In the years that followed, the government pumped billions of dollars into labs and universities and enterprises, on projects ranging from cloning to underwaterrobots.
"BeagleBone has inspired numerous developers to create a wide variety of innovations from self-teaching electronic education kits to underwaterrobots, " said Clint Cooley, president, CircuitCo.
Miners can use underwaterrobots to dig up deposits left from "black smokers, " which are little towers of metallic sulfides that form after magma forces fluids with copper, gold and other metals through the seafloor.