Leading the Charge: Fast 40

From multinational battery developers to commercial-vehicle components manufacturers merging new-age motors with established power-transfer technologies, Battery & Electrification Technology's Fast 40 presents...

The Rechargeable Renaissance

After years of lukewarm reception and limited funding, it looks as if the battery electric vehicle (BEV) market is finally going full throttle. According to a recent Forbes article, Schmidt Automotive Research...

Extending Battery Life of Small Drones

A continuous flight of small drones over its perimeter could enhance security of the nation's border, but there is one small problem: The battery limitation of small drones (they last about 30 minutes) is...

Micro-Supercapacitors Enable Fast Charging

Micro-supercapacitors could revolutionize the way we use batteries by increasing their lifespan and enabling extremely fast charging. Now, researchers at Chalmers University of Technology have...

A High-Energy Density Lithium-Ion Battery

National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) and Softbank Corp. have developed a lithium-air battery with an energy density over 500Wh/ kg - significantly higher than currently lithium-ion batteries....

Hydropower Technology Swaps Dams with Electric Trucks

In steep mountain regions, the potential for generating electricity from a small stream of water is high, however, the hydropower potential of these regions remains untapped as it...

New Material Offers Promise for Solid-State Batteries

Researchers from the University of Waterloo, Canada, who are members of the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research (JCESR), headquartered at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne...

Using Silver Sintering in Traction Inverter Assembly

Traction inverter power density (KW/L) and efficiency ($/KW) strongly impact electric vehicle (EV) weight, driving range, and cost of ownership. Unfortunately, traditional soldered power...

New Products

Battery Management Solution InnovationLab (Heidelberg, Germany) has launched BaMoS, its battery monitoring solution for automotive applications. BaMoS uses ultra-thin printed pressure and temperature sensors to capture...

Ultracapacitor Solutions to Address Energy-Storage Needs of Vehicles

As the electrification of automobiles continues to accelerate, the need for a safe, reliable, high-power energy-storage technology is greater than ever. Ultracapacitors...

Developing a Better Way to Recycle Lithium-Ion Batteries

Decarbonizing transportation is key for meeting U.S. greenhouse gas reduction targets because moving people and goods is the largest direct source of climate-altering emissions....

Determining Dynamic Object Tracking Accuracy

There is already a wide body of work in which assessments of various motion capture systems have produced a wide range of different results. These studies produce useful and relevant results for...

Ensuring Optical Fiber Alignment

Most optical networks have many fiber couplings and even minor losses at these junctions will produce significant signal losses that cause problems in data transmission. Precise fiber alignment at the optical...

Challenges of Coating Aspheric Lenses

Aspheric lenses let optical system designers improve resolution, reduce the number of lens elements required, and increase system light throughput. Their complex, non-spherical surfaces correct for more...

Manufacturing Wafer-Level Optics Using UV Adhesives and Polymers

Micro-optics and nanostructures are key technologies for the latest optoelectronic components in smartphones, smart glasses and vehicles. Some examples used in consumer...

5G Strobe Light: NIST Imaging System Spotlights the Tiny Mechanical Hearts at the Core of Every Cellphone

Inside every cellphone lies a tiny mechanical heart, beating several billion times a second. These micromechanical resonators play an...

Terahertz Energy Focused by Credit Card-Sized Device to Generate High-Resolution Images

Researchers have created a device that enables them to electronically steer and focus a beam of terahertz electromagnetic energy with extreme precision....

New Products

Plasma Deposition Process Alluxa, Inc. (Santa Rosa, CA) recently introduced its next-generation SIRRUS™ plasma physical vapor deposition (PVD) platform offering full spectral coverage from ultraviolet (200 μm) to infrared...

Understanding Cryocooled Infrared System Reliability

Where the ability to detect mid-wave infrared (MWIR) radiation is mission critical, readiness and the importance of long, maintenance-free infrared (IR) system operation is vital. In...

Using CoaXPress-over-Fiber for High-Speed Machine Vision

High-speed digital imaging expands the benefits of traditional machine vision (MV), transforming it from a process control tool into a diagnostic tool. Traditional MV systems use...

Products of Tomorrow

This column presents technologies that have applications in commercial areas, possibly creating the products of tomorrow. To learn more about each technology, see the contact information provided for that innovation.

Q&A: Radar Imaging at Terahertz Frequencies

Professor Kenneth K. O. and his colleagues at The University of Texas at Dallas and Oklahoma State University have developed an innovative and affordable terahertz imager microchip that can enable...

Create the Future Design Contest: Success Story — Shaping the Future with 3D Printing

Behrokh Khoshnevis has always known that 3D printing would make its biggest impact on big structures. While most advances in additive manufacturing...

Embracing Agile Product Development

We've made some impressive strides from both a societal and industry perspective in the face of this unrelenting pandemic. And while the Aerospace and Defense (A&D) industry has been hit exceptionally...

Test Strategies to Track Hypersonic Threats

Hypersonic weapons, unlike ballistic missiles, take unpredictable paths and can evade missile defense systems. To counter hypersonic technologies, radar engineers must build systems that have no...

Polymer Mixture Creates Ultra-Sensitive Heat Sensor

An ultra-sensitive heat sensor was developed that is based on the fact that certain materials are thermoelectric. The electrons in a thermoelectric material move from the cold side to the warm...

Material for the Next Generation of Smart Sensors

Scientists have developed color-changing, flexible photonic crystals that could be used to develop sensors that warn when an earthquake might strike next. The wearable, robust, and low-cost...

Bimodal “Electronic Skin”

Through the use of magnetic fields, scientists have developed an electronic sensor that can simultaneously process both touchless and tactile stimuli. Prior attempts have so far failed to combine these functions on...

Detecting Health Markers in Thread-Based, Wearable Sweat Sensors

Engineers have created a flexible electronic sensing patch that can be sewn into clothing to analyze sweat for multiple markers. The patch could be used to diagnose and monitor...