Inspired by nature’s ability to shape a petal, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have developed a new tool for manufacturing three-dimensional shapes easily and cheaply, to aid advances in biomedicine, robotics, and tunable micro-optics.Researchers developed a method...

In a study of 40 videotaped conversations, an automated system developed by University at Buffalo researchers correctly identified whether interview subjects were lying or telling the truth 82.5 percent of the time. The automated system tracks eye movement. The system...

A “Cheetah” robot gallops at speeds of up to 18 miles per hour (mph), setting a new land speed record for legged robots. The previous record was 13.1 mph, set in 1989. The use of ground robots in military explosive-ordinance-disposal missions already saves many lives and prevents thousands of other...

NASA's Robotic Refueling Mission (RRM) began operations on the International Space Station with the Canadian Dextre robot and RRM tools, marking important milestones in satellite-servicing technology and the use of the space station robotic capabilities. A joint effort between NASA and the...

Predicting how large numbers of visitors to major events will behave is difficult, even using evidence based on past experience. To prevent disasters, police, rescue services, and event organizers have to be able to identify dangerous bottlenecks, hidden obstacles, and unexpected escape routes...

To make a silicon solar cell, you start with a slice of highly purified silicon crystal, and then process it through several stages involving gradual heating and cooling. But figuring out the tradeoffs involved in selecting the purity level of the starting silicon wafer — and then exactly how much to heat...

All across America, trucks and tractor-trailers are transporting industrial explosives such as munitions, rocket motors, and dynamite on nearly every artery of the country’s interstate and highway system. America’s track record in transporting these materials is about as...

Engineering researchers at the University of Michigan designed a device that harvests energy from the reverberation of heartbeats through the chest and converts it to electricity to run a pacemaker or an implanted defibrillator. These mini-medical machines send electrical signals...

University of California, San Diego bioengineers have developed a self-healing hydrogel that binds in seconds, like Velcro, and forms a bond strong enough to withstand repeated stretching. The material has numerous potential applications, including medical sutures, targeted drug delivery, industrial sealants,...

Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation (TDCS), a deep brain stimulation technique, uses electrodes to direct tiny painless currents across the brain. The currents are thought to improve the firing of neurons and the forming of connections that enable learning. The technique has shown potential in...

What if design engineers could work with and interact with assemblies with real-time feedback on the structural dynamics acting on the components? What if physics simulations, which currently take hours or days to compute, had so much processing power available that they can be...

The universal challenges faced by bike manufacturer Trek in creating a new-generation racing bike apply to many companies today: Create products that are sturdy yet use lightweight materials, spot design defects earlier in the design phase, and reduce time from sketch to physical prototype. Trek used...

Offshore wind is an enormous potential resource for the United States - with strong, consistent winds located in the Atlantic, Pacific, the Great Lakes, and the Gulf of Mexico. As part of a planned six-year $180 million initiative, an initial $20 million will be available from the DOE this year as the first...

An impact model was developed to predict how three specific foam types would damage the Space Shuttle Orbiter insulating tiles. The inputs needed for the model are the foam type, the foam mass, the foam impact velocity, the foam impact incident angle, the type being impacted, and whether the tile is new or aged (has flown...

This document discusses a technique that provides a means for suspending large, awkward loads, instrument packages, components, and machinery in a stable, controlled, and precise manner. In the baseplate of the test machine, a pattern of grooves and...

A document describes a zeptobolometer for ultrasensitive, long-wavelength sensors. GSFC is developing pixels based on the zeptobolometer design that sense three THz wavelengths simultaneously.

A document describes a high-performance, modular, and state-of-the-art Command and Data Handling (C&DH) system developed for use on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) mission. This system implements a complete hardware C&DH subsystem in a single...

A document discusses an electro-optic sensor that consists of a collimator, attached to one segment, and a quad diode, attached to an adjacent segment. Relative segment-segment motion causes the beam from the collimator to move across the quad diode, thus generating a...

An inorganic, biodegradable silica gel fiber (SGF) acts as a physical scaffold to aid the growth of new cells and the collagen structure that supports them. As a scaffold, it can also be used to deliver drugs over a wide area to aid in healing. The material is integrated into the tissues and...

Energy-saving nozzles offer droplet sizes down to 25 microns, at operating pressures as low as 100 psi. Nozzle passages, including metering slots, spin chambers, and exit orifices, are designed to minimize pressure drop, resulting in conservation of pump energy up to the exit orifice.

A company wants to decrease the frequency and severity of respiratory illness in homes with adults, teens, and children. Affordable indoor air quality improvement solutions must be provided to consumers via an air purification device. The client seeks a third-party partner who can offer a currently commercialized/...

Many types of food spoilage are slowed when air and moisture are removed from around the food. Current removal solutions, however, are expensive, take up too much space, and require complicated processes. A new technology must remove air and moisture with the single push of a button. Any proposed...

Specialized mixed-signal (radio frequency and digital) hardware and processing techniques are employed to enable processing of the multi-GHz signal bandwidth, along with the instruction of an inter-symbol guard time (ISGT) to facilitate synchronization to the received pulse-position modulation (PPM) signal.