Increasing physical endurance with a smart suit under way

By Damir Beciri
21 July 2012

wyss-smart-suitDefense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has recently funded the researchers from Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University to develop a smart suit that could be used to improve physical endurance for soldiers in the field. Unlike exoskeletons we previously wrote about, the proposed suit will be made from soft and lightweight… »

Mobile Music Touch glove aids in touch sensation recovery

By Damir Beciri
2 Comments20 July 2012

mobile-music-touch-gloveAfter a year of sustained injury or illness, most of the individuals with limited feeling or movement in their hands due to quadriplegia see very little improvement in recovery for the remainder of their lives. Georgia Tech researchers have created Mobile Music Touch (MMT) – a wireless, musical glove that may improve sensation and motor… »

New technology improves light polarization in LC projectors

By Damir Beciri
19 July 2012

imagineoptix-pg-pcs-1Researchers from North Carolina State University and ImagineOptix Corporation have developed new technology which provides a major breakthrough for projectors that use liquid crystal (LC) technology. The new technology could lead to projectors which are smaller, nearly two times more efficient and more affordable, thus enabling their longer battery life and significantly lower levels of… »

Green architecture – College of Human Ecology at Cornell

By Damir Beciri
One Comment18 July 2012

cornell-college-of-human-ecology-1The Cornell University College of Human Ecology Building modern design blends into the surrounding natural landscape with minimal disruption to the neighboring community on Forest Home Drive. The building was built with commitment to responsible stewardship and sustainability, and it is on target to achieve LEED Gold certification with striving for LEED Platinum, the highest… »

Tensor Display – a step closer to glasses-free 3-D TV

By Damir Beciri
15 July 2012

mit-tensor-displayHolograms – most of us want them in our homes, but we still can’t have them. As an alternative and more feasible solution, MIT Media Lab’s Camera Culture group devised a multiple-perspective, glasses-free 3D display technology they named Tensor Display. Instead of the complex hardware required to produce holograms, the system developed by the Media… »

New chip harnessing power from light, heat and vibrations

By Damir Beciri
13 July 2012

mit-harnessing-multiple-energy-sources-1Most efforts to harness multiple energy sources so far have employed switching to the source which provides most energy at that moment, but a group of researchers at MIT developed a system able to combine energy from multiple sources by switching rapidly between them. The  system could to be used in new battery-free monitoring systems… »

Modified plant protein can be used as drug-delivery vesicle

By Damir Beciri
13 July 2012

sesame-and-sunflower-seedsResearchers from the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) have developed a new approach for making biocompatible vesicles that can carry drugs to their targets in the body. By starting with a protein that is found in sunflower seeds, they used genetic engineering to make a variety of protein molecules that assemble into biocompatible vesicles and other… »

Swarming UAVs could be used to save lives at sea

By Damir Beciri
12 July 2012

unsw-monica-chiInspired by the swarming patterns of animals in nature, an aerospace engineering PhD student from the University of New South Wales (UNSW), Australia, is using biomimicry to develop an algorithm which simulates novel and chaotic flight formations of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The results could be used in order to improve their performance in marine… »