The field of robotics makes consistent progress but the great success of so far has been in automating repetitive tasks in process control and assembly, yielding dramatic cuts in production.

The next step - towards cognition and more human-like behavior - remains elusive. It has been difficult to make robots that can truly learn and adapt to unexpected situations in the way humans can, while it has been equally challenging trying to develop a machine capable of moving smoothly like any animal. There is still no robot capable of walking properly without jerky slightly unbalanced movements.

A recent conference, jointly organized by the European Science Foundation (ESF) and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and held in Japan, was targeted at young researchers actively working in the fields of cognitive science and robotics.

Physicists from the University of Granada and University of Valencia, analyzing data sent by the Huygens probe from Titan, say they have “unequivocally” proved that there is natural electrical activity on Titan, the largest of Saturn's moons.

Scientists generally believe that the probability of organic molecules, precursors of life, being formed is higher on planets or moons which have an atmosphere with electrical storms.

Juan Antonio Morente, from the Department of Applied Physics at the University of Granada, told Servicio de Informacion y Noticias Cientificas(SINC) that Titan has been considered a “unique world in the solar system” since 1908 when, the Spanish astronomer, José Comas y Solá, discovered that it had an atmosphere, something non-existent on other moons.

If you're happy and you know it, you're probably a man.

Statistics revealed in the next edition of the Journal of Happiness Studies found that, on average, by the time men reach their 48th year of life their happiness exceeds that of women.

Century-long, nationally-based data on unfulfilled desires were analyzed by University of Cambridge expert Anke Plagnol and University of Southern California Economist Richard Easterlin.

Its something that every coach and every athlete of every sport is searching for... the EDGE. That one training tip, equipment improvement, mental preparation or tactical insight that will tip the game towards them. The body of knowledge that exists today in each sport is assumed, with each competitor expected to at least be aware of the history, beliefs and traditions of their individual sport. But, if each team is starting with the same set of information then the team that takes the next step by applying new research and ideas will capture the edge.

To me, that is what sport science is all about. The goal is to improve sports performance by imagining, analyzing, experimenting, testing, documenting and training new methods to coaches and athletes.

Supported by the European Commission 7th Framework Programme of Information Society Technologies, the euroFOT integrated project launched in May and led by Ford involves 28 partners including major European vehicle manufacturers as well as leading automotive technology suppliers and research institutes and will be conducted over a period of 40 months.

In vertebrates with separate sexes, sex determination can be genotypic (GSD) or temperature-dependent (TSD). TSD is very common in reptiles, where the ambient temperature during sensitive periods of early development irreversibly determines whether an individual will be male or female. The number of males and females in a population is the sex ratio, a key demographic parameter crucial for population viability.

Some studies have suggested that TSD may also be very common in some species of fish, with increasing temperatures generally affecting the sex ratio of a species in one of three ways: increased numbers of males, increased numbers of females or increased numbers of males at high and low temperatures, with a balanced sex ratio at intermediate temperatures.

Sleep is regulated by two processes: circadian and homeostatic. Circadian regulation affects the timing of sleep, and the homeostatic mechanism affects the need for sleep.

While scientists and physicians know what happens if you don't get six to eight hours of sleep per night, investigators have long been puzzled about what controls the actual need for sleep. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine might have an answer, at least in fruit flies. In a recent study of fruit flies, they identified a gene that controls sleep.

Researchers have created a 3D image of a material referred to as "liquid smoke." Aerogel, also known as liquid smoke or "San Francisco fog," is an open-cell polymer with pores smaller than 50 nanometers in diameter.

Aerogel is a form of nanofoam, an engineered material designed for high strengh-to-weight ratio. Such nanofoam structires are also present in the fields of geology, phospholipids, cells, bone structure, polymers and structural materials, wherever lightness and strength are needed.

For the first time, Lawrence Livermore and Lawrence Berkeley scientists have peered into this material and created three-dimensional images to determine its strength and potential new applications.

An enriched extract of Boswellia serrata (the 'Indian Frankincense' herb) has been proven to reduce the symptoms of osteoarthritis. Research published today in Arthritis Research & Therapy has shown that patients taking the herbal remedy showed significant improvement in as little as seven days.

Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis; it commonly affects weight-bearing joints such as the knees and hips, along with the hands, wrists, feet and spine. The symptoms include pain, stiffness and limited movement. This randomised, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial of 70 patients will be of great interest to sufferers, especially those who don't get adequate relief from existing treatments.

Less able to achieve their life goals, women end up unhappier than men later in life – even though they start out happier, reveals new research by Anke Plagnol of the University of Cambridge, and University of Southern California economist Richard Easterlin.

Plagnol and Easterlin's study, forthcoming in the Journal of Happiness Studies, is the first to use nationally representative data spanning several decades to examine the role of unfulfilled desires in a person's sense of well-being.

As the researchers explain, expectations of success may vary among those raised in different generations (i.e., an economic depression). Data sets from a range of time periods may also have different demographic compositions.