[From The Peoria Journal Star, where the story includes a 1:44 minute video and additional images; more images are available at The Journal Star’s Eye blog; the Center’s web site is here] Virtual training center opens in Peoria to revolutionize health care and medicine By Pam Adams of the Journal Star Last update Apr 26, 2013 PEORIA — Mayor Jim Ardis said it would be a recruiting tool for the world’s leading researchers and doctors. Dr. Sara Rusch, regional dean of the University of Illinois College of Medicine at Peoria, called it the “catalyst for transformational change in our community.”…

[From Gizmodo, where the story includes several additional images] Hands-On With the Iron Man Virtual Reality Setup: This is as Badass as Kinect Gets Chris Mills | March 26, 2013 To shamelessly promote the Iron Man 3 launch — 25th April, for you calendar-watchers out there — Marvel’s touring a nationwide Kinect-powered virtual reality setup that lets you ‘become’ Iron Man. And yeah, it’s pretty much as awesome as it sounds.…

[From The University of Southern California; more information is available here] USC develops virtual tool to train child interviewers By Evy Jacobson April 24, 2013 Conducting interviews with children who have witnessed a crime or have been victims of abuse or neglect comprises some of the most challenging and sensitive investigative work for attorneys, social workers and law enforcement officers. Getting a child to overcome embarrassment and fear and disclose information is a process where the wrong question or reaction can cause a child to withdraw, stop talking or provide misinformation. A joint research project between the USC Gould School…

[From TAXI, where the story includes a 5:36 minute video] LOL: A Life-Sized, Man-Shaped Boyfriend Pillow For Lonely Women By Dorothy Tan, 22 Apr 2013 Utrecht-based Dutch designer and illustrator Noortje de Keijzer has created a funny and rather creepy knitted boyfriend pillow for lonely women who need a man in their lives.…

[From the Smithsonian’s Surprising Science blog; a short video from the experiment is available at LiveScience] [Image: Brain scans show that the neurological patterns linked with pangs of empathy for humans also occur when we see a robot like WALL-E treated harshly. Image via Flickr user Rob Boudon] Neuroscience Explores Why Humans Feel Empathy for Robots April 23, 2013 Joseph Stromberg If, while watching WALL-E, your heart broke just a little bit when you saw the title character desperately travel across outer space in search of true love, it doesn’t mean you’re crazy. Sure, WALL-E is a robot.…

[From MIT’s Technology Review, where the story includes a 2:36 minute video] New 3-D Display Could Let Phones and Tablets Produce Holograms Optical trickery lets a modified LCD produce hologram-like still images and videos. By Katherine Bourzac on March 20, 2013 A new kind of three-dimensional display developed at HP Labs plays hologram-like videos without the need for any moving parts or glasses. Videos displayed on the HP system hover above the screen, and viewers can walk around them and experience an image or video from as many 200 different viewpoints—like walking around a real object. The screen is made…

[From Popular Science, where the story includes additional images and a 1:46 minute video] Can Virtual Reality Treat Addiction? Researchers are plugging in smokers, alcoholics, and even crack addicts to expose them to a relapse environment–and teach them how to deal with it. Will it work? By Colin Lecher Posted 04.19.2013 When the addicts enter the room, they haven’t met the people inside. They’ve never been there before, but the setting is familiar, and so is the pipe on the table, or the bottles of booze on the ground. Soon enough, someone’s offering them a hit, or a drug deal’s…

[From The Future of Things] Nike Launched A Holographic 3D Advertising Campaign Nike was always an innovator, in advertisement as well as in sportswear. Recently the company launched a campaign for a super flexible athletic sneakers by using 3-D holographic ad displayed on special street signs in Amsterdam. Thursday, April 11, 2013 – Iddo Genuth We might think that we have already seen everything there is to see when it comes to sophisticated advertisements, but apparently there is always something new around the corner. This time it’s a new 3D holographic technology known as HOLOCUBE. The HOLOCUBE is a fully…

[From The Huffington Post] Clifford Nass On ‘Seductive’ Tech And Why You Treat Your Phone Like A Friend Bianca Bosker 03/06/2013 Why are people polite to computers? And why are they moved by flattery from a machine they know is spouting words at random? According to Stanford University professor Clifford Nass, who studies how humans interact with machines, we tend to treat computers much like we treat living, breathing people. Our interactions with our friends and our iPhones aren’t so different, after all. Nass, the author of more than three books about how people use technology, has worked with companies…

[From The Hollywood Reporter, where the story includes a photo gallery] ‘Iron Man 3’ to Become First Film to Play in 4DX Format in Japan The film will be shown with tilting seats, blowing wind and fog and odor effects via technology that is expected to come to the U.S. this year. 4/16/2013 by Gavin J. Blair TOKYO — Iron Man 3 will be shown starting April 26 in 4DX at a theater in Nagoya, central Japan, operated by the Korona World chain, which plans to screen 12 titles a year using the new format. “Fourth dimension” effects utilized by…

[From HelpMeSee via PR Newswire] Breakthrough in Virtual Reality Surgical Simulation Legacy of Aviation Safety Pioneer Inspires Application of Flight Simulation Principles to Medicine Early Stage Prototype Simulator Presented to French Prime Minister NEW YORK, April 11, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — Research scientists from the SHACRA team with INRIA (Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique) in Lille have achieved a significant milestone in medical simulation. With funding and technical support from HelpMeSee and in collaboration with physicians from the Lille and Strasbourg hospitals, the team has developed a simulator prototype for cataract surgical training. The key feature of…

[From MIT’s Technology Review; see also “In ‘Futurama,’ robots follow ‘Bender’s Law,’ not Asimov’s” at CNET] Does a Tele-Robot Operator Need a Visa and W-2? Experts gathered this week at Stanford’s Law School to discuss the robot revolution. Jessica Leber April 11, 2013 As robotics software and hardware is commercialized, companies will face some interesting new conundrums, which may give them pause before adopting technologies ranging from workplace telepresence robots and robotic surgical tools, to driverless cars and commercial drones. But make no mistake, it will be the lawyers just as often as the technologists guiding purchasing decisions, and a…