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Q&A: Electronics & Computers
Dr. Beyah and a team of researchers from Georgia Tech and Rutgers University have developed a three-layer system to verify that components produced using...
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Sound-Off: Physical Sciences
Sound-Off: How Should Universities Prepare Tomorrow’s Vehicle Designers?
The skill set for tomorrow’s automotive designer? A combination of traditional engineering, physical sciences, mathematics, and, more than ever, ethics.
News: Aerospace
NASA’s Mehdi Khorrami explains how he uses high-performance computing to handle one of the FAA’s biggest complaints: aircraft noise.
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Briefs: Motion Control
Researchers at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL) have created the first functional robot powered entirely by vacuum. It is made of soft building blocks that move by having air sucked out...
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Application Briefs: Motion Control
Deciding between a gantry and a robot for your application isn’t always as clear-cut as it may seem. To automate a simple, yet time-consuming and potentially dangerous task in...
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Articles: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Proper filtration plays an important role in ensuring that hydraulic systems operate trouble-free. High-performance filters maintain the cleanliness of the hydraulic fluid over its entire service life. In...
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Application Briefs: Motion Control
The launch, landing, and overall mission of NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) is arguably one of the most daring — and successful — space exploration endeavors ever...
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Briefs: Motion Control
An engineering team at the University of California San Diego has designed and built a gripper that can pick up and manipulate objects without needing to see them and without being...
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Briefs: Motion Control
Scientists at Disney Research have developed a modular, reconfigurable legged robot named Snapbot that can move forward, interact with its environment, and perform other tasks based on a number of...
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Products: Electronics & Computers
Corrosion-Resistant Valve GF Piping Systems (Irvine, CA) introduced a corrosion-resistant pneumatic diaphragm valve for highly corrosive dosing and open/close applications. The Type 604/605 pneumatically actuated dosing valve is...
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Briefs: Motion Control
Origami has once again inspired engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Besides aesthetic beauty, the Japanese tradition of paper-folding addresses a persistent problem faced...
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Briefs: Motion Control
The James Webb Space Telescope will be the most powerful space telescope ever built. With a 21-foot diameter, the telescope’s primary mirror is six times larger than the one used by the...
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Articles: Robotics, Automation & Control
A team of engineers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign built a new kind of crawler robot. The wheel-less design takes inspiration from two unconventional sources: origami...
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Briefs: Imaging
Fine-grained human motion tracing — the ability to trace the trajectory of a moving human hand or leg, or even the whole body — is a general capability that is useful in a wide variety of...
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Briefs: Materials
The slippery state caused by water or oil is called superlubricity — where there is basically no friction on a surface. In graphene, this superlubricity state comes from atomic orbitals that...
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Briefs: Communications
Zero-Power Radio Receiver
There are several different types of wireless radio frequency identification (RFID) tags that are truly zero-power radios. Currently, most unpowered wireless RFID tags only have a range of a few meters. There are longrange, low-powered tags that draw energy either from a battery or some other form of localized power. A...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Silicon has several qualities that have led it to become the bedrock of electronics. One is that it features a very good “native” insulator — silicon dioxide, or silicon...
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Briefs: Communications
System Integrates High-Speed Data and Wireless Power Transfer
Sources of wireless power — such as wireless cellphone charging pads — require near-physical contact with the pad, limiting the usefulness of a truly wireless power source. Recent work has extended wireless power to mid-range, which can supply power at inches to feet of separation....
Briefs: Imaging
A large-area detector without any dead space capable of handling a large dynamic range does not currently exist. Current large-area detectors have dead zones created by abutting several modules...
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Briefs: Green Design & Manufacturing
KSC Weather Data Archive
The Spaceport Weather Data Archive provides a fully searchable database of weather data gathered at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) and the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Not only can the user easily retrieve data and download it, but the user can also view graphically the weather data on a map overlay. The data are updated...
Briefs: Green Design & Manufacturing
A device has been developed that is capable of relatively lengthy unattended operations and high sampling frequency of underwater environmental data anywhere in the world. The...
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Briefs: Imaging
Moving target indication (MTI) methodologies are essential tools to detect, locate, recognize, and track the moving targets of interest in a movie or video sequence. Different MTI methodologies can be...
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Briefs: Communications
A new high-isolation RF circulator provides enhanced detection ranges (radar) and improved reception (communications) by reducing signal leakage and undesirable internal reflections between ports...
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Briefs: Imaging
WiFi signals are everywhere. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs, or drones) are expected to become a larger part of everyday life. A new methodology was developed for high-resolution,...
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Briefs: Communications
Engineers at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center have developed a machine-to-machine (M2M) network navigation protocol to enable spacecraft to perform autonomous navigation and positioning, even...
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Briefs: Materials
Aluminum Alloy for High-Temperature Applications
NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center originally developed a high-performance piston alloy to meet U.S. legislative restrictions on vehicular exhaust hydrocarbon emissions. NASA 398 aluminum alloy exhibits excellent tensile and fatigue strength at elevated temperatures. NASA 398 alloy also offers...
Briefs: Materials
Self-healing hydrogels rely on water to incorporate reversible bonds that can promote healing. Engineering self-healing properties in dry materials, such as rubber, has proven more challenging because rubber is made...
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Briefs: Green Design & Manufacturing
Electromagnetic Mop (EMop) for Oil Spill Cleanup
The spillage of oil into the environment is an ongoing concern. Marine oil spills draw much attention because the oil harms marine animals and floral life. Current methods to aid in cleaning up the oil include containment booms, oil skimmers, and dispersants. Chemical dispersants are a tradeoff...

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