50499682/ns/technology_and_science-space/t/got-good-idea-how-bash-asteroids-they-want-hear-it/#.UcamwvnVBsk
(physorg version)
http://phys.org/news/2013-01-asteroid-deflection-mission-ideas.html



NASA proposal for Lassoing asteroids

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/50398762/ns/technology_and_science-space/t/nasa-might-lasso-asteroid-drag-it-orbit-near-moon/#.UcamyvnVBsk

Asteroid capture article (potentially for mars mission)

http://www.euronews.com/2013/04/11/nasa-unveils-plan-to-catch-asteroid-as-step-to-mars-flight/


Asteroid tug boat, giant engine that will strap on an asteroid to change its orbit http://b612foundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/Asteroid_Tugboat.pdf

wikipedia list of asteroid avoidance tech
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asteroid_impact_avoidance

another paper on asteroid deflection
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~sue/TJA_LindhurstLabWebsite/ListPublications/Papers_pdf/Seismo_1621.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_tractor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_Beam_Shepherd

more deflection options
http://theweek.com/article/index/239846/6-clever-ways-to-avoid-getting-hit-by-an-asteroid

Asteroid capture animation
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2308660/Animation-released-shows-Nasa-intends-CAPTURE-asteroid.html


nuking an asteroid for deflection
http://www.adrc.iastate.edu/files/2011/09/AAS-11-403.pdf

I need to reread this, I don't think this is the same idea as mine, but it might be
http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=7431


http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/pdf/10.2514/6.2008-6254

Knock off Nerf Idea

Fig 1 Nerf N-Strike Elite Rayven
Source:Hasbro corporate page

One of the minor frustrations of many traditional nerf gun designs is the potential for darts jamming.  While newer designs have added special access ports for clearing darts that have folded in on each other I felt it would be cool to put forth my own concept for a dart gun that eliminates the potential for jams and allows for easier reloading to boot.  Instead of utilizing the more common spring clip design used in toys like the Nerf Rayven (figure 1) this design would have each round placed in their own specialized chamber (fig 2)

(I will try to add some more details but right now I need to just get this out the door before I get back to job applications)

One of my favorite ideas in this design is the small magnets embedded in the pink side wall of the clip.  They serve as  way for whoever is using the toy to expand their clip as they are still firing their first clip.  During normal operation the magnets will keep the clips attached with enough force that normal jostling won't allow them to come apart and as each round is fired the next cell in the clip is chambered with the firing mechanism.  As the clip is pulled through and about to expire, a small amount of pressure is applied to the pink arms, forcing the magnets far enough apart that they upper clip can simply fall off.  On the right hand side of Figure 2 you will see the turquoise linear gear teetj that would allow for a worm gear to power the clips through the gun.

Figure 2

So while I like where I am going with this idea, I am going to call this a very basic early draft as there are about 20 things I would like to rethink/redesign for a system that would probably make a lot more sense

Wave Energy Concentration Via Metamaterials

One of the most interesting (for engineering and physics nerds) technologies to come out of the 1990's, while they were first theorized in 1968 it took over 30 years before researchers could develop the first application of a metamaterial, altering the magnetic properties of a material.  As our understanding of metamaterials grows the number of potential uses have skyrocketed.  Articles dealing with creating "The Cloak of Invisibility" have received some of the greatest attention, but some of the other uses should not be ignored.  Researchers have created so called superlenses, earning the name as a result of their ability to see at resolutions once considered impossible  ex. viewing a protein under an optical microscope.  While metamaterials that work within the electromagnetic spectrum receive more press coverage, researchers are also utilizing the underlying physics of the technology to guide the energy of physical waves, including seismic, acoustic, and hydraulic wave-forms.

The ability to guide the energies of ocean waves has tremendous implications, from the DoD's efforts to eliminate energy lost to wave action on Naval vessels to cloaking ocean structures from tsunamis.  What I would like to suggest is utilizing these wave guide technologies into ocean energy production.

The available wave energy from the world's oceans has been estimated to be roughly 2 trillion watts, or enough power to help 8 Del'Oreans to travel back to 1955 (in non-science fiction terms this would be the equivalent of powering 800 Million American households)  While the available ocean energy is tremendous, the sea is also one of the harshest environments for energy production, the technologies needed to provide an affordable generating platform are still being developed.

What I would suggest is using a network of structures intended to focus the energy of waveforms that occur most frequently in a given area.  By concentrating the energy of the waves onto a single point engineers would minimize the number of moving parts and consequently critical failure points.  (see figure 1 below) The site of the concentrated wave action could utilize any number of suggested wave capture technologies.  The concentrated energy of the wave system would also allow for additional safety features on the generating element, further increasing the systems life expectancy.  The likely ecological benefits of using a complex structure as opposed to the guide wall approach used by the Wave Dragon would stem from allowing organisms to flow more naturally around the structure as needed.

Fig 1:  Potential appearance of a the wave generator, (lacking a deep understanding of geometric requirements of a meta material lens the configuration above is arbitrary (my bad))

 The primary rational for having the metamaterial configuration for energy concentration versus the solid wall approach being implemented by the Wave Dragon platform (besides the fact that it would be awesome), is based off a personal theory as to the robustness of a walled approach for a floating platform, it is my belief that a metamaterial structure would allow for more redundancy in the structure, increasing survivability.  Additionally conversations at an MREC conference in 2012 highlighted that the more variable the wave forms a given generator would have to accommodate, the greater the potential cost of the system through outs a given life expectancy.  A metamaterial wave guide would concentrate the force of some of the most common wave frequencies while (hopefully) more chaotic elements would only minimally interact with the platform.  In Figure 2 you can see how the amplitude of the wave grows as it comes closer to the focal point of energy production.

Fig 2 Cutaway view of the metamaterial wave power plant.

The largest concern for this wave generator proposal is that of cost efficacy, while the design is intended to reduce the quantity of moving parts for a given production capacity, the installation of the wave guides is far from a non-trivial component of the overall cost.  That being said with the huge reliability and availability of wave power for coastal communities, it is my opinion that at least some degree of research would be worth the investment.  Accounting for the maintenance of the guide pylons is another consideration as bio-fouling has the ability to drastically alter the geometry of a given wave guide.

The wave generator system should be thought of as a renewable energy deployment platform, not just a hydro-kinetic generator.  The tops of the wave guide pylons could have wind turbines or solar panels mounted on them, transforming them from simple inert structures to more surface area for offshore energy production.  The interior volume of the pylons might also be considered for pumped air energy storage, (an slightly different version of the idea, and one more) as proposed by the MIT Energy Initiative or pumped hydro-electric.  The two storage mechanisms could work in tandem with the pumped hydro being utilized during low tide and the pumped air energy storage being utilized during high tide.  The interior volume of the pylons might also be considered for a micro-server farm, being in  a location with relatively constant sea temperatures (or at minimum cold enough to benefit processor cooling), while not necessarily optimal for all applications, it could serve as a very remote back up location for important data.

TL:DR (what I was trying to say was) energy developers could use crazy geometries to build a structure intended to concentrate the energy of ocean waves onto a small point, theoretically lowering the cost of producing energy from ocean waves

During my research I cam across a selection of articles I didn't necessarily fit into this narrative but they either informed comments to one degree or another or might be useful for further reading
people actually researching into the idea.
This groupd of post docs based in France is doing some work associated with water based metamaterials, but not for wave form concentration (as I can barely understand from their abstracts)


List of other Wave generating technologies

http://mhk.pnnl.gov/wiki/images/5/58/Wave_Energy_Utilization.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_power

http://www.icrepq.com/icrepq-08/380-leao.pdf

http://www.oceanrenewable.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/futuremarineenergy.pdf

Using Metamaterials for Hiding sea craft from ocean waves
http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2011/07/a-submarine-that-doesnt-make-wav.html

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Invisibility-Cloaks-Could-Hide-Ships-from-Waves-256723.shtml


Alternative wave generator
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0141118712000648
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cycloidal_Wave_Energy_Converter

The Metamaterial that I used as a reference (now I realize as it was a cloak design it was probably a poor choice, but you know... I was making it up)
http://nanopatentsandinnovations.blogspot.com/2011/01/newly-developed-cloak-hides-underwater.html

Background research on wave energy
http://www.see.ed.ac.uk/~shs/Wave%20Energy/thorpe%20review%20.pdf

A Kit of Parts for Front-line Manufacturing

The various branches of the United States Department of Defense have all started to make large pushes into developing unique capabilities in rapid prototyping capabilities.  In entry, Wise Welding Warriors, I noted how rapid-prototyping was being used to drastically reduce the turn around time between war-fighters finding critical problems in their ability to operate effectively and developing material solutions for that problem.  The logistical benefits of being able to build and repair components closer to the front-line are already impressive and will only become more useful as the capabilities of the various technologies mature.  Currently relatively simple mechanical solutions can be created by Rapid Equipping Force's  ELM facilities, the ability to integrate electronic components into design solutions will undoubtedly serve as capability multiplier.

Open source electronics platforms including the Arduino and Rasberry Pi have taken the maker community by storm allowing amateur inventors to create technologies ranging from automatic plant watering systems, to  pens that work in 3-D, to prosthetic prototypes, and semi-autonomous vehicles.  The consistent characteristics of these platforms, working in tandem with their opensource nature allows for creative talents to avoid reinventing the wheel, but instead refining a technology for a given need.  The Lego Mindstorms platorm has also unleashed unimaginable levels of creativity from its user base, by being both open ended in use and reliable.  This kind of open source creativity/capability added to ELM style operations could allow engineers anywhere in the world to develop advanced solutions for conflict regions around the world.

Within the realm of robotics technologies creators could know that they would have access to a micro-controller and assorted components that from the get go would be capable of being formed into traditional small scale land based robots or quadcopters.  As efforts were added to the platforms engineers might develop additional remote sensing capabilities or robots intended to aid local farmers in optimizing water usage for irrigation, aiding in good will missions to counter insurgent activities.

 A set database of standardized components as well as a shared database of tips and tricks would mirror current open source civilian projects.  This similarity would be extremely intentional, ideally the components used would also share traits with products already available to civilians.  For sake of security concerns there would be some rather significant differences between the platforms used by the Department of Defense and its allies and more traditional open source ecosystems.  The development community would need to be multi-tiered with increasing levels of security needed to access more sensitive aspects of the community portal, extremely general community work would work through a civilian accessible web host, while moderated the platform would most likely benefit from minimizing any heavy handed oversight by military command (voiding extreme scenarios).  At a higher tier, only recognized academic groups, contracting firms, and military personal would have access, sharing would be less immediate but still reasonably open.  The highest tiers would likely only need to concern a vetted group of developers who would be responsible for communication protocols and the source code of the devices.  This tiered system of development would work to prevent potential hazards highlighted in the Armed Forces Journal article "Print when ready, Gridley", where the author voiced concerns of design databases being hacked and mobile factories are transformed into a digital fifth column.

The hardware utilized by military personal would ideally be as similar in design as possible to the platforms available to the public, with key exceptions in the ability for components to communicate on military channels, which for obvious reasons should not be put out for general access, unlike many drone transmissions in Afghanistan.
DARPA has already begun work on developing open platforms for organizations to have a common base package for building a product around, the ADAPT sensor system is serving as the flagship technology.  The sensor package has already been used as a ground sensor and the control module for a quad-copter.

Mobus Bridge: A(n) (Im)Possible City in the Sky

Mobius Bridge is a mega-construction structure for the 31st century, built above the Earth's equator Mobius Bridge would be ring structure serving as a habitat platform.  Unlike many space rings proposed in science fiction works like Larry Niven's Ringworld the Mobius Bridge would not use centripetal force to provide the source of gravity, instead the Earth's gravity well would provide the attraction force.  For the Earth to provide the pull of gravity more naturally to the body of the Mobius Bridge, the structure of the Bridge would need to orbit around the Earth with the same angular velocity as the Earth's natural rotation.

What the the Orbital Rings might look like
Source: http://io9.com/if-earth-had-a-ring-like-saturn-508750253

Traditional approaches to placing objects in Earth Orbit would make it impossible for a space based structure to provide a gravity force not provided by some kind of additional acceleration put on a selected object.  The design of the Mobius Bridge would require some unique solutions to keep the ring structure both in orbit and having objects placed on the Bridge still feeling the downward tug of gravity.  Several potential solutions could be considered for keeping the Bridge suspended.  The first potential solution considered would involve using a collection of tethers linking up with counterweights, similar to the solutions suggested for building a space elevator.

        For a sufficiently low mass bridge designs a massive collection of thrusters would provide the necessary counter forces to keep the Bridge in orbit.  Unfortunately by the time the station got big enough to allow for a proper habitat the energy requirements to keep it suspended in space would only make sense for a species with near god like levels of energy production and control.  The most likely solution for keeping the Mobius Bridge in orbit would be to have the structure be made from two primary components.  The habitat segments of the Bridge would lazily drift over the Earth's equator maintaining the same day night cycle as the ground below.  Within the frame of the habitat would be one or more massive magnetic orbiting rings.  Each of these orbiting rings would serve as a track-way for the habitat structure to ride on, similar to magnetic levitation trains here on Earth.  The dynamic interaction of the forces between the inner rings and the habitat ring create a situation where the net balance leaves residents of the habitat ring experiencing the slightly reduced pull of the Earth's gravity, several hundred kilometers above the ground.

Roughly speaking the force of gravity on the Bridge would be a result of the tangential velocity of the ring and  its distance from the center of the Earth.  (for those who aren't power nerds, this means you are accounting for the tendency of objects being spun to pull outwards and that the force of gravity gets weaker at a distance)  To make the calculations easier, the primary sources of accelerations can be separated into two primary equations.  The biggest impact on the gravity felt by objects in the habitat ring of the Bridge would be the distance between the bridge and the Earth.  The force of gravity between two objects can be calculated using Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation, (see Fig 1)

Figure 1:  Newton's Law of Universal Gravitation

In this equation the variables are defined as follows

Figure 1A

F is the force of gravitational attraction.
G sub c is the gravitational constant (Fig 1A).
M1 and M2 are the respective masses of the objects                                                     being analyzed.
r is the distance between the center of mass of the objects

               While the above form is the most universal form of the Law of Gravitation for cases where M1 is much larger than M2 a slightly different version is used, where only the mass of the major body really needs to be considered.

Figure 2:  Acceleration of Gravity Near the Surface of a large body

Where g represents the rate of acceleration between the two objects, Gsubc is still the same and MEarth is the mass of the Earth, which is roughly 5.9736E+24kg and r represents the distance from the center of mass of the Earth to the center of mass to the object.  On the surface of the Earth r averages roughly 6370 km, for the Mobius Bridge that value will most likely fall between 6500 km and 6900+ kilometers from the Earth's center.

For the station being built at 130 km above the Earth's surface, or just 30 km above the line that defines what is legally space, the force of gravity would work out to be roughly 9.44 m/s^2.  At 530 km above the average surface of the Earth, gravity would still be an acceptable 8.37 m/s^2.   (note that these values don't yet factor in the centripetal force)

The second major influencing variable for determining the acceleration of gravity on objects on the Mobius bridge is the centripetal force caused by station rotating with the same angular velocity as the ground below. 

The relation of centripetal force to net acceleration would be a negative resultant of the equation 

Figure 3:  Acceleration of Gravity at the Equator
Reference:  Western Washington University

ω^2*r.  Where ω is equal to to the angular velocity of the planet Earth.  The value of is ω equal to 2*π/1day or 2*π/86,400s.  Putting all of these variables back into a single equation we get the equation to the right.  Using this equation we can create a rather useful table (Fig 4) on how much acceleration would be felt at different target orbits.  (A curve showing the estimated gravitational force at various altitudes will be found further down, useful detail the platform would experience roughly 0.5 g's around 2600 km above the Earth's surface)

Figure 4:  Force of gravity at 130, 330, 530, and 1000 km above the Earth

             Another consideration for making the Mobius Bridge would the trade off of habitable surface area vs how much of the sky would be blocked out by the station.  Making the Bridge too large would cause tremendous environmental impacts, affecting the amount of sunlight reaching plants, migratory patterns of regional fauna, and more.  To limit the impact of building a Mobius Bridge around the Earth, engineers would need to determine how much of the sun and moon could conceivably be blocked by the structure  before being problematic.  According to these sources NASA and Wikipedia the Sun and Moon are both roughly 0.5 degrees or 1800 arc seconds across from the perspective of an Earth bound observer (the decision to use angles allows for consideration of the perceived size of objects with respect to a terrestrial observer as opposed to the absolute size which will be constrained the most by this).  As this document deals with estimated values, we will roughly constrain the relative width of the station to between 1/100th and 1/10th the angular diameter of the Sun and Moon (between 0.005 and 0.05 degrees across).

Courtesy of Wikipedia.com: Angular Diameter

Fig 5 A geometric representation of the angular diameter
Courtesy of Wikipedia.com: Angular Diameter 

where d is the actual width of a selected object and D is the distance between the observer and the body and δ is the resultant angle. (see Fig 5)

Ex:  If engineers decide that they want to make a station that keeps its inhabitants at roughly 0.9 g's they would need to build it at an altitude of about 330km.  (See Fig 4) at that altitude and with the given constraints of keeping the station from not blocking the Sun excessively we get the equation shown in Fig 6

Fig 6 Angular Diameter with constraints

Solving for d @ D=330km we get the range 28.77m < d < 287.7 m

The final design would need to be a careful balance between the width constraints required for ecologically sustainable properties, maximizing internal working space, and a host of other variables.  One fortunate trait of the Mobius Bridge is that you are not limited to making a single structure around a planet, given enough time and patience by an advanced civilization a planet might be found with a collection of archologies that would rival the ring's of Saturn in beauty.

Follow Up Materials
One additional means of maintaining the operational altitude of the Mobius Bridge would be the use of electromagnetic tethers as a means of using the Earth's magnetic field to gently counter the pull of gravity and compensate for uneven mass distribution, both within the archology and the outside universe.  These tethers work by utilizing the Lorentz Force within the Earth's magnetic field. (I will try to add a less physics cut and paste explanation, once I understand this enough to do so)

Figure X  G force curve with respect to altitude (in meters)

Disclaimer Bit
It turns out the idea for building a Mobius Bridge was suggested at least as early as the 1870's by many geek's favorite inventors Nikola Tesla.  Wikipedia has a cool entry on Orbital Rings that provides a host of additional details.  A group called the Alna Space Program seems to have done an incredible amount of research into the design requirements of building an Orbital Ring, but I think I'm still going to call it a Mobius Bridge (seems sexier)  The author/engineer Paul Birch published a paper in the 80's into creating an orbital ring and other dependent structures, including a lightsail wind mill, and an orbital sphere built around a planet.
Other outlandish engineering proposals can be found on the Wikipedia entry for Megastructures, although something as large as the Mobius Bridge, you might as well go grandiose and call it a giga-structure.  Developing an orbital ring platform for planets like Venus could be integral in long term attempts to terraform the planet.

Other Stuff
Using the Lorentz Force for crazy orbits 
Further Reading on Tether Propulsion