A Scottish team of scientists discovered a way to create floating robots by Corina Ciubotaru

After intensive studies, Scottish scientists have discovered a way to make things levitate by using a force that makes objects stick together. It's really not as strange as it sounds. The force is called Casimir-Polder force and it causes nano-particles to attract each other more as they are pushed closer together in a vacuum. This effect can be reversed, as the two Scots found, thus creating a repelling effect that can be used to make the small particles levitate. Micro-machines, airbags...the possibilities for development are endless. And they may all be explored, given that the scientific world is very interested in nano-technology these days. Scientists have organized a soccer match between nanobots a few weeks ago, to prove how well they could be controlled by remote. Levitating machines would be much more maneuverable and fast, so the progress is huge, a well-earned reward for the long time it took the science world to measure and use this force. The team from the University of St. Andrew's believes the repelling effect could be used in the first stage to keep tiny machines from sticking together. Scientists also made other important discoveries in regard to things we only read about in science-fiction books. Some proved they could create an invisibility cloak by directing light waves around a subject. Even though it will still take a while for people to be floating from one place to another, this breakthrough certainly brings the science-fiction future much closer to our reality. I, for one, anxiously expect the day that teleporting will be widely available.

related story: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070806/wl_uk_afp/britainsciencelevitation;_ylt=AiOutUt38sNnGlmE2XHdjaes0NUE

by Corina Ciubotaru for PocketNews (http://pocketnews.tv)

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