Important Innovations

Brand New Material thru New Tech Treatment Process  University of Maryland Engineers and Their Breakthrough Wood  Researchers at the University of Maryland have produced a type of wood that's as tough and strong as steel. And, it's inexpensive.  The wood is 12 times stronger than natural wood and 10 times tougher.  It's a strong competitor to steel.  A new tech treatment process developed by UMD engineers created this brand new material. Super Wood Steel Replacement This treated wood can replace steel and titanium alloys.  It's comparable to carbon fiber but much less expensive. The potential uses are big and commercial scale. For Buildings, Cars and Airplanes The engineers say this natural wood substance is strong and tough enough to construct cars, airplanes and buildings.  It's as strong as steel but 6 times lighter.  The wood takes 10 times more energy to fracture than natural wood.  And it can be bent and molded at the beginning of the treatment pro

Boston Dynamics SpotMini Grabbing a Soda   Cranking Out Thousands of SpotMinis & Practical Robots Boston Dynamics is ready to produce a lot of SpotMinis.  You can purchase it in 2019.  It's an all-electric nimble robot that the company says is good at home, the office and outdoors.  The robot can wash the dishes, open the door, climb stairs and carry & handle packages and other objects. Productify The company is expanding its focus.  Since its founding it has been viewed as a leading R&D robotic innovation center.  Now, it's ready to also "productify"  meaning create and sell practical robots on a commercial scale.  SpotMini is a great example.  Word is they're going to unleash thousands of robots with different applications onto the market over the next few years. Uses According to the company, primary uses for SpotMini right now are as an assistant at the office, home and outdoors.  Also for emergency response, security and entertai

Harvard Robot to Do Surgery It's a tiny, soft robot, inspired by spiders, that may operate on humans someday.  Harvard and Boston University engineers and scientists developed it.  Their goal is to enable the robot to get to areas inside the human body that surgeons can't reach. This is the 1st time a flexible soft robot with an extensive range of capabilities has been created on such a small scale.  The process is called MORPH. Robots One Millimeter in Size Boston University and Harvard's Wyss Institute have developed a process to create millimeter-sized, flexible robots.  It's a hybrid technology that merges 3 different fabrication techniques.  With the process, the team created a soft robot spider made of silicone rubber.  It has 18 degrees of "freedom", meaning changes in structure, motion and color.  These devices are at the micrometer scale level, meaning they can operate in small, inaccessible places. Many Applications The soft robotic devices

University of Colorado at Boulder Breakthru Technology E-Skin This e-skin is self-healing, malleable and fully re-cyclable.  It can be used for robotics, prosthetics and for better medical devices. E-skin is a thin, translucent material that mimics the function and mechanical properties of real human skin. University of Colorado's e-skin also has sensors embedded in the skin for critical measurements. Awesome Tech Loaded with Sensors The e-skin has sensors embedded to measure pressure, temperature, humidity and air flow.  The tech has several unique properties including a polymer called polyimine.  It's also laced with silver nanoparticles to provide strong mechanical strength, chemical stability and electrical connectivity. The e-skin can be easily fitted to curved surfaces like a human arm or hand and even a robot's finger for a sense of touch. Polyimine Does It According to University of Colorado scientist Jianliang Xiao, what's unique is the chemical bond

Wednesday Series:  Innovation Addressing Pressing World Needs like Air Pollution Honeycomb Structures Inspired by Bees Scientists at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology have created a 3D structure inspired by the honeycomb of bees to control air pollution.  It's a flexible, 3D porous material that helps filter air to remove pollutants and viruses. Large Structure, Quick Build The King Abdullah University team developed a simple method that in 5 minutes produces a flexible film with a complex, hierarchical structure that has repeating patterns of interconnected regularly shaped pores. It's a honeycomb structure with a very large surface and the ability to selectively extract material like pollutants. Latticework and Symmetry Both the lattice of a honeycomb and the symmetry of a diatom are complex living structures with patterns and shapes that have long inspired scientists.  The research team says they've developed an important platform to design a

Power Beaming is an Emerging Disruptive Technology Source: Silent Falcon UAS Technologies -Silent Falcon California-based Silent Falcon UAS Technologies is partnering with the Pentagon's Advanced Research Projects Agency -DARPA -  to implement laser power beaming for its solar-electric powered drones.  Silent Falcon drones can fly non-stop 6 hours using batteries and solar energy. They are the world's first solar electric, long range, long endurance unmanned aircraft system or UAS. DARPA wants to make the flight time much longer by topping off the batteries via laser beams from the ground.  DARPA officials say they're right on the brink of delivering this disruptive technology. Endless Uses for Endless Flights What DARPA wants is drones capable of indefinite flight.  The drones would engage in sequences of flying and flying while charging from a high powered laser beam directed from the ground.  There would be no need to land and refuel.  This emerging technology

4D Videos thru 4D Goggles University of California researchers have created 4D goggles that have the ability to make entertainment content 4-dimensional.  Meaning, more immersive through multi-sensory experience. UC San Diego Discovery UC San Diego neuroscientists developed 4D goggles. They can be synchronized with entertainment content like movies, music, games and virtual reality to greatly enhance the experience.  They bring immersive, multisensory effects near to the face to deliver the feeling of really being there. Ongoing Research This is fascinating research.  The 4D goggles allow viewers to feel, during a movie, a slight touch when an object like a spacecraft is approaching. To do this with the 4D goggles, the neuroscientists mapped brain areas that integrate the sight and touch of a looming object.  That aided their understanding of the perceptual and neural mechanisms of multisensory integration and how more than a dozen brain areas were found to respond more stron