Electronics & Software

Here are innovative solutions for your biggest challenges in Electronics and Software - Power Supplies and Management, Board-Level Electronics, Components and Batteries. You’ll find applications essential to military, aviation, medical and automotive design engineering.

Stories

5 Ws: Wearables

5 Ws of Puncture-Proof Soft Electronics

The durable soft electronics could be used in wearable electronics and soft robotics and could someday be part of a stretchable smartphone.

Briefs: Energy

Fuel Cell Boosts Electric-Powered Vehicles

This fuel cell could power a variety of transportation modes such as unmanned underwater vehicles, drones, and eventually electric aircraft.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Programmable Fiber Provides Power and Transmits Data

Designed for soldier uniforms, the fiber can sense, store, analyze, and infer activity when sewn into a piece of clothing.

Briefs: Wearables

Chemistry Approach for More Robust Soft Electronics

The approach could lead to more flexible health monitors, wearable devices, sensors, optical communication systems, and soft robotics.

Briefs: Nanotechnology

Fiber-Metal Laminate Manufacturing Technique

Synthesis of fiber-metal laminates is performed using RF plasma spray deposition.

Briefs: Materials

Origami Solves Challenge of Storing and Moving Rocket Fuel

A folded plastic bladder could store and pump the fuel.

Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition

Atom-Based Radio Communications

An atom-based sensor can determine the direction of an incoming radio signal.

UpFront: Communications

UpFront: September 2021 Tech Briefs

NASA Washing Machine Designs Go for a Spin Right now, there is no laundry service in space. Astronaut garments aren’t washed. They are put onto ships that burn up in the atmosphere. At NASA Glenn,...

Briefs: RF & Microwave Electronics

Multiplexed Optical Antennas

These antennas dramatically increase the amount of information that can be simultaneously transmitted by a coherent light source.

Products: Test & Measurement

New on the Market: September 2021

Power distribution units, pressure sensors, connector straps, and more.

Briefs: Photonics/Optics

Centimeter-Long Snail Robot Powered with Light

The soft robot harvests energy from a laser beam and can crawl on horizontal surfaces and climb vertical walls and an upside-down glass ceiling.

Briefs: Communications

Conformal, Lightweight, Aerogel-Based Antenna

The flexible antenna was designed for active aeronautical satellite communications.

Briefs: Wearables

Wearable Sensor Helps ALS Patients Communicate

A skin-like device can measure small facial movements in patients who have lost the ability to speak.

Facility Focus: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Facility Focus: The Pennsylvania State University School of Engineering

Learn about the batteries, skin sensors, flexible antennas, and other cutting-edge research coming from Penn State Engineering.

Briefs: Aerospace

Service Valve for In-Orbit Cooperative Satellite Fueling

The valve enables telerobotic resupplying of media such as propellant and pressurant.

Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control

Human Reflexes Keep Two-Legged Robot Upright

The robot can walk, run, jump, and interact with the environment in synchrony with a human operator.

Q&A: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Q&A: Flexible, Printable, Tunable Microwave Resonator Arrays

Fiorenzo Omenetto, Frank C. Doble Professor of Engineering at Tufts University School of Engineering, Dean of Research, and Director of the Tufts Silklab led a team that has produced...

Articles: Data Acquisition

Executive Roundtable: Cloud Software

Tech Briefs asked 5 execs: What should a user consider before moving to the cloud?

Briefs: Materials

Cladding and Freeform Deposition for Coolant Channel Closeout

This method is a faster way to manufacture combustion chambers and nozzles for aerospace propulsion as well as heat exchangers in oil and gas applications.