News

Applied physicists at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) have created an ultrathin, flat lens that focuses light without imparting the distortions of conventional lenses. At 60 nanometers thick, the flat lens is essentially two-dimensional, yet its focusing power...

Using smartphones' GPS and imaging capabilities, University of Missouri researchers have developed new software that determines the exact location of distant objects, as well as monitors the speed and direction of moving objects. The software could eventually allow smartphone-armed soldiers...

With a whistle and a roar, the "Mighty Eagle," a NASA robotic prototype lander, sailed to an altitude of 100 feet. During the 35-second run, the vehicle was "open loop," navigating autonomously without the command of the onboard camera and flying on a preprogrammed flight profile.Once it reached the...

PML researchers have devised a novel source of portable sunlight that may fill an urgent need in renewable energy research – namely, light sources that generate a near-perfect solar spectrum to be used in testing the performance and efficiency of photovoltaic (PV) materials.The team’s...

A smart filter with a shape-shifting surface can separate oil and water using gravity alone, an advancement that could be useful in cleaning up environmental oil spills, among other applications. The researchers created a filter coating that repels oil but attracts water, bucking conventional...

Scientists at MIT and the University of Pennsylvania are taking more than inspiration from nature — they’re taking ingredients. The group has genetically engineered muscle cells to flex in response to light, and is using the light-sensitive tissue to build highly articulated robots. This...

A multi-university research team led by North Carolina State University will be developing methods to create two-dimensional (2-D) materials capable of folding themselves into three-dimensional (3-D) objects when exposed to light. The effort, which is funded by a grant from the National...

Sandia National Laboratories wind energy researchers are re-evaluating vertical axis wind turbines (VAWTs) to help solve some of the problems of generating energy from offshore breezes. Though VAWTs have been around since the earliest days of wind energy research at Sandia and...

A significant milestone for remotely piloted aircraft was ushered in with the first student sortie in an innovative T-6 Texan II simulator. The new setup has dramatically increased the ability to train remotely piloted aircraft pilots, and the ingenuity behind the new...

Researchers at the Army Research Laboratory (ARL) are testing new technologies it created for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) that could give commercial and military maintenance programs earlier warning of problems. Condition-based maintenance, known as CBM, will get safer aircraft...

The remotely piloted X-48C aircraft successfully flew for the first time on August 7 at Edwards Air Force Base in California's Mojave Desert.

New algorithms allow an autonomous robotic plane to dodge obstacles in a subterranean parking garage, without the use of GPS. Because autonomous plane navigation in confined spaces is difficult, the MIT team is providing the plane with an accurate digital map of its environment.The plane determines...

Sandia National Laboratories has developed a cost-effective robotic hand that can be used in disarming improvised explosive devices, or IEDs. The technology is dexterous enough to mimic human capabilities.The Sandia Hand is modular, so different types of fingers can be attached with magnets and quickly...

A driver remotely steers a modified vehicle through an obstacle course from a nearby location as a researcher looks on. Occasionally, the researcher instructs the driver to keep the wheel straight — a trajectory that appears to put the vehicle on a collision course with a barrel....

A new sensor and software suite sponsored by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) recently returned from West Africa after helping partner nations track and identify target vessels of interest as part of an international maritime security operation. Researchers deployed the Rough...

Ford Motor Co. expects that by 2015, 80 percent of the cars it sells in North America will have Wi-Fi built in. Two Wi-Fi-equipped cars sitting at a stoplight could exchange information free of charge, but if they wanted to send that information to the Internet, they’d probably have to use a paid service...

Researchers at MIT, Harvard University and Seoul National University have engineered a soft autonomous robot that moves via peristalsis, crawling across surfaces by contracting segments of its body, much like an earthworm. The robot, made almost entirely of soft materials, is remarkably...

A research team at the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) has developed a software tool that enables users to perform in-depth analysis of modeling and simulation data, then visualize the results on screen. The new data analysis and visualization tool offers improved ease of use compared to...

A team of researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology has used complex computational models to design swimming micro-robots that carry cargo and navigate in response to stimuli such as light.The simple micro-swimmers could rely on volume changes in unique materials known as hydrogels to move tiny flaps that...

Researchers at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), collaborating with the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel, have now demonstrated a drastically new way of achieving negative refraction in a metamaterial.The primary advantages of the new technology...

A team of researchers at MIT has discovered a way to create wrinkled surfaces with precise sizes and patterns. This basic method, they say, could be harnessed for a wide variety of useful structures: microfluidic systems for biological research, sensing, and diagnostics; new photonic devices that can control...

A team of Harvard scientists has developed a slick way to prevent the troublesome bacterial communities from ever forming on a surface.The researchers used their recently developed technology, dubbed SLIPS (slippery-liquid-infused porous surfaces), to effectively create a hybrid surface that is smooth and slippery...