Today on engineering newswire, brought to you by PD&D TV, we’re putting employees on time out, playing Tetris in a pumpkin and saving lives with robotic bees:

• Harvard University electrical engineers are working on RoboBee, a miniature flying robot inspired by the biology of a bee and the insect’s hive behavior.
• CalmSpace is a self-contained, plug-and-play sleep capsule optimized to create the perfect environment for tired office workers to catch some shut eye.
• Madison, WI-based Orbital Technologies has successfully flight tested its patented vortex liquid fuel rocket engine, establishing substantial progress toward the development of a 30,000-lb thrust vortex engine.
• Pet-Proto, a predecessor to DARPA's Atlas robot, has recently been confronted with obstacles similar to those robots might face in the DARPA Robotics Challenge.
• Pumpktris is a playable version of LED Tetris, housed inside of a pumpkin.

Do you have story ideas? Comment below or email pdd_web@advantagemedia.com and we'll cover them in an upcoming episode.

For more information, subscribe to our channel at http://www.youtube.com/user/pddnet.