Stories
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Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping
NASA Marshall Space Flight Center has developed a numerically controlled grinding tool that eliminates undesirable periodic variations in surface contours in optical and other surfaces — such as mid-spatial...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Liquid metal printing is integral to the flexible electronics field. Additive manufacturing enables fast fabrication of intricate designs and circuitry. The field features a...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
An increase in computing performance has been achieved by squeezing ever more transistors into a tighter space on microchips. This downsizing has also meant packing the wiring within...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
NASA Ames Research Center has developed an innovative built-in temperature sensing method for micro-heaters. The temperature sensing of chip-based microheaters is conventionally done with the...
Blog: Sensors/Data Acquisition
Researchers at Purdue University and the University of Virginia have designed peelable electronic films that can be cut and pasted onto any object, offering new sensing capabilities to...
INSIDER: Photonics/Optics
Northern Arizona University assistant professor Ryan Behunin collaborated with a team of physicists from Yale and the University of Texas at Austin in discovering an innovative way...
Application Briefs: Materials
The demand for innovative solutions to enhance the safety of military personnel is continually on the rise. This includes the need to improve the performance of military vehicles and aircraft, in terms of both safety...
Articles: Electronics & Computers
The term “smart camera” has been used for decades, but there has been little agreement on the actual definition. This article will use the term “smart” as the Merriam Webster dictionary defines it: the...
Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition
A temperature sensor was developed that runs on 113 picowatts of power — about 10 billion times smaller than a Watt. The technology could enable devices that can be powered by harvesting energy from...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
The wetting behavior of a liquid on a solid surface is a phenomenon of significant practical importance. The angle of liquid-to-solid contact is important in areas such as adhesion,...
Q&A: Electronics & Computers
Plastics are excellent thermal insulators — a quality that can be an advantage in some applications. But this property is less desirable in products such as plastic...
Blog: Energy
Professor Jaana Vapaavuori spoke with Tech Briefs about the manufacturing methods that could someday decrease the cost and increase the lifetime of flexible solar cells.
Products: Sensors/Data Acquisition
Laser Sensors
The optoNCDT 1750 laser sensors from Micro-Epsilon, Raleigh, NC, feature measuring ranges of 500 and 750 mm for fast, high-precision measurement tasks that require large measuring ranges. They are...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Demands for improved computer processing power have led researchers to explore both new processes and other materials beyond silicon to produce electronic components....
Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
Actuators are used in a wide variety of electromechanical systems and in robotics, in applications such as steerable catheters, aircraft wings that adapt to changing conditions, and wind turbines...
Briefs: Electronics & Computers
Power electronics used for routing, control, and conversion of electrical power traditionally utilize silicon semiconductors. These systems tend to be bulky, require active cooling, and are inadequate for...
Briefs: Materials
NASA Langley Research Center has developed a simple mechanism for the clean cutting of high-strength and high-toughness carbon nanotube/poly-mer fiber composites on demand without high blade wear or replacement...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
For several decades, improvements in conventional transistor materials have been sufficient to sustain Moore’s Law — the historical pattern of microchip manufacturers...
Blog: Semiconductors & ICs
A new microchip allows sensor nodes to run uninterruptedly, even when the battery runs out.
Products: Energy
Assembly Pins
JW Winco, New Berlin, WI, offers GN 2342 RoHS-compliant stainless steel assembly pins with three washer types available that place the bolt in an axial position in its insertion direction. The washer...
Facility Focus: Photonics/Optics
This year, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) marks 75 years as a research institution. Located in Oak Ridge, TN, ORNL is the largest US Department of Energy science and energy laboratory, conducting basic and...
Articles: Electronics & Computers
The need to measure laser output characteristics, including average power, pulse energy, and pulse shape, is a common requirement across many industrial and research applications. However,...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Freeform Fabrication Using Electrically Conductive Filaments
The use of multifunctional composites such as mechanically reinforced, electrically and thermally conductive parts is of interest in a range of application areas. Especially interesting and important is where tailorability of function is achieved by strategic placement of materials with...
Briefs: Energy
Fabric Converts Kinetic Energy into Electric Power
A fabric was developed that converts kinetic energy into electric power. The greater the load applied to the textile and the wetter it becomes, the more electricity it generates. The woven fabric generates electricity when it is stretched or exposed to pressure. The fabric can currently generate...
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Novel Radiation Shielding Material for Dramatically Extending the Orbit Life of CubeSats
NASA Langley Research Center has developed an innovative radiation shield made by layering metal materials in the Z-shielding method. It is a new, low-cost, and easy-to-implement method to protect CubeSat electronic circuits from ionizing radiation found in low...
Briefs: Propulsion
New Methods in Preparing and Purifying Nanomaterials
Innovators at NASA’s Glenn Research Center have made several breakthroughs in treating hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) nanomaterials, improving their properties to supplant carbon nanotubes in many applications. These inventors have greatly enhanced the processes of intercalation and exfoliation....
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Surface-Field-Enhanced Detection of Deep UV Photons in Silicon Carbide Avalanche Photodetectors
While silicon carbide (SiC) is an ideal material for building ultraviolet (UV) photodetectors, the absorbed photons get recombined in the first few nanometers at the surface due to a large absorption coefficient in the 200- to 250-nm wavelength band....
Briefs: Semiconductors & ICs
Technique Measures Temperature of 2D Materials at the Atomic Level
Newly developed two-dimensional (2D) materials such as graphene — which consists of a single layer of carbon atoms — have the potential to replace traditional microprocessing chips based on silicon, which have reached the limit of how small they can get. But engineers have been...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Plastic Material Works as a Heat Conductor
Plastics are excellent insulators, meaning they can efficiently trap heat — a quality that can be an advantage in something like a coffee cup sleeve. But this insulating property is less desirable in products such as plastic casings for laptops and mobile phones that overheat, in part, because the...
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Webcasts
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The Real Impact of AR and AI in the Industrial Equipment Industry
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Podcasts: Medical
How Wearables Are Enhancing Smart Drug Delivery
Podcasts: Power
SAE Automotive Podcast: Solid-State Batteries
Podcasts: Power
