Juice your iPhone on the go using this "iconic" charger
By Rick Martin
November 3, 2010
We've covered a number of iPhone portable chargers in the past, ranging from the well-known Mophie Juice Pack to the environmentally friendly iCharge Dx.
There are countless solutions that will ensure that your green battery
indicator icon stays fully green, the difference with this iPhone
charger is that it's been designed to resemble that very same indicator
graphic. Appropriately, it's called the Icon. Read More
Flexible metamaterials the key to a working invisibility cloak?
November 3, 2010
Scottish researchers are reporting a "practical
breakthrough" that could lead to the development of that most sought
after of wardrobe items – the invisibility cloak. The concept of the
invisibility cloak (not pictured) is based around harnessing the unique
electromagnetic wave-bending properties of metamaterials, but this poses problems when it comes to creating flexible surfaces suitable for applications like clothing and contact superlenses for visual prostheses... problems which the new material design known as "Metaflex" hopes to address. Read More
While rooftops are the obvious place to put solar
cells to generate clean electricity for the home, we’ve seen a number
of technologies aimed at expanding the potential solar collecting area
to include windows using transparent solar cells. These include Octillion Corp’s NanoPower Window technology, RSi’s semi-transparent photovoltaic glass windows, and EnSol’s transparent thin film.
In this latest development, U.S. scientists have fabricated a new type
of self-assembling transparent thin film material that could boost the
cost effectiveness and scalability of solar window production. Read More
Researchers transmit holographic images in near-real-time
By Ben Coxworth
November 3, 2010
We may still not have light sabers or
faster-than-light spacecraft, but one other piece of Star Wars
technology now looks like it may be on the horizon: 3D holographic
videoconferencing. This week researchers from the University of Arizona,
Tucson, unveiled a holographic system capable of transmitting a series
of three-dimensional images in near-real-time – a significant step
towards the live transmission of life-size, full color, holographic
video of people or other objects. Read More
See what you're drawing with the oStylus touchscreen stylus
By Paul Ridden
November 3, 2010
If you've ever tried to create a work of digital art on an iPad
then you may have suffered the frustration of not being able to see
exactly what's going on directly beneath your finger. Even a stylus
can't offer an ideal view of the exact edge of those thin outlines.
Looking somewhat like it should be in the hands of a dentist, the
oStylus solves this by giving tablet artists a porthole to the screen
beneath. There's no need for cables or driver software, the capacitive
screen for which this device was designed simply registers the flat disc
at the end as though it was a human digit. Read More
When biking and camping collide – the Bikamper
By Ben Coxworth
November 3, 2010
Camping, especially when it’s not car-supported
camping, is all about reducing what you have to carry with you. If
someone comes along with a tent that doesn’t require poles, then that’s
definitely welcome news. As its name implies, however, what Topeak’s
Bikamper does require instead is a bicycle – probably a little
bulkier to carry with you than tent poles, but presumably the folks at
Topeak are assuming that you would have the bike with you already,
anyway. Read More
When it comes to exploring the murky depths of
the oceans, autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) have become
increasingly important over the past decade. These vehicles generally
fall into one of two groups: propeller-driven vehicles such as Snookie
that can travel fast and carry lots of instruments, but are limited to
expeditions of just a few days, and “gliders,” which can stay at sea for
weeks or even months at a time, but are slow. Engineers have combined
the best of these two approaches to create a new long-range AUV (LRAUV)
that can travel rapidly for hundreds of kilometers, “hover” in the water
for weeks at a time, and carry a wide variety of instruments. Read More
The next revision to the web document creation
language has generated a lot of excitement in web circles, the most
headline-grabbing change of course being the option for creators to
choose how audio and video are delivered to a user's computer. The World
Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has just announced the results of a browser
test where all of the top players were pitted against each other to see
how well they cope with HTML5. And the winner is... Read More
Creative Technology has announced its break into
the tablet computer market with the forthcoming release of the 7- and
10-inch ZiiO entertainment devices. The tablets are said to deliver the
"best wireless audio performance you will get from an Android-based
tablet" and also offer fuss-free Bluetooth pairing with the company's
headphones and speakers. Also announced is the Zen Touch 2 media player.
Read More
Earth-sized planets could be common, according to NASA survey
By Paul Ridden
November 3, 2010
Astronomers at the W.M. Keck Observatory in
Hawaii have just completed an intensive five year survey of the heavens,
looking at planets orbiting 166 sun-like stars within 80 light years of
our own solar system. Contrary to popular theory, the study has found
that the majority of planets in close orbit to their stars are some
three to ten times the size of our Earth and not, as previously thought,
giants with three times the mass of Jupiter. The study has also led the
researchers to speculate that there could be billions of
as-yet-undetected smaller planets capable of supporting life. Read More
Ambitious plans for 5 gigawatt solar plant in South Africa
By Darren Quick
November 4, 2010
Laying claim to “what will be the world’s largest
solar power plant” is difficult these days with so many in development,
but the Texas-based Fluor corporation is drawing up plans for a five
gigawatt (GW) plant in South Africa that would certainly make it amongst
the world’s largest. The company has been selected to perform a
feasibility study for the potential solar park to be built on the edge
of the Kalahari Desert in the Northern Cape Province of South Africa –
an area the South African government says is among the sunniest three
percent of regions in the world. Read More
Workers in meat-processing plants may soon be
able to assess the qualities of cuts of meat, just by subjecting them to
light. Canadian researchers have developed a spectroscopic tool that
evaluates the color, texture and exudation (water release) of pork cuts.
It's hoped that the technology will improve quality control, optimize
production and allow for exports that are better sorted for their target
markets. Read More
The pioneering Toyota Prius
holds the honor of being the best-selling hybrid vehicle of all time,
and as such has pretty much become the poster child for green
automobiles. Its low emissions and high fuel economy put it on a lot of
car shoppers’ “maybe” lists, but there’s one thing that might cause some
people to pass it up – its rather uninspiring appearance. To show just
what a hip, happening car a Prius can be, the pimped-out Prius
C&A Custom Concept vehicle is currently making its North American
debut at the 2010 SEMA auto show in Las Vegas. Read More
Is reality a 3D hologram of a 2D universe? A team
of researchers at the US Department of Energy's Fermilab are trying to
take a measurement of the fabric of spacetime to show that there is a
finite unit that makes up the universe. To do so, they have created the
world's most accurate clock, the holographic interferometer or
holometer. Read More
The 3D-Spheric-Mouse simplifies 3D workflow navigation
By Paul Ridden
November 4, 2010
Digital artists working in a three-dimensional
graphic environment may find current input peripherals a little
restricting. Before the creative juices can be let loose, the workspace
needs to be moved, zoomed and rotated to the correct position for work
to start. Then it's a case of repeatedly stopping to reposition before
being able to apply just the right amount of texture, tone or shadow.
The 3D-Spheric-Mouse from axsotic promises to make things a little
easier by allowing for one-handed rotation and movement of the virtual
object over six axes. Job done! Read More
Bed-making is a breeze with the Zip Bed
November 4, 2010
Italian furniture design company Florida has
created the perfect bed for those mornings when you just want to grab a
coffee and run out the door. All that you have to do is simply get out
and zip it up – no more making your bed in the morning. At night, you
just unzip it and climb back in. If you like the snugged-up feeling, you
can even be “zipped-in." Read More
TomTom has announced a couple of new additions to its GO
range of satellite navigation devices. In addition to offering
multi-touch control courtesy of a capacitive glass screen, the GO 2405
TM and GO 2505 TM feature voice recognition capabilities, instant and
continuous routing, hands-free calling capability, a new easy mount
system and a slim redesign. Read More
Plants metabolically engineered to produce new drugs
By Darren Quick
November 4, 2010
Scientists have been engineering new genes into
plants for a number of years in an effort to expand on naturally
occurring medicinal compounds. Now chemists at MIT have gone one step
further, using an approach known as metabolic engineering to alter the
series of reactions plants use to build new molecules, thereby enabling
them to produce unnatural variants of their usual products. Read More
Looks like the legions of iPhone
users are pretty keen to get Flash video on their device with news that
Skyfire 2.0 mobile web browser has effectively “sold out.” Within five
hours of being released on iTunes, the Skyfire Flash video solution shot
to the head of the top grossing app list and third highest paid app
overall and overloaded the Skyfire servers, leaving potential buyers
staring at the “Please Upgrade Flash” message while the folks at Skyfire
Labs scramble to increase capacity. Read More
Nanotechnology products could become much more
commercially practical, thanks to work being performed by engineers at
Oregon State University (OSU). Using a new fabrication method, they have
been able to increase the production rate of nanoparticles
by 500 times, while simultaneously reducing the amount of
environmentally-harmful byproducts involved. It’s definitely big news –
or really tiny news, depending on how you look at it. Read More
Abraham-Louis Perrelet began working on an
automatic watch winding mechanism in 1770 (the year Captain Cook
“discovered” Australia). By 1777, he’d perfected the invention and
founded the House of Perrelet watches the same year. His success in
harvesting energy from the wearer led to his next invention, the
pedometer, and he subsequently went on to manufacture a range of firsts
in the watch industry. Innovation still underpins the company, and
Perrelet patented its Double Rotor (one on the dial side, one on the
movement side) in 1995. Now it has put them on show with its TURBINE XL
watch, enabling caffeine-addicted, ADHD-suffering freaks (guilty) to
amuse themselves for hours. Don’t believe me? See inside. Read More
Fujitsu has announced a transmission power
amplifier that is set to extend the transmission range of wireless
communications networks by six times. The company's newly development
gallium nitride (GaN) High Electron Mobility Transistor (HEMT) has
achieved the world's highest output for wireless communications in the
millimeter-wave W band. Read More
Throughout the world, reactive paper-based
systems are used to test peoples’ blood, urine and other bodily fluids
for biomarkers that indicate everything from diabetes to pregnancy. Such
systems are also used to detect pollution in water. However, for many
of these tests to be accurate, an exact amount of time must pass between
the application of the fluid and the viewing of the paper – if the
paper is observed any earlier or later, the perceived results could be
inaccurate. People typically use stopwatches to avoid this problem, but
not everyone in the world has access to such devices, so scientists from
Pennsylvania State University (PSU) have developed a simple timer that
can be built into the paper itself. Read More
Dyson answers dog hair problem with the Groom tool
By Paul Ridden
November 5, 2010
Just when you've got the sofa or carpet clean,
the dog appears and sheds a few pounds of loose hair all over the place.
It's a problem faced by dog lovers the world over and one which the
folks at Dyson UK have been considering for the past year. The result is
a vacuum attachment for medium to long haired dogs which sucks up loose
hair and dead skin before it gets anywhere near your new clean floor or
prized upholstery. Read More
Panasonic's smallest and lightest interchangeable lens camera
By Paul Ridden
November 5, 2010
Panasonic's newest addition to its LUMIX Micro
Four Thirds camera range squeezes a host of new features into a frame
that's a good deal lighter and smaller than its predecessor. The company
has given the DMC-GF2 a more powerful image processor, increased its
sensitivity, and added touchscreen interactivity. Like the model before
it, the camera has a built-in flash and high definition movie recording,
although users now get a choice of 720 progressive or 1080 interlaced.
Read More
If you’re one of the many people, yours truly
included, who always found math class a bit on the difficult side then
maybe all you needed was a jolt of electricity. Electroconvulsive
therapy (ECT) has been used as a psychiatric treatment since the 1930s
and is still used today, most commonly as a treatment for severe
depression. Now researchers are reporting that applying an electrical
current to the brain could enhance a person’s mathematical performance
for up to six months without impacting their other cognitive functions.
Read More
The iPad
is proving to be a useful tool for many different types of musicians
who use it in as many different ways, so comfortably integrating it into
your on-stage kit makes a lot of sense. The iKlip universal microphone
stand adapter for iPad does just that with a fully-adjustable,
lightweight design that attaches to almost any microphone stand. Read More
US$2,000 bounty put on open source drivers for Microsoft's Kinect
By Darren Quick
November 4, 2010
It’s only just been released in North America and already there is a move to hack Microsoft’s Kinect
motion controller to allow it to be used on systems other than the Xbox
360. As part of its Open Kinect (OK) project, New York-based
open-source hardware developer, Adafruit, is offering a US$2,000 bounty
to anyone who can produce some open source drivers capable of getting
the RGB out and distance values captured by the USB device. Read More
Panasonic ceases production of iconic Technics analog turntables
By Darren Quick
November 4, 2010
In a move that will surely bring a tear to many
an eye in the DJ community, Panasonic last month announced that it was
discontinuing production of analog products within its Technics brand –
most notably its iconic line of turntables. Technics turntables are
renowned for their quick start-up and reliability thanks in part to a
Direct-Drive turning mechanism that used magnets instead of a belt drive
and have become the turntable of choice for DJs the world over. Read More
Sir Clive Sinclair's X-1 pedal-electric hybrid
By Ben Coxworth
November 4, 2010
The name Sinclair was stamped on single-person
electric transport way back in 1985 with the world's first mass produced
electric vehicle – the Sinclair C5. Fast forward to 2010, drop a wheel,
shed lots of weight, add modern batteries and you start to get a
picture of the newly developed Sinclair Research X-1. Essentially an
electric-assist recumbent bicycle with an open-sided fairing, it has the
aerodynamics, ergonomic pedaling position and weather protection of a velomobile, yet its weight and price are closer to those of an electric-assist bicycle. Read More
Scientists have for the first time created "super
twisted" light which can be used for more effective disease and virus
identification. The process involves polarizing a light beam to create a
kind of light corkscrew, then reflecting it off a gold surface to twist
the vortex even tighter. Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease are two
conditions now being examined using this new technique. Read More
After a couple of months of teasing glimpses BMW
has announced that its Vision EfficientDynamics concept vehicle will go
into production. The plug-in hybrid vehicle that made its debut at IAA
last year as a concept vehicle
is a four-seater (2+2) sports car conceived to combine the performance
of a BMW M Car with the fuel economy and emission management exceeding
that of a small car. Read More
In his book The Artificial Ape, Dr
Timothy Taylor convincingly argues that humans are biologically a
product of technology. If Taylor is correct, then the ground edge stone
tool pictured is of enormous significance. Stone tool-use among our
earliest hominid ancestors dates to 3.4 million years ago, but the use
of grinding to sharpen stone tool edges is very recent. This is the
oldest ground-edge stone tool ever found and represents bleeding edge
technology 35,000 years ago. Read More
Get your skates on with the FlyRad motorized unicycle
By Darren Quick
November 7, 2010
We’ve seen a few vehicle designs that have had a
crack at bringing the unicycle out of the circus and onto the street,
such as the self-balancing eniCycle, the UnoMoto, the EMBRIO and Honda’s U3-X.
Here's a very different approach. Although it is a one wheeled
motorized vehicle, there's nothing self-balancing about the FlyRad – the
design requires the rider to wear a pair of inline skates while they
sit, stand or simply get dragged along. Read More
Electric vehicles
offer quiet operation, zero local emissions and instant torque –
attributes that are attractive across the transport sector, not just for
cars and motorcyles. One of these areas is light trucks and the
Mitsubishi Fuso Truck and Bus Corporation (MFTBC) Canter E-CELL concept
is a taste of things to come on urban roads. Based on the 3.5 ton Fuso
Canter 3S13, the Canter E-CELL sees the combustion engine replaced with
an electric motor producing peak power of 70 kW and 300 Nm of torque.
The result is a range of around 75 miles with top speed limited to 50
mph, while recharge time on the 40 kWh battery pack is around six hours
via a 380-volt power network. Read More
Architects have been looking at ways to improve city buildings with living walls and living roofs
that add some much needed greenery and help remove carbon from the
atmosphere. Now researchers are looking at using a different sort of
“living “ material created from protocells – bubbles of oil in an
aqueous fluid sensitive to light or different chemicals – to create a
coral-like skin that could be used to clad city buildings, build
carbon-negative architecture and even "grow" reefs to stabilize the city
of Venice. Read More
Samsung has filed a patent for a new type of
liquid lens that provides not only autofocus capability, but also true
optical zoom capability. Liquid lenses, with their small form factor and
lack of motors or moving parts, are ideal for use in compact cameras,
phones, and other mobile devices. Where a conventional liquid lens may
provide only autofocus, Samsung’s design uses two separately
controllable liquid lenses in a single array to provide both functions.
Read More
Researchers at the University of Bristol have
developed a seismological "speed gun" which takes multiple seismic
readings of single events to determine how quickly the Earth's mantle is
moving. While the instruments used to measure this movement aren't
hand-held or new to the field, the way that the data is interpreted is
ground breaking. Read More
The star of the 2010 EICMA motorcycle show held
in Milan this week was undoubtedly the new MV Agusta F3. Though many of
the specifics of the new three cylinder 675cc F3 have not yet been
revealed (such as weight), it has more horsepower (138 bhp) than any
supersport category motorcycle bar the Ducati 848 V-twin. The engine
uses a counter-rotating crankshaft (claimed to partially balance the
gyroscopic effects of the wheels to make a more nimble machine), and
comes with ride-by-wire, traction control and multiple engine power maps
– all firsts in the class. Most of all though, it has impeccable
breeding. Read More
The upgradable, recyclable Bloom laptop concept
By Ben Coxworth
November 5, 2010
It’s a given that we will one day be discarding our present laptop computers. It’s also a given that e-waste
is currently a huge problem, that looks like it’s only going to get
worse. While most of the materials in a laptop can be recycled, all of
those pieces of glass, metal, plastic and circuitry are stuck together
pretty tight, and require a lot of time and effort to separate. What is
needed are laptops that are designed to be taken apart, for easy recycling – that’s why a group of graduate students from Stanford University made one. Read More
Switzerland’s Yves Rossy, better known as Jetman or Fusionman,
has achieved another aviation first by performing two aerial loops
using his unique jet-powered strap-on wing. Rossy made headlines in 2004,
when he first achieved horizontal flight with his original carbon fiber
wing, flying 12 kilometers (7.46 miles) over the Alps. He created an
even bigger fuss in 2008, when he used his wing to fly across the English Channel. Then, just last year,
he got a bit wet when he unsuccessfully tried to fly from Morocco to
Spain. Now, however, he can add another success to his growing list.
Read More
While the food versus fuel debate continues to put crop-based biofuel production on the back burners it might just be Cannabis sativa
that blazes the competition. Researchers at University of Connecticut
have found that industrial hemp has properties that make it viable and
even attractive as a raw material, or feedstock, for producing
biodiesel. Hemp biodiesel has shown a high efficiency of conversion (97
percent) and has passed laboratory’s tests, even showing properties that
suggest it could be used at lower temperatures than any biodiesel
currently on the market. Read More
What's wrong with this picture? If you said the
engines are upside down, you'd be wrong. The odd engine placement is
part of a cruise-efficient, short take-off and landing (CESTOL) aircraft
concept from the Georgia Tech Research Institute which also sees
mechanical wing-flaps replaced by high-speed blasts of air to generate
extra lift. It's hoped that the development of such craft will make more
airports available to fixed-wing jet aircraft by enabling take off and
landing at steep angles on short runways, as well as reducing engine
noise. Read More
Quantum cryptography has been around since the
1980's but up until now only very small packets of information have been
able to be encrypted at one time. Now a breakthrough that identifies
the angle and rotation of photon particles is taking this technology to
the next level. Read More
Real-life gadgets for real-life superheroes
By Ben Coxworth
November 8, 2010
Yes, there are real-life superheroes.
And no, we’re not just referring to firefighters, paramedics, and other
heroic people who we’re used to seeing coming to the rescue of others.
We’re talking about costume-wearing, identity-concealing,
cool-name-having people who fight crime, pollution, or other evils in
their own communities, on their own time, and at their own risk. Many of
them actually patrol the city streets, ready to intervene if they see
trouble brewing – and being ready includes having the right tools. Given
that none of these people have Bruce Wayne’s budget, however, their
gadgets tend to be less like Batmobile clones, and more like... well, read on and see for yourself. Read More
Fancy a roadtrip? Don't have a driver? No problem! The team from VisLab have just completed a journey from across two continents
in two autonomous vans – the longest single trip undertaken by an
autonomous vehicle. Over the 8,000 miles (13,000km) there were only a
few technical hiccups and it seems that border officials, the police,
journalists and tired crew members were a bigger hazard than the tough
road conditions. Read More
In the creation of the film Avatar,
director James Cameron invented a system called Simul-cam. It allowed
him to see the video output of the cameras, in real time, but with the
human actors digitally altered to look like the alien creatures whom
they were playing. The system also negated the need for a huge amount of
animation – every performance was captured in all its blue-skinned,
pointy-eared majesty as it happened, so it didn’t need to be created
from scratch on a computer. Now, researchers from the University of
Abertay Dundee have built on the techniques pioneered by Simul-cam to
create a new system, that lets users act as their own cameraperson
within a 3D environment. Read More
Toshiba has announced that its new mSATA SSD
storage solution, that was recently found inside Apple's new 11-inch Macbook Air,
is being made available to other product developers. The super-slim
Blade X-gale series comes in three capacity options and users can expect
a fast read/write performance and a long life expectancy. Read More
A consortium of scientists has been formed to try
and stem the rise of sexually transmitted diseases (or infections as
they are now called) that's said to be reaching epidemic proportions in
the UK. As early diagnosis and treatment is essential in such matters,
the team is creating a self-diagnosis system where results can quickly
be displayed on a mobile phone or computer screen. The system could even
automatically make an appointment at a clinic or direct the unfortunate
sufferer to the nearest pharmacy, where treatment would be waiting.
Read More
Does the world need another iPhone/iPod Touch dock?
The world of Harley riders just might, and the DashLink from Hell’s
Foundry is here to meet that need. The DashLink replaces the stock fuel
tank console on your Harley-Davidson with an integrated dock that
securely holds your iPhone or iPod Touch, while keeping it charged and
ready for use. Read More
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