Yesterday I went to a robot fair here in Sofia that is arranged to show off the projects that the students in the university are working on and for them to make connections. The theme of the robots were supposed to be robots that can help people in their homes, but most of the robots were more to show the possibilities with robot technology then to do something practical. The robot that amazed me the most was the Cockroach robot, which is like a car for a cockroach. The cockroach is walking on a ping pong ball and this is then telling the robot which way to drive. If there is a risk for collision this is detected by the robot and small fans start blowing in front of the cockroach to make it change direction.

The guy who made this robot, Valentin, have the idea that for the next step connect a small robot to the cockroach brain and this way be able to control the cockroach with a remote. Although I feel bad for the cockroaches I think Valentin treats them good as he has a big collection of bizarre animals at home as a hobby.

Although Valentin invented this exact cockroach robot the idea was inspired from ConceptLab.

Also right now in Sofia there is a 3 day extreme sport movie festival with movies of varied quality. Today is the last day of the festival and for more information and the program, follow this link: http://www.predizvikatelstva.com