Imagine waking up on a cold winter’s morning to
light streaming in through your bedroom window and the smell of fresh
coffee. The concrete floor is warm and your favorite music starts to
play as you eat your breakfast. As you drive away the house
automatically locks, the thermostat reduces and the insulation panels
close as the house goes into hibernation until you return. Welcome to
LUMENHAUS, the completely solar powered, open plan house that uses
computer technology, flexible architectural design and energy efficiency
to adapt to its owner’s changing needs as well as environmental
conditions... and it recently won the 2010 Solar Decathlon Europe. Read More
The last time we did a story on extrasolar
planets (or exoplanets) in October, 2009, there had been 374 planets
outside our solar system discovered. As of June 28, 2010 that number had
risen to 464. The numbers look set to get a further boost thanks to a
new technique that allows planets even down to the mass of the Earth to
be detected with relatively small diameter telescopes. For the first
time, using the technique known as Transit Timing Variation (TTV), a
team of astronomers from Germany, Bulgaria and Poland have discovered an
exotic extrasolar planet with 15 times the mass of Earth in the system
WASP-3, 700 light years from the Sun in the constellation of Lyra. Read More
Blooms of blue green algae, also known as
cyanobacteria, are not something you want occurring in your water
system. When ingested, the microorganisms can cause rather unpopular
reactions such as headaches, stomach aches, fever, diarrhea, nausea and
vomiting. Oh yes, and they can also kill people, not to mention
livestock and wildlife that unsuspectingly drink from affected lakes and
rivers. Fortunately, researchers may be on the way to a green (as
opposed to blue-green) method of controlling the problem: low-frequency
ultrasound. Read More
Luckily there aren’t many countries that drive on the opposite side of the road and
share borders. However, they do exist, such as China, which drives on
the right, and the former British colony of Hong Kong, and former
Portuguese colony of Macau, both which drive on the left. This can pose
an interesting problem for engineers and road planners, but Dutch
architectural firm, NL Architects, has come up with a bridge with a
twist – a concept that not only puts the drivers on the correct side of
the road physically, but helps reinforce that fact visually to help get
the drivers into the mindset of driving on the opposite side of the
road. Read More
Researchers from University of Minnesota have
removed a barrier to improving solar cell efficiency by showing how heat
energy currently lost from semiconductors can be captured and
transferred to electric circuits. They hope manufacturers will use the
results to produce solar cells with twice the output of current solar
cells and at a lower cost. Read More
Although most new Bluetooth compatibility is
still centered on version 2.1 +EDR, which was formally adopted way back
on July 26, 2007, the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) has
announced the formal adoption of Bluetooth Core Specification Version 4.0.
The hallmark feature of the new specification is its low energy
technology that should open up entirely new markets for devices
requiring low power wireless connectivity. Read More
On display at the Design Engineering and Manufacturing Solutions Expo
in Tokyo, this pen assembly machine is an impressive example of robotic
multi-tasking and dexterity – albeit perhaps not that practical. So if
you happen to work on a pen assembly line, you might now be redundant
thanks to this robot. Or maybe not... Read More
If you want to preserve food, you put it in the
fridge, but when it comes to human organs, things get a little more
complicated. Researchers at the University of Sunderland in the UK are
working on new ways to preserve organs which could dramatically improve
the effectiveness of the donor system. The aim is to expand the donor
pool by allowing organs that would normally be unsuitable for
transplantation – such as those from heart attack victims – to be
preserved by rapid cooling. Read More
Seeing the Airpiano being played, one can't help
but be reminded of a graceful martial artist, musical conductor or
mysterious magician. The innovative interface is activated and
controlled by moving a hand in mid-air above the flat display surface
and within range of a sensor array matrix. Driven by custom software,
the device can put a huge library of tones and sounds at a player's
disposal. Read More
IBM has announced that its first-of-a-kind hot water-cooled supercomputer
has been installed at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich
(ETH Zurich). Named the Aquasar, the system not only consumes up to 40
per cent less energy than an air-cooled machine but the direct
utilization of waste heat in the building's heating system translates to
an 85 per cent cut in carbon dioxide emissions. Read More
Unsurprisingly, the Australian outback doesn’t
exactly boast the greatest mobile phone coverage in the world. But
researchers down under have managed to make mobile phone calls in this
remote landscape without the use of towers or satellites. Instead of
relying on expensive infrastructure, the researchers created a
mesh-based phone network between Wi-Fi enabled mobile phones that allowed them to communicate with each other. Read More
It happens often in research. While looking for
one thing, scientists stumble across another. In this case, researchers
at Oregon State University's College of Forestry were looking for an
elusive wood-based adhesive that would be solid at room temperature but
melt when the heat was turned up. What they stumbled upon was an easily
produced, environmentally benign, pressure sensitive adhesive which
holds the potential to be cheaply produced from a wide range of
vegetable oils. Read More
Sick and tired of having his bike stolen while studying in Stockholm, Ulf Laxström decided to design a foldable bike
that was easy to store inside, but retained the functionality and
styling of standard full-sized bicycles. His solution was the Fubi (an
abbreviation for “Future bike”) that Laxström says has all the
characteristics of a “regular” bike, with its ability to fold up just an
added bonus. Read More
A prototype of England’s Taranis Unmanned Combat Aircraft System
(UCAS) that we first covered back in 2006 has been unveiled for the
first time by the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD). Three and a half years
in the making and the product of more than a million man-hours the
concept demonstrator is designed to test the possibility of developing
the first ever autonomous stealthy UCAV that would ultimately be capable
of precisely striking targets at long range, even on another continent.
Read More
Hidden explosives, chemical weapons, biological
agents and illegal drugs could one day be optically detectable from up
to 20 meters away. How? Well, every substance has its own unique
terahertz (THz) radiation “fingerprint”, the waves of which pass through
anything other than metal or liquid. Scientists from New York state’s
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute are working on a way of analyzing those
waves, then determining what substance they’re emanating from. The
process would be harmless to both the subject and the observer, and
could make the world a much safer place. Read More
Some people might see it as a natural progression
in the digital age, while others might see it as kind of blasphemous,
but LEGO
is set to launch an online video game based on its popular building
blocks. Using over 2,000 types of pieces in 26 colors, players of LEGO Universe
will virtually create their own avatars and other props, joining fellow
subscribers worldwide on interactive adventures in the Land of
Imagination. Picture a kid-friendly version of something like World of Warcraft,
but one in which players have to build all the structures, vehicles,
animals and whatnot that surround them, and you get the idea. Read More
With all the publicity the Gulf Oil Spill
is currently receiving, it’s easy to forget about another disaster from
which the city of New Orleans is still recovering - the flood caused by
Hurricane Katrina in 2005. That flood, of course, occurred because the
levee along the city’s coastline couldn’t stand up to the assault of the
storm-driven waves. Daniel Wren, a hydraulic engineer who works for the
USDA Agriculture Research Service in Oxford, Mississippi, is now
working on a system that might have kept that from happening. He has
developed floating barriers that can dissipate up to 75 percent of a
wave’s energy, before that wave reaches the levee. Read More
After reports last week that a number of iTunes
accounts had been hacked and used to purchase apps, ostensibly by
developers targeting top-ranking positions in the App Store, Apple
addressed the problem publicly... albeit in a somewhat low-key and
reluctant tone reminiscent of antenna-gate. Read More
After five years, the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration has finally given approval to an eye telescope that
treats macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness in the U.S.
The Implantable Miniature Telescope (IMT) has been developed by
VisionCare Ophthalmic Technologies, Inc. as part of Centrasight, a new
patient care system which treats end-stage age-related macular
degeneration (AMD). Read More
Gizmag caught up with Hanvon at China's Consumer
Electronics Show in Qingdao this last weekend and took a closer look at
the company's new tablet computer, the Touchpad B10. Benefiting from
Intel's ultra-low-power processor and a couple of gigabytes of system
memory, the Windows 7 multi-touch tablet also features a built-in camera
and both VGA and HDMI display ports for onward connectivity to either a
monitor or television. Read More
The GeForce GTX460 is NVIDIA's
latest addition it its Fermi-class graphics processors. The company
promises monster geometry processing power, life-like DirectX 11 gaming
graphics and stereoscopic technology. A couple of hundred dollars will
be enough to secure the NVIDIA GPU, but it might also be worth checking
out overclocked third party developments. Read More
We all know of optical fibers, the filaments of
glass that carry data in the form of light pulses and enable the
high-speed global telecommunications networks we take for granted today.
For the past decade, Yoel Fink has been working at MIT to develop
fibers with ever more sophisticated properties which enable fabrics to
interact with their environment. Fink and his collaborators have now
announced a new milestone on the path to functional fibers – fibers that
can detect and produce sound. Read More
If our pets can now send tweets,
then it only makes sense that our unborn children should be able to as
well. The Kickbee is a prototype device that lets them do just that,
even if they’re not aware that they’re doing it. It takes the form of an
electronics-filled stretchable spandex band, which the pregnant mother
wears over her bulging belly. When it detects movement underneath
itself, the result is a Twitter update along the lines of “I kicked
Mommy!” Read More
Military technology has once again trickled down
to the consumer level. This time in the form of iron-on tags that aim to
eliminate the embarrassing problem of body odor. Employing an even more
high-tech approach than the flatulence molecule soaking Better Marriage Blanket,
the underarm clothing Odegon Odour Tags were apparently developed
whilst formulating new materials for special filters to protect military
personnel from lethal nerve gas and agents. Read More
The world's first hybrid solar/coal power plant
has been built near Palisade in Colorado. Xcel Energy and Abengoa Solar
are partnering on the demonstration project which uses solar parabolic
trough technology to supplement the use of coal. Initially, it's
expected to reduce the emissions generated by the Cameo Station's Unit 2
plant by three to five percent, but it's thought that this could
increase to up to ten percent. Read More
As devices such as the Pulse Kick ‘n’ Go Xcelerator and T-Board
show, designers are always looking for new and interesting (and
hopefully profitable) ways to provide kids with the various cuts and
scrapes that are an essential part of growing up. The latest pretender
to the throne still occupied by bikes, skateboards and scooters
is the Freerider Skatecycle – a two wheeled recreational vehicle that
allegedly combines the “foot control of snowboarding, the balanced
turning of skateboarding, and the nimble, undulating movements of
casterboarding.” Read More
What do get when you combine a Leica M8, a
universal shelving system and a Braun radio designed by Dieter Rams,
some Illy ground coffee tins and an Ikepod Solaris watch? Probably not
much but thankfully 18-year-old Andrew Seunghyun Kim has used design
influences from those very items to produce a gorgeous mobile phone
concept he's decided to call the "HTC 1" (though he has no affiliation
with HTC).
From the slight curve to the touchscreen display to its metallic
construction and simple but functional user interface – it's a pretty
slick design. Read More
Three years ago, Brammo made headlines with one
of the first consumer electric motorcycles to hit the U.S. market – the US$12,000 Enertia.
Capable of 60 mph and a range of around 40 miles, the Enertia was a
lightweight and fun commuter … but what a difference three years can
make! Meet the Enertia's big brother, the Empulse 10.0 – a
slick-looking, hard-hitting fully electric streetfighter with a
sustainable top speed over 100mph and a range in excess of 100 miles on a
single 2-hour charge. Available to order now, the Empulse more than
doubles the Enertia's practicality, while adding a huge whack of fun to
the equation. Pricing is a pleasant surprise – the top-spec model will
go for US$13,995, but the final cost may be as little as US$7,000 in
certain states once federal and state incentives are taken into account.
We spoke to Craig Bramscher, Brammo's founder and CEO, about the
Empulse, the dawn of electric motorcycle racing and the very exciting
future of electric motorsport. Read More
LG may have been beaten to the 3D TV punch by the likes of Samsung, Sony and Panasonic
but the Korean manufacturer has still managed to claim a first with its
new Infinia HDTVs – namely the world’s first Full LED 3D HDTV. This
seems to be splitting hairs a bit as both Samsung and Sony offer 3D TVs
in edge LED backlit flavors, but LG’s new LX9500 series are the first
with LED backlighting that supports localized dimming for improved
contrast and blacker blacks. LG’s entry into the 3D market also sees the
release of the edge backlit LX6500 series and the company’s first
3D-capable Network Blu-ray player. Read More
Researchers at MIT have found that using
specially treated thin layers of carbon nanotubes in batteries can boost
the amount of power delivered per unit of weight by up to ten times.
While the technology still needs improving, its full development and
large-scale employment would certainly revolutionize the way we use any
electronic devices, from an iPod to an electric car. Read More
The Elonex 710EB eBook with full color screen
first outed in April this year has now reached pre-order status with a
UK availability date of July 31. The 7-inch e-Reader uses an LED backlit
LCD display rather than e-Ink, benefits from wireless connectivity,
will double up as a photo viewer or media player and has an 8 hour
battery life. Read More
The interchangeable lens consumer-oriented HD camcorder Sony teased us with when it announced its NEX interchangeable lens digital cameras
has now been unveiled. As previously revealed, the Handycam NEX-VG10
features the same Exmor APS HD CMOS sensor found in the NEX-5 and NEX-3
and will be able to share E-mount interchangeable lenses with those
devices. Calling the NEX-VG10 the world’s first consumer HD camcorder
with an interchangeable lens system, Sony says it enables users to
capture images and videos with background defocus effects and shallow
depth of field. Read More
Fujitsu's
new wireless outpatient registration and information system has just
been launched. Should a user need to visit a medical center operating
the system, slotting a chipped-card into a special device will
wirelessly register the outpatient and provide information about a
scheduled appointment, where to go and what wait time can be expected.
Read More
Unveiled earlier this week in St. Louis, Boeing's Phantom Eye will set a new benchmark in long-endurance unmanned aerial vehicle
(UAV) technology when it takes to the skies in 2011. With a wing-span
of 150-feet, the hydrogen-powered aircraft will cruise at 150 knots,
carry up to 450-pounds and stay aloft at 65,000 feet for up to four
days. Boeing calls it a game-changer, and plans are already in progress
to build a bigger version that can remain airborne for 10 days. Read More
As anyone who has ever tried to swat a fly will
know, the little beasties have almost impossibly-fast reflexes. It turns
out, in fact, that they have a response time faster than that of any
computer. If only we knew what their secret was, perhaps we could
develop robots that could react just as quickly. Well, scientists at
Germany’s Max Planck Institute of Neurobiology are working on it. Since
1956, a mathematical model has existed that accurately predicts how a
fly’s brain will recognize and process visual movements. What hasn’t
been understood is how the individual nerve cells interact, to make that
recognition and processing possible. Given that a fly’s tiny brain
contains over 100,000 nerve cells per cubic millimeter, it would seem
impossible to observe the reactions of any one of those cells. That,
however, is just what the German scientists have done. Read More
Gardening can be physically-demanding work.
Whether you’re weeding, planting or harvesting, almost every
garden-related task seems to involve kneeling down and/or bending
forward - definitely not so easy on the knees or the back. For
commercial garden workers, however, help could be on the way in the form
of the Wunda Weeder, a device which allows workers to lie down as they
tend to the crops. Read More
When Google announced this past Monday that the
company would be releasing App Inventor, an app development tool
requiring zero programming knowledge, a number of questions arose around
the tech sphere. Would this lead to an explosion of Android apps? And
if so, how are we supposed to filter through all the 'crapps' that are
sure to enter the marketplace (Attention, World, I invented a word:
crap+apps=crapps). Does this mark a turning point where programmers
start to become obsolete? Read More
Chinese photographic accessory company Fotopro
has developed a heavy-duty flexible tripod that has interchangeable
feet. The Fotopro RM-110 is comprised entirely of adjustable joints and
comes standard with four sets of feet: spiked, suction, rubber and
magnetic. We’ve tried all four and they offer a stable mount on any
surface, but particularly so on flat or metal surfaces - the suction
cups and magnetic feet are capable of affixing so solidly they can
handle the weight of even a middleweight pro video camera. We’re
predicting the USD$60 RM-110 will become a standard fixture in the kit
of every photographer and videographer. Read More
The Bubble Bike is an ingenious low cost
transport solution for Northern China where temperatures drop well below
zero in winter and the roads are not nearly as suitable for scooters
and motorcycles as they are in summer. The recipient of a 2009 Red Star
Design Award (China’s equivalent of the red dot awards), the
full-electric, three-wheel Bubble Bike sells in China for RMB 5000 (around US$730). Read More
The miniaturization of electronics has seen the
wiring of connections between chips and circuit boards become a
substantial obstacle. Such connections are traditionally made from
pre-fabricated metal wires that connect to a designated bonding pad on a
chip. However, many microelectronic devices are much smaller than the
required 50-by-50 micron square bonding site, prohibiting integrated
functions on a very small scale. Engineers at the University of Illinois
have now developed a novel direct-writing method for manufacturing
metal interconnects that could enable the further shrinking of
integrated circuits and expand microelectronics. Read More
Samsung's Galaxy Beam Smart Projector Phone will
be available in Singapore to StarHub customers from July 17. The unit
will feature a built-in Texas Instruments DLP Pico Projector
which will enable you to project from your phone onto a wall. There's
also Offline and No SIM modes, Hand Writing Recognition (English and
Simplified Chinese), RSS Reader, Mobile Widgets and much more. This is
going to be an amazing new product – it might be worth taking a trip to
Singapore just to have a look at one! Read More
Most of us at one time or another has lost our
keys and know the stress that it causes. Compounding things is the cost
that comes with calling out a locksmith to replace all the locks on the
windows and doors of your house. But what if you could change your locks
simply by inserting another key? That’s just what the Matrix Key System
designed by Australian locksmith, Stuart Webb, does. Inserting a new
key into the lock effectively changes the lock, rendering the old key
useless and saving the hassle and expense of calling a locksmith. Read More
Seemingly simple things like talking to people at
eye level and reaching things on shelves can be a huge drawback for
those in wheelchairs. Sitting in a wheelchair for extended periods can
also lead to the increased risk of certain infections and blood
circulation problems. A robotic exoskeleton called REX puts wheelchair
users back on their feet, enabling a person to stand, walk and go up and
down stairs and slopes. Read More
Rice is the second highest produced grain in the
world after corn. With a large portion of corn crops grown for purposes
other than human consumption, rice takes the title of the most important
grain with regards to human nutrition and caloric intake. It is
especially important in Asian counties such as Japan, however, the
consumption of domestic rice in Japan has decreased by half compared to
1962. In an effort to arrest this decline, Japan’s Sanyo has committed
to creating products that contribute to increasing rice consumption. The
latest is the GOPAN, the world’s first home cooker that makes bread
from rice grain. It should also appeal to those on a gluten-free diet.
Read More
In order to help make electric vehicles
a public success story, a solid charging infrastructure needs to be
rolled out. GE has enlisted the creative assistance of renowned
industrial designer Yves Behar to produce a user-friendly, durable and
pleasantly curvy charging solution for the upcoming electric revolution.
The WattStation not only cuts down on full-cycle charge time but also
features an LED status system, a tilted touchscreen user interface and
cable that retracts into the unit's metallic body. Read More
It’s not often that you see a new product which
caters to a market as potentially massive as the Waistband Amplifer's –
the tiny belt-mounted speaker offers up to 10 watts of amplification to
broadcast your voice, or any audio source (SD/MMC card, MP3, iPod, etc)
to the immediate vicinity for 8+ hours, making it perfect for teachers,
outdoor instructors, tour guides, in-store spruikers, scout masters,
construction site supervisors, soap box orators, sidewalk religious
zealots or maybe even personal outdoor karaoke. Read More
Movie makers who want to enjoy hours and hours of
uninterrupted recording might be interested in a new addition to Canon's
VIXIA line of camcorders. The new VIXIA HF M32 can record up to 24
hours of continuous footage on its 64GB internal memory, but should the
main storage medium become full, the camcorder can automatically switch
over to whatever memory card is sitting in the SDXC slot. Read More
Velocity Micro is getting ready to release a
couple of 7 inch full color Android e-Readers and a similarly-sized
Android tablet computer. The Cruz reader features a resistive
touchscreen, wireless connectivity, the Kobo eBook reading application
and internet browsing functionality. The Cruz tablet differs only in
touchscreen technology, storage capacity and wireless connectivity and
the StoryPad has been created especially for kids. Read More
Today's automobiles are jam-packed with numerous
sensors and warning systems to help drivers stay safe. Much of the
feedback from such systems is provided visually, but there's so much
going on that drivers may well be approaching overload. Researchers from
Yale's School of Engineering have opted for a different mode of
physical stimulus by installing tiny vibrating motors inside a driver's
seat to advise of the approach of other vehicles. Read More
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