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

Articles: Wearables

Products of Tomorrow

A cryptographic ID tag, a high-reliability NASA switch, and a stretchable thermoelectric generator...

Special Reports: Design

Electronics Design & Assembly - May 2020

The latest advances in chip and board-level design and manufacturing are spotlighted in this compendium of recent articles from the editors of Tech Briefs and Aerospace & Defense Technology...

Question of the Week: Transportation

Will 'Metal-Air Scavengers' Power Vehicles and Robots?

Penn Engineering researchers have introduced a "metal-air scavenger" vehicle, which gets energy not from a battery, but from breaking chemical bonds in the aluminum surface it travels over. The technology, which works like both a battery and an energy harvester, has 13 times more energy density...

Blog: Propulsion

A Faster Way to Design Rockets: Scientific Machine Learning

To speed up the design process, researchers from the University of Texas are finding more efficient ways to predict, or "learn," a rocket's behavior.

Blog: Energy

Super-Porous Material Gives Hydrogen-Powered Vehicles a Boost

A team at Northwestern University is developing a material so porous that if you were able to unfold a gram of it, you could go farther than a football field.

Blog: Test & Measurement

'mRIXS' Offers Deeper Look into Battery Chemistry

A Berkeley Lab system provides a much more sensitive probe of the chemical state of battery electrodes, especially when the battery is operated under high capacity mode.

INSIDER: Sensors/Data Acquisition

Stretchy Electronics for Next Generation Smart Devices

A new manufacturing process could produce flexible electronics for things like virtual reality-enabled contact lenses, solar-powered skins that mold to the contours of your car, and...

INSIDER: Electronics & Computers

Atomic Chains in Nanotubes Push the Electronics Frontier

Wearable tech and electronic cloth may be the way of the future, but to get there the wiring needs to be strong, flexible, and efficient.

INSIDER: Electronics & Computers

New Etching Technique Produces Far Smaller Semiconductors

Microelectronics like semiconductor devices are at the heart of the technologies we use each day. As we move into an era where we are stretching the limits of Moore’s Law, it is...

INSIDER: Internet of Things

Ultra-Low Power Chip for IoT Wi-Fi

More portable, fully wireless smart home setups; lower power wearables; batteryless smart devices, could all be made possible with this new ultra-low power Wi-Fi radio. It is housed in a chip smaller than...

Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control

Algorithm Helps Swarming Robots Avoid Collisions

This technology could help control driverless cars and automated warehouses.

Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Square Structural Joint with Robotic Assembly Tool

Square trusses replace round for enhanced strength and robotics compatibility.

Briefs: Imaging

Multifunctional Structure Stabilizes and Rotates Satellites

This technology cancels out the vibrations of a satellite by vibrating the solar panels in the opposite direction.

Products: Imaging

Product of the Month

Rugged tablets from Teguar Corp. can be used to monitor manufacturing operations.

Articles: Lighting

Resolution, Accuracy, and Precision of Encoders

Here's what you'll need to know when you’re choosing an encoder for a motion control system.

Briefs: Manufacturing & Prototyping

Machine Learning Software for 3D Printing

Manufacturers, medical device companies, and others can use this 3D printing software driven by artificial intelligence (AI).

Facility Focus: Test & Measurement

Facility Focus: California Institute of Technology

See some of the world-changing tools and technologies launched by Caltech scientists, from earthquake monitoring to helping the blind see.

Briefs: Electronics & Computers

Streaming Software Speeds Apps

Apps could take up less space on a smartphone and apps could download instantly.

Articles: Automotive

Seeing with Sound Next-Level Ultrasonic Sensors for Intelligent Cars

Even though ultrasound has been studied by scientists for many years, its capabilities in practical applications are yet to be fully harnessed.

Briefs: Transportation

Relaxor Piezoelectric Single-Crystal Multilayer Stacks for Energy Harvesting Transducers (RPSEHT)

Applications include powering portable electronic devices and sensors, and harvesting waste mechanical energy for aircraft, automobile, and other transportation equipment.

Products: Electronics & Computers

New on the Market: April 2020

Vision-based 3D printing, network analyzers, particulate sensors, and more.

Briefs: Communications

Laser Radio Transmitter

This device transmits data via a semiconductor laser, opening the door to ultra-high-speed WiFi.

Q&A: Mechanical & Fluid Systems

Q&A: Simple Solar-Powered Desalination

Lenan Zhang and his team at MIT developed a small, economical, highly efficient device to provide fresh drinking water using only the Sun for its energy input.