November 22nd, 2009

The surgeons of tomorrow: Miniaturized robots that go inside you

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 4:28 pm

Categories: Engineering & Innovation, Health & Medicine, Nanotechnology, Robotics

Tags: Bot, Robots, Emerging Technologies, Chris Jablonski

Before the advent of laparoscopic or keyhole surgery in the 70’s, operations such as a stomach bypass or gall bladder removal required large incisions and long periods for recovery. The next chapter further minimizes the invasiveness of surgical procedures via robots that are millimeters in size that infiltrate our bodies through the ears, eyes and lungs, to take tissue samples, deliver drugs, or install medical devices.

Brad Nelson, a roboticist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EHT) in Zurich, recently told New Scientist; “It’s not impossible to think of this happening in five years. I’m convinced it’s going to get there.”

Hurdles to overcome include the development of new mechanisms for propulsion and power supply on a miniature scale, which are also prerequisites to the loftier idea of nanoscale medical robots swimming in our bloodstream.

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November 19th, 2009

7 things you should know about Body Area Networks (BANs)

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 12:08 am

Categories: Computers & Internet, Defense & Security, Health & Medicine, Wireless & Telecom

Tags: Communication, Sensor, IEEE, Wireless, Body Area Networks Technology, Wi-Fi, Wireless And Mobility, Chris Jablonski

The budding field of Body Area Networks gives new meaning to the term “personal” in PCs. In a nutshell, the technology leverages wireless communications protocols that allow for low-powered sensors to communicate with one another and transmit data to a local base station and to remote places like hospitals.

For instance, small flat sensors placed on the skin, or even under it, could be used to create a “medical” body area network that provides doctors with real-time data about their patients’ bio-signs. Another key application is short-range person-to-person communications that could help protect front line soldiers in combat.

BAN technology is still in its infancy and mainstream adoption is still over the horizon as engineers and researchers work to overcome challenges involving interoperability, sensor design constraints (i.e. power and complexity), privacy, and security to name a few. Once these issues are overcome, expect BANs to first revolutionize healthcare allowing for concepts like telemedicine and mHealth to become real, and potentially allow for groundbreaking uses in communications, security, and sports.

Below, in no particular order, is a list of facts, news, and generally good things to know about BANs: Read the rest of this entry »

November 12th, 2009

Top three Star Trek-style holodeck experiences

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 12:24 am

Categories: Computers & Internet, Energy & Environment, Engineering & Innovation, Health & Medicine, Nanotechnology, Science & Nature, Space & Aerospace

Tags: User Interaction, 3D, Pixel, StarCAVE, Audio System, Tech Spec, Projectors, Virtual Reality, Hardware, Components

Surround 3D TV is making its way to your living room. To get a sense of what it may look and sound like, look no further than the cutting edge of virtual reality taking shape at academic research centers outfitted with world class data visualization facilities. In this post, we’ll take a look at three (ok, four) of the most remarkable scientific visualization technologies.

Allosphere: University of California, Santa Barbara

The AlloSphere is a spherical space in which immersive, virtual environments allow researchers to convert large data sets into experiences of sight and sound. For example, it allows researchers to “fly” through a hydrogen atom while hearing sonified features of the wavefunction of its single electron to help describe invisible processes of nature.

The facility consists of a 30-foot diameter sphere built inside a 3-story cube that’s nearly echo-free. Inside the chamber are two spherical hemispheres that are constructed of perforated aluminum designed to be optically opaque and acoustically transparent. A 7-foot-wide bridge runs across the center, supporting the users. High-resolution video projectors can project images across the entire inner surface enabling seamless stereo-optic 3D projection.

The Allosphere has more than 500 audio components that hang suspended in rings just outside the aluminum shell and are connected to multiple Gigabit Ethernet LAN fibers that lead to a server farm consisting of seven Hewlett Packard 9400 workstations (as of April 2009).

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November 8th, 2009

Laser-powered 'space elevator' wins $900,000 NASA prize

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 9:29 pm

Categories: Engineering & Innovation, Space & Aerospace

Tags: NASA, Elevator, Laser, Cable, Network Technology, Aerospace & Defense, Telecommunications, Personal Technology, Networking, Manufacturing

LaserMotive, a Seattle-area company specializing in laser power beaming, has claimed a $900,000 prize with their photovoltaic-powered machine that has climbed nearly 3,000 feet (1 km) at an average speed greater than 2 meters per second, or just over four minutes.

With a payload in tote, the robot climbed a long cable suspended from a helicopter to test ideas that can potentially lead to the realization of space elevators.

The accomplishment took place on the first day of the Power Beaming competition in the 2010 Space Elevator Games at NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center in California’s Mojave Desert.

While the LaserMotive team fell short of reaching NASA’s top-level prize of up to $2 million for climbing the entire length of the cable in three minutes or less (about five meters per second), they still hold bragging rights as the first in the 3-year history of NASA’s space elevator contest to climb a 2,953-foot-long ribbon.

Here is a video of one of LaserMotive’s attempts:

The company doesn’t have plans to use the technology to access space via an elevator climbing a cable, but rather to develop a business based on the idea of beaming power. In fact, the prize will serve as seed money to develop technology and system prototypes for use in aerospace and other industries. For instance, it can potentially be used to provide power to remote areas of military bases or to operate electrically powered unmanned aircraft for extended periods.

Here are additional sources covering the story:

CBS News.com, SmartPlanet, The 2009 Space Elevator Games Blog, PhysOrg.com

November 3rd, 2009

Biodegradable silk electronics to improve implants

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 7:27 pm

Categories: Computers & Internet, Engineering & Innovation, Science & Nature

Tags: Electrode, Silk, Electronics, Telecom & Utilities, Chris Jablonski

Building on advancements in foldable ultra-thin flexible circuits, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Tufts University have developed electronics that almost completely dissolve inside the body by incorporating silk.

Technology Review reports that the research group has demonstrated arrays of transistors made on thin films of silk.

Typically, implanted electronics are encased to protect them from the body, but these new electronics don’t need such protection. The silk allows for the electronics to conform to biological tissue as it melts away over time.  And the thin silicon circuits left behind don’t cause irritation because they are just nanometers thick.

The image on the left depicts the implantable device. It consists of a clear silk film, about one centimeter squared, with six silicon transistors on its surface. The device can be implanted in mice like the one in this image and the silk degrades over time. It causes no harm to the animal. (The orange liquid on the hair is a disinfectant used during the surgery.)

Here is how the article describes how the devices are made:

To make the devices, silicon transistors about one millimeter long and 250 nanometers thick are collected on a stamp and then transferred to the surface of a thin film of silk. The silk holds each device in place, even after the array is implanted in an animal and wetted with saline, causing it to conform to the tissue surface.

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November 1st, 2009

Wave disk engines to make hybrid vehicles cheaper, more efficient

Posted by Chris Jablonski @ 10:23 pm

Categories: Energy & Environment, Engineering & Innovation

Tags: Disk, Engine, Backups, Chris Jablonski

Researchers from Michigan State University and the Warsaw Institute of Technology are developing a wave disk engine and electricity generator that promises to be five times more efficient than traditional auto engines in electricity production, 20% lighter, and 30% cheaper to manufacture.

The new hyper-efficient engine is about the size of a large cooking pot, and could replace current backup generator technology of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, according to Green Car Congress.

The idea may not be far-fetched as the team, led by Norbert Müller, an associate professor of mechanical engineering, has recently been awarded $2.5 million from the Department of Energy’s ARPA-E program to begin work on a vehicle-size wave disc engine/generator that could be ready in two years.

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