Bouncing Red Ball

By passing infrared rays through an aqueous solution of silver ions, researchers at Japan’s Riken have succeeded in creating nano-sized three-dimensional silver objects, including these tetrapods measuring 1/500th of a millimeter.
Gold and silver ions exposed to ultraviolet rays have been known to solidify by absorbing the energy of photons inside the rays. However, because [...]

If you stroll along the back streets of Akihabara and visit robot sites on the Internet fairly often, it would seem that tiny robots that do increasingly sophisticated little things are popping up regularly in Japan.
Take this interesting pet robot for single geeks announced by Robo Engine the other day.

Diminutive Pyuuun (Weee! in English) uses [...]

Bandai Networks has announced the availability of their green-colored Gachapin-and-Mukku-themed netbook powered by Windows XP. Gachapin and Mukku are two popular Japanese anime characters: Gachapin is a 5-year-old dinosaur boy and his friend Mukku is a red yeti.
This decidedly unique netbook is anime-themed all over, from its custom system sounds (”oyaho”, “jaa ne” and “tadaima” [...]

After a recent spell of bad news, here’s a good one for Toyota.
The Winglet, Toyota’s personal transporter in the style of Segway, will start initial production next year, 2009. Aiming for corporate customers, Toyota will deliver the first batch of 10 Winglets to the Central Japan International Airport in Aichi Prefecture.
This early release of the [...]

In the winter of 1992, All Nippon Airways (ANA) held a contest to design one of its Boeing 747 jets. The result was Marine Jumbo, a whale-shaped airplane decorated with sea creatures and designed by Yukie Ogaki, then a 6th-grade schoolgirl.
The highly successful and much publicized design was soon followed in 1996 by another 747 [...]

The Media Arts Festival Executive Committee, composed of people from the Japanese Agency for Cultural Affairs, the National Art Center and CG-ARTS Association, has announced the winners of the 12th Japan Media Arts Festival. 2,091 works from 43 countries and regions were evaluated to come up with winners in Art, Entertainment, Animation and Manga. [...]

Sony’s hand-powered Odo series of colorful and playful gadgets. Photo by CNet Japan.
Cnet Japan’s online gallery of the Eco Products 2008 Expo is one of the most extensive there is. It is worth a look.

Business Media 誠：エコプロダクツ2008：オフィスで使用済みコピー用紙を再生紙に——明光商会 via kwout

Meiko Shokai, which has a large market share of shredder machines in Japan, wants its customers to do more with those shredded paper. At the recently held Eco Products 2008, it introduced its Paper Recycler, a chemical-free equipment to recycle used paper without leaving the office.
Developed with office equipment maker Seed, [...]