EALTH AND WELLBEING
San Francisco-based
purveyor of technologically-themed apparel Alphyn Industries has
released the DELTA415 Wearcom jeans: a pair of jeans which allow the
wearer to see and use a touchscreen smartphone without needing to
actually take it out of their pocket. Read More
We’re not sure how hotly contested this particular world record
is, but at the very least it does provide a nice bit of video to start
the working week – particularly for those who spent the weekend hacking
around the golf course chasing that elusive hole in one. Former Formula 1
driver David Coulthard has claimed the record for the “farthest golf
shot to be caught in a moving car, ever.” Read More
A new implantable fuel cell
that harvests the electrical power from the brain promises to usher in a
new generation of bionic implants. Designed by MIT researchers, it uses
glucose within the cerebrospinal fluid surrounding the brain to
generate several hundred microwatts of power without causing any
detrimental effects to the body. The technology may one day provide a
whole new level of
reliability and self-efficiency for all sorts of implantable
brain-machine interfaces that would otherwise have to rely on external
power sources. If proven harmless, the method could be used to power
implants that could, among other things, help the paralyzed regain the
ability to walk. Read More
How does a two-man indie development studio
create a game with the sort of gameplay and visuals one would normally
associate with seven- or eight-figure budgets? That must be the question
on at least some of the lips of the 400,000 or so people who've watched
the trailer to Finnish studio Theory Interactive's Reset, a first-person puzzle game said to be very much in the mold of Portal. Read More
San Francisco-based
purveyor of technologically-themed apparel Alphyn Industries has
released the DELTA415 Wearcom jeans: a pair of jeans which allow the
wearer to see and use a touchscreen smartphone without needing to
actually take it out of their pocket. Read More
For over 30 years, the US$250,000 cash prize
for the American Helicopter Society's Igor I. Sikorsky Human Powered
Helicopter Competition prize has looked decidedly secure, but Gamera II has changed all that. Last week, Clark School of Engineering
team pilots came so close to breaking one of the competition's major
milestones that they could virtually smell it. Ph.D. candidate from Kyle
Gluesenkamp from the School's mechanical engineering department,
hand-cranking and pedaling like his life depended on it, managed to keep
the huge quad-rotor craft aloft for 50 seconds, an impressive new world
record that's currently awaiting validation by the National Aeronautic
Association (NAA). Read More
Many of today's deskbound workers regularly head
to the gym to try and keep the fat from clinging to their waistlines.
For those who are also fond of the great outdoors, a UK company has
developed and installed over 250 open air exercise areas across the
country. The latest addition to a product catalog featuring robust,
weather-proof versions of exercise machines you might find in any modern
indoor gym is the world's first energy-harvesting outdoor gym called
the TGO Green Heart.
As users burn off the calories on the free-to-use cross trainer, hand
bike, fitness bike and recumbent bike, the company's proprietary
technology harvests all that people power and converts it into useable
electricity. Read More
Cellphones have come a long way since the models
of the 1990’s, but if there is one area in which a brand-new iPhone 4S
still cannot hope to compete with those venerable handsets, it is
battery life. With this in mind, California-based company Pacific
Productions has unveiled the JuiceBuddy, an iPhone and iPod Touch
charger which is small enough to fit on a keyring. Read More
We’re not sure how hotly contested this particular world record
is, but at the very least it does provide a nice bit of video to start
the working week – particularly for those who spent the weekend hacking
around the golf course chasing that elusive hole in one. Former Formula 1
driver David Coulthard has claimed the record for the “farthest golf
shot to be caught in a moving car, ever.” Read More
The safflower plant is one of the oldest crops
known to man. Used by the ancient Egyptians in dyes, oils derived from
safflower seeds are today used as a sustainable replacement for
fossil-fuel-derived oil in a wide variety of products and industrial
processes. Researchers at Australia’s CSIRO have now developed a new
“super-high” oleic safflower that could make the crop even more
attractive to growers and industry. Read More
When Mini unveiled its Clubman-based Clubvan concept
at the Geneva Motor Show earlier this year, we fully expected that the
vehicle would make the move from concept to production line - not only
because it filled a growing niche for compact commercial delivery
vehicles, but also because Mini has a recent history
of taking its concept cars into production. True to form, the company
has now announced three different Clubvan models that will be hitting
showrooms later this year. Read More
High-radiation environments are a silicon
microchip's worst nightmare and even state-of-the-art radiation-shielded
circuits can fry after just a couple hours of exposure. Now engineers
at the University of Utah have come up with a micro-electromechanical
system that could be used to build robots and computers that are
impervious to such conditions and may help us deal with high bursts of
space radiation, damaged nuclear power plants or even the aftermath of a
nuclear attack. Read More
Mazda has added a new micro-mini
tall wagon to its lineup in Japan with the release of the Mazda
Flairwagon. Designed to seat four adults with plenty of headroom, the
Flairwagon features sliding rear doors on both sides and a low rear step to provide easy ingress and egress in the tightest of parking spaces. Read More
A lot of people will run their air
conditioner or a room fan if they don’t want to get too hot in bed, but
also don’t wish to sleep with no covers at all. If the overheating
problem is due to body heat trapped under the covers, however, why not
just run a fan in the bed? That’s the idea behind the Bed Fan. Read More
Regular Gizmag readers may recall the Hövding airbag collar
we covered back in October 2010. Recent tests by Swedish insurance
company Folksam suggest that, when it comes to direct impact tests, the
Hövding beats the competition hands down. Read More
Google Australia has announced the release of
Build with Chrome (or Build for short), perhaps the simplest online LEGO
builder we've seen, and one that works right in your browser - as long
as its Chrome. Completed models are located on a Google Map, which
effectively becomes a permanent exhibition space
A robot hand developed by the
University of Tokyo's Ishikawa Oku Lab is reportedly so adept at the
game rock, paper, scissors that it is unbeatable against a human
opponent. Read More
Hyundai is getting in on the incessant zombie trend with an actual concept car
designed to mow down the fearsome hordes of undead brain suckers. It's
called the Zombie Survival Machine, and it looks exactly like what it
sounds like. Hyundai has partnered with Robert Kirkman, creator of the
famed comic book and graphic novel The Walking Dead, in building the concept for Comic Con. Read More
Recent days have seen reports emerge
of a successor to Concorde capable of speeds of over 2,485 mph (4,000
km/h) that could fly from London to Sydney in a mere four hours. Read More
With Mountain Lion set for a July release, Gizmag
offers some tips on backing up, cleaning up and optimizing your Mac to
make the upgrade process go as smoothly as can be for those wishing to
adopt Apple's latest "big cat." Read More
As home extensions
go, this eye-catching extruded cloud is certainly something different.
Completed earlier this year, the "Cloud House," as it is now known, is
the result of both the renovation and extension of what was once a
traditional double-fronted Edwardian house in the Fitzroy North suburb
of Melbourne Australia. It's now anything but. Read More
Thankfully, data transmission
speeds have come a long way since the days of dial-up when users would
have plenty of time to twiddle their thumbs as they waited for an image
or MP3 to make its way to their hard drive. These days, broadband cable
currently supports speeds of around 30 megabits per second, which is a
hell of an improvement. Now researchers have outdone that by a factor of
around 85,000 by using twisted beams of light to transmit data at up to
2.56 terabits per second. Read More
Mazda has added a new micro-mini
tall wagon to its lineup in Japan with the release of the Mazda
Flairwagon. Designed to seat four adults with plenty of headroom, the
Flairwagon features sliding rear doors on both sides and a low rear step to provide easy ingress and egress in the tightest of parking spaces. Read More
California-based company PLX Devices first came to our attention in 2010 with its XWave brainwave interface accessory for iDevices that read a wearer’s brainwave information. It appears the call center headset-like
form factor may not have appealed to many as the device no longer
appears on the company’s website, but it has been replaced with a
similar device in a design that should make the wearer much less
self-conscious – a brain computer interface headband. Read More
We certainly hear a lot about solar cells
that are able to convert larger and larger percentages of the sun’s
energy into electricity. That’s all very well and good, but if those
more-efficient solar cells are too expensive, they will still ultimately
prove impractical for everyday use. Researchers from North Carolina
State University, however, have found a way of creating “ultra-thin”
solar cells that should create just as much electricity as their thicker
siblings, but at a lower cost. Read More
After nearly two years of availability in the
United States, Sony is updating its Google TV offerings running on the
Android platform, and making them available in a number of international
markets. With the upcoming release of the NSZ-GS7 Internet Player and
NSZ-GP9 Blu-ray Disc player with Google TV, Sony will be the first major
manufacturer to launch Google TV devices outside the U.S. Both units
will also come with a redesigned remote control that features a touchpad
and QWERTY keypad for easier navigation of content on the big screen.
Read More
Imagine if you were a police officer who suddenly
realized that the abandoned vehicle you were assessing contained a
bomb. While you might have had some training in how to handle such
situations, would it all easily come back to you in the heat of the
moment? Well, even if it wouldn’t, you might still know what to do ...
if you were using the FiRST app. The U.S. Department of Homeland
Security developed the application for emergency response personnel, to
serve as a step-by-step guide for managing bomb threats. Read More
A lot of people will run their air
conditioner or a room fan if they don’t want to get too hot in bed, but
also don’t wish to sleep with no covers at all. If the overheating
problem is due to body heat trapped under the covers, however, why not
just run a fan in the bed? That’s the idea behind the Bed Fan. Read More
Researchers at MIT have developed a new type of
photovoltaic cell made with carbon nanotubes that captures solar energy
in the near-infrared region of the spectrum, which conventional silicon
solar cells don’t. The new design means solar cell efficiency could be
greatly increased, boosting the chances to make solar power a more
popular source of energy. Read More
The commercialization of GPS technology has been a
boon for those navigating unfamiliar city streets, highways and byways,
but head inside out of sight of the GPS satellite signals and the
limitations of the technology can quickly become evident. Other efforts
to solve the problem involve the use of accelerometers, sometimes combined with magnetic field sensors,
but a new system developed at Duke University promises to provide
precise indoor localization using a different approach – detecting
“invisible” landmarks. Read More
Researchers at Georgia Tech’s Center for Music Technology
have developed a one-foot-tall (30 cm) smartphone-enabled robot called
Shimi, which they describe as an interactive “musical buddy.” Leveraging
the power of a docked Android smartphone and the music library
contained on the mobile device, Shimi can recommend songs, dance to the beat and play tunes based on listener feedback. Read More
An innovative cooling design for SuperMUC, Europe's most powerful supercomputer,
will use warm water instead of air to keep tens of thousands of
microprocessors at the optimal operating speed and increase peak
performance. The system, which is said to cool components 4,000 times
more efficiently, will also warm the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre
Campus that hosts it during the winter months, generating expected
savings of up to US$1.25 million per year. Read More
While Kodak finally succumbed to the march of technology and bowed out of the camera-production biz
earlier this year, another icon of the pre-digital photography age is
determined to stick around. Looking to leverage its expertise in instant
film cameras, the company has developed a number of digital cameras, such as the PoGo, that provide the same instant photo capabilities, but with the use of new technology. The latest is the Z2300, which packs an integrated printer to spit out prints in under a minute – no shaking required. Read More
Magnetic resonance. We all think of the massive
multimillion dollar magnetic resonance imaging machines into whose
gaping mouth we are slowly propelled on a motorized table, ready to have
our smallest flaws exposed. But the phenomenon of magnetic resonance
has other medical uses. A team of physicians and scientists led by Prof.
Ralph Weissleder of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) has developed a
handheld diagnostic magnetic resonance (DMR) device that can diagnose
cancer in an hour with greatly improved accuracy compared to the current
gold standard. The DMR technique is sensitive enough that only material
from a fine needle aspiration biopsy is needed for the test - a far
less painful experience compared to the usual surgical or core needle
biopsies. Read More
No one likes going to the doctor. There's the
inevitable wait in the waiting room before eventually being ushered into
the office of the harried doctor who spends most of his day dealing
with relatively minor complaints or simple follow-up visits. Then, of
course, there's the bill. But what if patients could get a check up
without having to actually visit the doctor? A smart T-shirt fitted with
various sensors is designed to do just that. Read More
Even the most complex things in our universe
start with small building blocks, and in the universe of LEGO you can
take that truism literally. Between traditional LEGOs, LEGO Technic
parts and some third-party LEGO-inspired projects, we've seen some truly
amazing creations built up from the foundation of those little plastic
blocks. Here's a visual look at ten of our favorites. Read More
The eco-amp by Los Angeles-based company eco-made
is an iPhone amplifier which eschews toxic plastics and a battery in
favor of an environmentally friendly approach to portable amplification.
Produced from 100 percent recycled paper, the eco-amp comes in a
flat-pack and requires assembly on the part of the consumer. Read More
Regular Gizmag readers may recall the Hövding airbag collar
we covered back in October 2010. Recent tests by Swedish insurance
company Folksam suggest that, when it comes to direct impact tests, the
Hövding beats the competition hands down. Read More
Google Australia has announced the release of
Build with Chrome (or Build for short), perhaps the simplest online LEGO
builder we've seen, and one that works right in your browser - as long
as its Chrome. Completed models are located on a Google Map, which
effectively becomes a permanent exhibition space
With Sony's NSZ-GS7 Internet Player and Vizio's Co-Star, this week has been a big one for Android-based media streamers.
Not to be outdone, Google has announced its Nexus Q media-streaming
device at its I/O conference. The device, which is powered by an
OMAP4460 processor, is something Google hopes will change the way people
share their entertainment in the home. Nexus Q will stream HD movies,
YouTube clips, music and Google TV content from the cloud. Read More
eWriter maker Improv Electronics has unveiled the
latest addition to its Boogie Board LCD eWriter lineup. Like the Boogie Board Rip
released last year, the new Boogie Board Jot boasts a 9.5-inch Reflex
LCD writing surface that doesn’t draw any power to write on and retain
an image but, unlike that model, doesn’t pack any onboard storage for
your digital doodles. Read More
Hot on the heels of the announcement of Sony’s NSZ-GS7 set-top box,
Vizio has unveiled its own Google TV-based device that merges live TV
with streaming entertainment in the form of the Vizio Co-Star Stream Player. Connecting the device to a HDTV will turn it into a smart TV capable of surfing the Web full screen using Google Chrome with support for HTML 5 and Flash content, accessing Google Play apps, streaming online video content, and – in a media streamer first – playing games via the OnLive cloud gaming platform. Read More
Google kicked off its three-day I/O event at the Moscone Center
today with several announcements, the most significant of which may
well be a 7-inch Android-based tablet named the Nexus 7. Built by
Taiwanese hardware manufacturer Asus and offered at a price of just
US$199 for the 8 GB storage model, the Nexus 7 is already available for
pre-order for consumers based in the US, UK, Canada and Australia. Read More
Autonomous vehicles and personal transportation pods featured quite heavily in our recent round-up of the Top Ten railways of the future, and the JPods concept from Bill James has both. At the center of the scheme
is a driverless, on-demand electric four to six seat vehicle suspended
beneath an overhead rail structure, which is topped with photovoltaic
panels. A user would let the JPod know the desired location via a
touchscreen interface and the vehicle's networked computer system would
determine the best route and motor there without further input from the
passenger. Read More
Despite the coming of the electric vehicle during
the last decade, there were far more electric vehicle manufacturers in
the world 100 years ago than there are today. Hundreds of manufacturers,
a large proportion of them electric, competed in the fledgling
automotive marketplace. This competition drove these manufacturers to
seek new and novel ways to seek publicity, and when a French Automobile
magazine ran top speed trials in December 1898, it sparked a flurry of
record attempts and six land speed records in just four months. The
electric Jamais Contente, which was the first purpose-built speed record
attempt car, prevailed in this early tussle by raising the land speed
record to 105.878 km/h (65.79 mph) in April 1899. Read More
Apple has released its all-new standalone
Podcasts app for iOS, perhaps indicating an increased desire on behalf
of the Cupertino-based company to take full advantage of the vast
repository of several hundred thousand free podcasts which it currently
hosts on iTunes. Read More
A robot hand developed by the
University of Tokyo's Ishikawa Oku Lab is reportedly so adept at the
game rock, paper, scissors that it is unbeatable against a human
opponent. Read More
A new mineral, named panguite, has been
discovered by Caltech researchers examining the Allende meteorite that
broke up in the skies over northern Mexico on February 8, 1969.
Panguite, an oxide of titanium, becomes the ninth new mineral to be
discovered in the meteorite by the team since 2007. Read More
The new Center for Virtual Engineering (ZVE) at
the Stuttgart headquarters of the Fraunhofer Institute officially opened
its doors for the first time on June 20. The unusual "prototype
building," designed by Dutch architectural firm UNStusdio, has been
awarded a gold certificate by German Sustainable Building Council
(DGNB), but its main feature is the focus on communal space designed to
foster a cooperative working environment. Read More
Watch out GoPro,
JVC is looking to take a bite out of the action cam market with its
rugged new JVC GC-XA1 ADIXXION camcorder. Leveraging its decades-long digital imaging prowess evidenced in models like the ProHD cams and GC-PX10 hybrid, the company says that its new small and lightweight video recorder
includes a range of features that leaves the competition behind.
Highlights include four levels of rugged protection, built-in Wi-Fi, a Super Wide lens, and Full HD video recording. Read More
Hyundai is getting in on the incessant zombie trend with an actual concept car
designed to mow down the fearsome hordes of undead brain suckers. It's
called the Zombie Survival Machine, and it looks exactly like what it
sounds like. Hyundai has partnered with Robert Kirkman, creator of the
famed comic book and graphic novel The Walking Dead, in building the concept for Comic Con. Read More
Amsterdam and Vienna-based design studio
Büro für MEHR has created a drive through concept for an airport
passenger terminal that could change the way airports process traffic.
The concept offers a significant reduction of the size of an airport’s
layout to simplify ground traffic and significantly reduce its
environmental impact. It is anticipated that within next decade aviation
traffic could almost double, with many airports already struggling to
facilitate increased demand. The Drive Through Airport concept has been
designed with future logistics in mind, while simply presenting an idea
that raises the question, why hasn’t anyone done this before? Read More
A new initiative from Virgin Galactic could soon see the space tourism company
branch out into space haulage. Tipped to be called Virgin Galactic
Cargo, the program could see WhiteKnightTwo aircraft carrying small
satellites into low Earth orbit, before launching them into space via
unmanned rocket. Read More
If you haven't heard about takotsubo
cardiomyopathy, also known as "broken heart syndrome," you may be
surprised to find that one to two percent of people who are initially
suspected of having a heart attack are finally discovered to have this
increasingly recognized syndrome. New research
suggests the condition that temporarily causes heart failure in people
who experience severe stress might actually protect the heart from very
high levels of adrenaline. Read More
Travel-friendly guitars like the Backpacker from
Martin are all fine and dandy if you're into acoustic playing but those
of us who prefer electric portability will likely need to seek out
something like Traveler's Speedster or Bob Wiley's Ministar.
The problem with the latter choice is also having to lug around an amp
and cables in order to be heard. Stanford graduates Andrew Penrose and
Ari Atkins have developed a go-anywhere electric guitar called the
Unlimited that features a built-in, battery-powered amplifier and
smartphone-controlled digital effects. Read More
The Children Development Center in the Thai town
of Mae Sot recently completed the last of four low-impact bamboo and
timber dormitories designed to provide temporary shelter for up to 100
children. The dorms were designed for rapid construction using local
materials and techniques in order to house child refugees from bordering
Burma. Read More
Recent days have seen reports emerge
of a successor to Concorde capable of speeds of over 2,485 mph (4,000
km/h) that could fly from London to Sydney in a mere four hours. Read More
After a decade on the market, the Roomba
has become the most well-recognized brand in robotic vacuum cleaners
and a staple of many households. But while iRobot has improved the
Roomba's filtering, suctioning, and collision detection over the years,
actually controlling the vacuum has been left to its automated systems.
Now iRobot has released the Roomba 790, which gives you direct control
of the robo-vac's movement and settings remotely with a new Wireless
Command Center. Read More
Thought that title might get your attention, but
shooting lightning bolts down laser beams is just what a device being
developed at the Picatinny Arsenal military research facility in New
Jersey is designed to do. Known as a Laser-Induced Plasma Channel, or
LIPC, the device would fry targets that conduct electricity better that
the air or ground that surrounds them by steering lightning bolts down a
plasma pathway created by laser beams. Read More
0 comments:
Post a Comment