INSIDER

Magnetic Chips Could Increase Computing’s Energy Efficiency

In a breakthrough for energy-efficient computing, UC Berkeley engineers have shown for the first time that magnetic chips can actually operate at the lowest fundamental energy...

2D Electronic Devices Could Replace Silicon

Two-dimensional electronic devices could inch closer to their ultimate promise of low power, high efficiency and mechanical flexibility with a processing technique developed at the Department of...

Researchers Store Digital Data in DNA

Researchers from the University of Washington and Microsoft have stored digital images in DNA. The team of computer scientists and electrical engineers has detailed one of the first complete systems to...

Smartwatches Can Now Track Your Finger in Mid-Air using sonar

As mobile and wearable devices such as smartwatches grow smaller, it gets tougher for people to interact with screens the size of a matchbook. That could change with a new sonar...

NASA Measures Raindrop Sizes from Space

For the first time, scientists have three-dimensional snapshots of raindrops and snowflakes around the world, thanks to the joint NASA and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency Global Precipitation...

New Flow Battery Offers Lower-Cost Energy Storage

A new flow battery technology is projected to cost 60 percent less than today's standard flow batteries. The lower cost is due to the battery's active materials being inexpensive organic...

New Ways to Construct Contactless Magnetic Gears

Magnetic gears transmit rotary motion like mechanical gears but instead of teeth they use magnetic attraction and repulsion between rotating magnets. Magnetic gears have several advantages...

Wall-Climbing Drone Flies and Sticks to Target

Researchers have developed the CAROS (Climbing Aerial RObot System) wall-climbing robot with higher mobility than existing wall-climbing robots because it can fly. It also can restore its pose...

Researchers Turn Carbon Dioxide into Concrete

A new system developed by UCLA researchers captures carbon from smokestacks and processes the C02 into a new building material that could replace concrete. The tiny cones of the "CO2NCRETE" material...

Graphene-Based Device Improves Water Filtering

According to the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report, lack of access to safe, clean water is the biggest risk to society over the coming decade. A new graphene-based filter built by Monash...

Microfluidics is Key to Mass-Producing Nanomaterials

Nanoparticles can be found in everything from drug-delivery formulations to high-definition televisions. They’re also expensive and a pain to make. Researchers at USC have created a new...

NASA Satellite Marks First Space Use of 3D-Printed Part

NASA’s Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) will carry an electrostatically dissipative Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM), or “strand-based,” 3D printed part made of...

Manufacturing Optical Chips with Multiple Purposes

Researchers are at the forefront of a revolution in microwave photonics, developing the first all-purpose programmable optical chips. Optical chips or processors are used in everything from...

Researchers Create Super-Thin Lens

Scientists at Australian National University have created a lens that measures one two-thousandth the thickness of human hair. The technology will support the development of flexible computer displays and...

Light-Up Skin Stretches Robotic Boundaries

Cornell University researchers have developed an electroluminescent skin capable of stretching to nearly six times its original size while still emitting light.

Self-Test Kit Warns Soldiers of Biological Exposure

The U.S. Army’s newly developed biological self-test kit can quickly identify the presence of a pathogen of concern such as ricin, anthrax, or plague, and automatically send the result to...

NASA Tests Life-Detection Drill in Earth’s Driest Place

The Atacama Rover Astrobiology Drilling Studies (ARADS) project completed its first deployment after one month of field work in the hyper-arid core of the Atacama Desert in Chile, the...

App Turns Smartphones into Earthquake Detection Network

UC Berkeley scientists released a free Android app that taps a smartphone’s ability to record ground shaking from an earthquake, with the goal of creating a worldwide seismic detection...

Ultra-Thin Solar Cells Rest on a Soap Bubble

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have demonstrated a solar cell so light and thin that it can rest atop a soap bubble.Though it may take years before the device is...

Stable "Superoxide" Opens the Door to a New Class of Batteries

While lithium-ion batteries have transformed our everyday lives, researchers are currently trying to find new chemistries that could offer even better energy possibilities. One of...

Iron Studded BNNTs Could Replace Semiconductors in Wearable Tech

The road to more versatile wearable technology is dotted with iron. Specifically, quantum dots of iron arranged on boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs). The new material is the subject...

Researchers Charge Up ‘Water Batteries’

Researchers from TU Graz and the Wetsus research center in The Netherlands have produced electrically charged water by means of a floating water bridge. The electric charge of the "water battery" can...

Neural Network Chip Can Perform Powerful Artificial-Intelligence Tasks

In recent years, some of the most exciting advances in artificial intelligence have come courtesy of convolutional neural networks, large virtual networks of simple...

Help NASA Improve Robonaut's Vision

To improve a robot's ability to "see", the fix is in the code.

Micrchip Enables Palm-Sized Radar Camera

Scientists at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have developed a chip that allows new radar cameras to fit into the palm of your hand.

High-Precision Robot Installs Webb Telescope Mirrors

The James Webb Space Telescope team is installing telescope mirror segments using a high-precision robotic arm. To precisely install the segments, the robotic arm can move in six...

Soft Electronics Change the Way Robot Fingers Move

A new soft robotic gripper made out of rubber and stretchable electrodes can bend and pick up delicate objects like eggs and paper. It uses electroadhesion – flexible electrode flaps that act...

Algorithm Analyzes Vibrations to Monitor Machinery Health

An artificial intelligence algorithm was developed that greatly increases accuracy in diagnosing the health of complex mechanical systems. Typical vibration analysis searches for...

Robotic Drones to 'Print' Emergency Shelters

Researchers from the University of Bath, Imperial College, and University College London have developed robotic drones designed to "print" emergency shelters. The flying robots will autonomously...