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Remote-Controlled Insect Ornithopter Developed

Aeronautical engineer Edwin Van Ruymbeke has developed a remote-controlled insect ornithopter called MetaFly.

Capable of reaching a top speed of 18 km/h (11 mph) and a maximum range of 100 metres (328 ft), the wings are flapped using a mechanical coreless motor and an aluminum heat sink that is powered by a rechargeable lithium-polymer battery.

Weighing 10 grams (0.35 oz), MetaFly measures 19 cm long (7.5 in) with a 29-cm (11.4-in) wingspan. The patented wings are made from carbon fibre, liquid crystal polymer and oriented polypropylene.

German Professor Who Is A Hardcore Star Wars Fan Has Just Repainted An Observatory Into R2-D2

Maybe one of our observatory domes can be painted to look like this? :-D.


In a galaxy far far away (Germany) Hubert Zitt, professor at the ZweibrĂŒcken University of Applied Sciences and known for Star Trek and Star Wars lectures, along with a small team, transformed the ZweibrĂŒck Observatory of the Natural Science Association into a giant R2-D2 – and it is out of this world.

The sci-fi professor completed the project in September 2018, aided by his father-in-law Horst Helle, the master painter Klaus Ruffing and several helping students and it has caught the eyes of Star Wars fans everywhere. The most notable fan of the re-design was Star Wars actor Mark Hamill who tweeted about it, “R2-D2 Observatory Transformed Germans Into Giant Nerds.”

While spectacular, Zitt and his team aren’t the first fans to complete a Star Wars design challenge. Goodsell Observatory at Carleton College in Minnesota was also transformed into an R2-D2 back in 2010.

Scientists rise up against statistical significance

We are not calling for a ban on P values. Nor are we saying they cannot be used as a decision criterion in certain specialized applications (such as determining whether a manufacturing process meets some quality-control standard). And we are also not advocating for an anything-goes situation, in which weak evidence suddenly becomes credible. Rather, and in line with many others over the decades, we are calling for a stop to the use of P values in the conventional, dichotomous way — to decide whether a result refutes or supports a scientific hypothesis5.


Valentin Amrhein, Sander Greenland, Blake McShane and more than 800 signatories call for an end to hyped claims and the dismissal of possibly crucial effects.

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