Features

Naval Research Laboratory

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) began operations in 1923 as the United States Navy's first modern research institution, and it continues today as one of the Navy's premier R&D resources. NRL's early 20th...

2017 Create the Future Design Contest: Medical Category Winner

Arterial Everter Jeffrey Plott, Adeyiza Momoh, Ian Sando, Brendan McCracken, Mohammed Tiba, Kevin Ward, Jeffrey Kozlow, and Paul Cederna University of Michigan Ann Arbor,...

New Products

High-Energy UV lamp McPherson, Inc. (Chelmsford, MA) introduces the flow-controlled windowless, hollow cathode UV lamp Model 629. This broad-spectrum source emits ionized gas emission lines with little or no absorption by neutral...

CoaXPress Blazes Trail for Faster, Higher Quality Machine Vision

Introduced in 2010, CoaXPress (CXP) has become a leading standard for high-end machine vision, as well as life sciences, security, and defense applications. The CXP standard...

Line Scan Cameras

Area array and line scan cameras are each suited for unique machine vision applications. Area array cameras, for all intents and purposes, are “conventional” cameras that use sensors with two-dimensional pixel arrays. The...

Improved Surface Characterization with AFM Imaging

To shrink device size yet still tightly control performance, new technology often requires increasingly stringent surface specifications. Characterization tools, in turn, must keep pace by...

Optical Monitoring System Enables Greater Accuracy In Thin-Film Coatings

The challenges in achieving greater accuracy in optical thin-film coatings, both historically and in today's coating processes, are many and deserve our scrutiny. The...

Q&A: LBNL's Dr. Haimei Zheng Makes Metal-Organic Spongy Photocatalysts

Dr. Zheng and her team of scientists from Berkeley Lab and Nanyang Technical University in Singapore made metal-organic spongy photocatalysts that convert carbon dioxide...

Product of the Month

ANSYS, Canonsburg, PA, introduced ANSYS® Discovery Live™ simulation software that allows engineers to immediately examine the impact of their design changes. Users can pose what-if questions upfront in the design process...

Brookhaven National Laboratory

Opened in 1947 on the former site of the U.S. military's Camp Upton in New York, Brookhaven National Lab's (BNL) initial mission centered on the peaceful exploration of the atom. Particle accelerators, leading...

AUGMENTED REALITY: Beyond Gaming to Real-World Solutions

Ask a stranger off the street what Virtual Reality (VR) is or how it works, and most people will have some inclination of what the technology entails; however, ask that same person...

Connectors Link Data Networks for Orion and Industry

Spinoff is NASA's annual publication featuring successfully commercialized NASA technology. This commercialization has contributed to the development of products and services in the fields of...

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.

Simulation Helps Samsung Deliver Safer, More Efficient Lithium-Ion Battery Packs

Siemens PLM SoftwarePlano, TXwww.plm.automation.siemens.com The use of lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries has made the electric vehicle (EV) a reality, and electric...

New Products

Torque Motor ThinGap (Camarillo, CA) has developed the first member of a new motor family of high peak torque density brushless PM motors that reach over 20 Nm/Kg. The frameless LSI 105 torque motor model is 105 mm OD (4.125...

Selecting the Correct Actuator

The need for actuators has grown exponentially. Nearly everywhere you look you can see pneumatic, hydraulic, or electric actuator systems at work in an endless variety of applications. There are many stereotypes...

MOTOR DRIVES: Build or Buy

Every system design presents a unique set of specifications regarding cost, space, time-to-market, and other factors. Designers must therefore make tradeoffs to meet these requirements, such as opting for a higher...

Inch vs. Metric Ball Screws: Are You Asking the Right Questions?

Because ball screws are available in both inch and metric dimensions, designers sometimes begin the specification process by selecting a product family based on the unit of...

Nano-Motion Stages Rely on High-Precision Encoders for Accuracy and Repeatability

ALIO Industries designs and builds very high precision automation stages for nano-level manufacturing and research applications, including microlithography,...

Q&A: NASA's Dr. James Thorpe Develops Instrumentation for Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA)

Gravitational waves from colliding black holes were first observed by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) instruments...

Product of the Month

The Measuring Division of Kaman Precision Products, Middletown, CT, announced the OEM-2306 non-contact linear displacement measuring instrument using eddy current technology. The board is factory-configured for each...

Self-Powered Wireless Sensors in the Industrial Internet of Things

Sensors have a key role in industrial production. For example, they can be used for quality and process monitoring or condition-based maintenance. The range of applications is...

Surgeons Can Feel a Robot's Grip

Thanks to advances in biomedical engineering, the use of robotic systems in surgery has become increasingly common. A clear challenge in robotic surgery, however, is the lack of haptic technology — there have...

Networking the IoT with IEEE 802.15.4/6LoWPAN

The Industrial Internet of Things is predicated on large-scale, distributed sensor/control networks that can run unattended for months to years with very low power consumption. The characteristic...

Linear Encoders Enable More Accurate Observation of the Sun

HEIDENHAIN CorporationSchaumburg, IL www.heidenhain.com Scientists know surprisingly little about what happens on the Sun. Solar researchers want to change this with the new Daniel K....

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.

DIGITALIZATION: The New Critical Success Factor

The terms Industry 4.0, Big Data, the Internet of Things, and the Digital Factory are being pitched around like a rugby ball, and almost always with a decided lack of clear definition. Let’s...

Carbon Nanotube Resin Shores Up Boats and Bikes

Spinoff is NASA’s annual publication featuring successfully commercialized NASA technology. This commercialization has contributed to the development of products and services in the fields of...

National Institutes of Health

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) traces its roots to 1887, when a one-room laboratory was created within the Marine Hospital Service (MHS), the predecessor agency to the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS). An...