文章资讯
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- 2015-06-12 High-tech sensors help kids keep eye on aging parents
- Each time 81-year-old Bill Dworsky or his 80-year-old wife Dorothy opens the refrigerator, closes the bathroom door or lifts the lid on a pill container, tiny sensors in their San Francisco home make notes on a digital logbook.
The couple's 53-year-old son, Phil, checks it daily on his smartphone. If there's no activity during a designated time, the younger Dworsky gets an automated email, so he can decide whether to call or stop by. "This is peace of mind, really," he says of the system he installed last year. - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 Researchers exploring spintronics in graphene
- Electronics is based on the manipulation of electrons and other charge carriers, but in addition to charge, electrons possess a property known as spin. When spin is manipulated with magnetic and electric fields, the result is a spin-polarised current that carries more information than is possible with charge alone. Spin-transport electronics, or spintronics, is a subject of active investigation within Europe's Graphene Flagship.
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- 2015-06-11 Sensor detects spoilage of food
- VTT has developed a sensor that detects ethanol in the headspace of a food package. Ethanol is formed as a result of food spoilage. The sensor signal is wirelessly readable, for instance, by a mobile phone. VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd is searching for a partner so as to commercialise the sensor.
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- 2015-06-11 A first step towards testing dark energy theories on the table top
- Scientists from FOM and the VU University Amsterdam have designed an experiment to test a popular candidate theory that could explain the mechanisms behind dark energy. Now, they have reached an important milestone on the long road they have been following for the past four years: a working dark energy force detector. The first few tests with this new device give confidence that the sensitivity required to put the theory to the test can indeed be reached in the setup.
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- 2015-06-11 A nano-transistor assesses your health via sweat
- Made from state-of-the-art silicon transistors, an ultra-low power sensor enables real-time scanning of the contents of liquids such as perspiration. Compatible with advanced electronics, this technology boasts exceptional accuracy – enough to manufacture mobile sensors that monitor health.
Imagine that it is possible, through a tiny adhesive electronic stamp attached to the arm, to know in real time one's level of hydration, stress or fatigue while jogging. A new sensor developed at the Nanoelectronic Devices Laboratory (Nanolab) at EPFL is the first step toward this application. - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 Tool to help manufacturers select wireless network that's right for them
- Going wireless is appealing to a growing number of manufacturers. Using wireless sensor networks to monitor and control equipment and processes eliminates the costly labyrinth of dedicated cabling to hardwire devices, enables flexibility in organizing operations, and expands opportunities for keeping tabs on plant-floor conditions and performance.
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- 2015-06-11 Biomedical sensors for disease detection made simple
- Healthcare researchers are increasingly focused on the early detection and prevention of illnesses. Early and accurate diagnosis is vital, especially for people in developing countries where infectious diseases are the leading cause of death. One way to achieve early detection is by developing simple biomedical sensors.
One challenge, however, is to ensure that biomedical sensors are environmentally stable, disposable and cost-effective. Current biosensors are made of glass or very expensive gold substrates that make it difficult to broaden their use and mobility in diagnostic and research areas. - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 The rise of wearable health tech could mean the end of the sickie
- Now that the sun is shining and the temperature is rising, it's officially sickie season: go to work, or get struck down with "flu", a "24-hour virus", or that faithful stand-by, the dodgy prawn takeaway.
Figures show that over a third of employees in the UK admit to pulling a sickie at some point or other. But things may be changing soon – wearable tech such as the Apple Watch, Microsoft Band, Fitbit, or Jawbone Up may become mainstream within a few years, bringing health monitoring capabilities that reveal how your body is performing. - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 Review: Curves and 'self-healing' in super-premium phones
- For those not satisfied with just a premium phone, Samsung and LG are offering two models best described as the Lamborghinis of smartphones.
You're already getting a lot with flagship phones from those two companies. For about $100 more, you can get a super-charged experience. Not everyone's going to want or need this, but here's what you get: - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 Performance enhancing sensor ready for commercialisation
- A wearable device being developed by the University of Strathclyde will provide real-time data analysis of fluid loss during exercise to enhance the performance of fitness enthusiasts and elite athletes.
The innovative transdermal sensor is a small device that attaches to the body to analyse electrolytes in sweat, with bluetooth technology used to send the data back to a smartphone – allowing the user to rehydrate properly and maintain optimum performance. - See Details
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- 2015-06-11 Research team produces powerful new tool for medical diagnostic applications
- Professor Georg Duesberg, Investigator in AMBER, the Science Foundation Ireland funded materials science centre based at Trinity College Dublin, and Trinity's School of Chemistry and his team, in collaboration with the group of Dr. Andreas Holzinger at Université Grenoble Alpes and Professor Maryam Tabrizian from Montreal McGill University, Montreal, have produced a new graphene biosensor.
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- 2015-06-10 Mobile input device Phree invites you to jot, sketch, take notes
- A Kickstarter campaign is heating up over a device called Phree. It's for writing on nearly any surface you want to and seeing your writing instantly appear on your screen. In a promotional video, a presenter says, "In 2015 we love our touchscreeens." Only, there's one problem: "They are not a perfect input device." Users need better precision and more space, and so Phree was created, taking you way beyond the screen.
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- 2015-06-10 New device could spell the end of no balls
- Foot fault no balls could be eliminated from cricket thanks to a new device that aims to stop bowlers overstepping the mark.
QUT's technology transfer company, qutbluebox, partnered with Cricket Australia to create a training aid that uses a sensor to detect when a bowler commits a no ball by overstepping the popping crease. - See Details
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- 2015-06-10 Defining a national standard for dynamic pressure waves
- In recent years, the physical damage done by pressure waves – such as traumatic brain injuries from explosives sustained by military personnel in the Middle East – has become an increasingly urgent public concern.
Although there are many dynamic pressure sensors in use by equipment manufacturers, testing laboratories, and military contractors, none of them provides measurements traceable to the International System of Units through a national standard. As a result, there is no way to judge the relative or absolute accuracy of the devices. - See Details
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- 2015-06-10 Successful Kickstarter project Neurio now delivering home electricity sensing
- At the end of 2013, a group of people calling itself Energy Aware, launched a Kickstarter project for a device they had created called Neurio—an electricity sensor that connects to a home's breaker panel and keeps track of usage—data is sent from it via WiFI to a cloud storage facility where it is analyzed put into a form that makes sense and then sent to the user's smartphone.
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- 2015-06-10 Subway riders' smartphones could carry tracking malware
- Millions of city dwellers with smartphones in hand, pocket or bag, use trains to get around night and day, seven days a week. The incoming message from three researchers in China is that an attacker could track them based on information from a phone's accelerometer. The three, from Nanjing University, have completed a study which went up on the arXiv server earlier this month. "We Can Track You If You Take the Metro: Tracking Metro Riders Using Accelerometers on Smartphones" describes the attack.
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- 2015-06-10 Biosensor may improve clinical diagnosis of influenza A
- Sensors based on special sound waves known as surface acoustic waves (SAWs) are capable of detecting tiny amounts of antigens of Influenza A viruses. Developed by A*STAR researchers, the biosensors have the potential to detect viral infections rapidly and reliably at the point of care, making them powerful tools for combating future pandemics.
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- 2015-06-10 Banknote check with ultra-fast line scan sensor
- Speed and accurate image reproduction are the alpha and omega of quality inspection in security printing. Conventional image sensors are limited in this regard. Fraunhofer researchers have developed an ultrafast line scan sensor that delivers high-quality images and identifies banknotes with faulty safety features.
In the first half 2014 alone, nearly 25,000 counterfeit euro notes worth EUR 1.5 million were registered, according to information by the Deutsche Bundesbank. In order to make the criminal work of counterfeiters more difficult, banknotes are equipped with special security features. - See Details
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- 2015-06-10 Team develops camera that uses sensors with just 1,000 pixels
- Thanks to the `megapixel wars', we are used to cameras with 10s of megapixels. Sensors in our cell phone and SLRs are made of Silicon (Si), which is sensitive to the visible wavebands of light and hence, useful for consumer photography. The abundance of Silicon, coupled with advances in CMOS-based fabrication has helped drive down the cost of sensors while simultaneously providing increased capabilities in terms of sensors with higher and higher resolutions.
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- 2015-06-10 New composite material as CO2 sensor
- A new material changes its conductivity depending on the concentration of CO2 in the environment. The researchers who developed it have utilized the material to produce a miniature, simply constructed sensor.
Material scientists at ETH Zurich and the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces in Potsdam have developed a new type of sensor that can measurecarbon dioxide (CO2). Compared with existing sensors, it is much smaller, has a simpler construction, requires considerably less energy and has an entirely different functional principle. - See Details
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- 2015-06-10 Injectable electronics holds promise for basic neuroscience, treatment of neuro-degenerative diseases
- It's a notion that might be pulled from the pages of science-fiction novel - electronic devices that can be injected directly into the brain, or other body parts, and treat everything from neurodegenerative disorders to paralysis.
It sounds unlikely, until you visit Charles Lieber's lab.
A team of international researchers, led by Lieber, the Mark Hyman, Jr. Professor of Chemistry, an international team of researchers developed a method for fabricating nano-scale electronic scaffolds that can be injected via syringe. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Computing at the speed of light: Team takes big step toward much faster computers
- University of Utah engineers have taken a step forward in creating the next generation of computers and mobile devices capable of speeds millions of times faster than current machines.
The Utah engineers have developed an ultracompact beamsplitter—the smallest on record—for dividing light waves into two separate channels of information. The device brings researchers closer to producing silicon photonic chips that compute and shuttle data with light instead of electrons. Electrical and computer engineering associate professor Rajesh Menon and colleagues describe their invention today in the journal Nature Photonics. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Efficiency record for black silicon solar cells jumps to 22.1 percent
- The researchers from Finland's Aalto University and Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya have obtained the record-breaking efficiency of 22.1% on nanostructured silicon solar cells as certified by Fraunhofer ISE CalLab. An almost 4% absolute increase to their previous record is achieved by applying a thin passivating film on the nanostructures by Atomic Layer Deposition, and by integrating all metal contacts on the back side of the cell.
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- 2015-06-09 Appeals court sides with Google in anti-Muslim film case
- A federal appeals court panel should not have forced YouTube to take down an anti-Muslim film that sparked violence in the Middle East and death threats to actors, a larger group of judges ruled Monday in a victory for free speech advocates.
The 11-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal sided with Google, which owns YouTube, saying the previous decision by a three-member panel of the same court gave "short shrift" to the First Amendment and constituted prior restraint—a prohibition on free speech before it takes place. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Google backs farm-focused startup as 'AgTech' blooms
- Google on Tuesday pumped $15 million into a farming-focused technology startup, the latest in a surge of investment applying Internet innovations to growing food.
The funding round led by Google's investment arm brings to nearly $28 million the total amount of money pumped into Farmers Business Network (FBN) by backers including powerhouse Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Silicon Valley aims for Cuba, but treads carefully
- If Horacio Nunez grew up in the United States instead of Cuba, the 26-year-old software engineer might have spent hours of his youth surfing the Web. But he had no Internet connection to his Havana home, so he learned how to code under conditions most of his Bay Area programmer peers are too young to remember.
"Internet in Cuba is like the Internet you had when Netscape was battling Internet Explorer," said Nunez, referring to the slow dial-up era of the 1990s. "You can't use Skype. There's no cloud. I used to carry a hard drive with all the books I could find." - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Laser technology advances microchip production
- A new process for cutting silicon wafers could streamline the production of smaller and more powerful microchips for electronic devices.
Electronic chips are built on small pieces of silicon that are cut from silicon sheets, called wafers, in a process known as dicing. Currently, dicing is performed by mechanical sawing or laser cutting, but these approaches can cause problems. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Defense Department's tech investing signals Silicon Valley's importance in cyberwarfare
- As more conflicts shift from land to cyberspace, the nation's defense agencies are relying less on missiles and tanks and more on Silicon Valley technology entrepreneurs and startups to secure the country's porous Internet battlefield.
In one of the most overt displays of the federal government's growing dependence on Silicon Valley, the Department of Defense late last month announced it will start providing venture capital funding to valley startups that can help the Pentagon develop more advanced cybersecurity and intelligence systems to fend off nation states and hackers targeting everything from top-secret military correspondence to public power grids. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Supercomputers a hidden power center of Silicon Valley
- Silicon Valley is famed for spawning the desktop, mobile and cloud computing revolutions. What is less well known is that it's one of the nerve centers for building the world's fastest number-crunchers.
Once confined to big national laboratories, supercomputers are now in demand to crunch massive amounts of data for industries such as oil exploration, finance andonline sales. - See Details
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- 2015-06-09 Best of Last Week—Increasing antihydrogen production, converting waste heat to electricity and video game brain impact
- It was another good week for physics as a team of researchers found some ways to increase antihydrogen production—having more of the stuff could lead to better experiments to learn more about antimatter in general.
It was an even bigger week for advances in technology—one team at the University of Florida created a new device that may make converting waste heat to electricity industrially competitive—a thermoelectric device that uses nanowires to capture heat emitted from engines and other machines. Another team, Vortex Bladeless, was aiming for a lower-cost wind energy approach—creating structures that look like straws with no moving parts that convert wind energy to electricity using oscillations. - See Details