Cameras

Answering Your Questions: What are New Missions for Military UAVs?

An industry expert tells a Tech Briefs reader what's over the next hill regarding military UAVs.

An ‘Active’ Machine-Vision Tool Adds Intelligence to Traffic Management

A new machine-vision tool extracts and reports valuable driving data from the standard traffic cameras already in place.

Energy-Efficient ‘SlothBot’ Moves Only When It Has To

While robots like the WildCat from Boston Dynamics reach speeds of just under 20 miles an hour, engineers from Georgia Tech have gone with a decidedly slower approach.

Smart Agriculture Sensors: Helping Small Farmers and Positively Impacting Global Issues, Too

Smart agriculture, also known as precision agriculture, allows farmers to maximize yields using minimal resources such as water, fertilizer, and seeds....

Graphene-Based Technology for Wearable Health Monitoring

Graphene Flagship partner ICFO, based in Barcelona, Spain is developing graphene-based prototypes that aim to turn mobile phones into life saving devices. The first of these will allow...

Model Gives Robots a Better Feel for Object Manipulation

A new learning system improves a robot’s ability to mold materials into target shapes and make predictions about interacting with solid objects and liquids. The system, known as a...

Vision Sensors in Factory Automation

There are a number of ways to extract data from a production line. In factory automation, sensors are used in work cells to gather data for inspection or to trigger other devices. These sensors fall into...

Ingestible, Expanding Pill Monitors the Stomach for Up to a Month

An ingestible pill was developed that, upon reaching the stomach, quickly swells to the size of a soft, squishy ping-pong ball big enough to stay in the stomach for an extended...

New Products

Software for Enhanced Laser Processing Prima Power Laserdyne (Champlin, MN) released of the FASTTRIM™ CAD/CAM software for use with its multi-axis precision laser processing systems. The FASTTRIM all-in-one software enables...

Improving Vehicle Fuel Economy with ADAS

Fuel economy is a key factor in worldwide energy-consumption. One way to improve fuel economy is using driver feedback to promote efficient habits (eco-driving). Emerging research is looking into...

An Introduction to Time of Flight Imaging

Three-dimensional (3D) imaging applications are used in many different industries ranging from industrial pick and place, palletization/depalletization, warehouse, robotics, and metrology to...

Live Cell Imaging Using Holotomography

Since Robert Hooke's microscopic observations of cork cells in the 17th century, optical imaging has proven an indispensable technique in elucidating the pathophysiology of diseases. Perhaps the real...

In-Situ Characterization and Inspection of Additive Manufacturing Deposits Using Transient Infrared Thermography

Additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, is a rapidly growing field in which solid objects can be produced layer-by-layer. This...

Coating Prevents Fogging on Transparent Surfaces

Anyone who skis, wears glasses, uses a camera, or drives a car is familiar with the problem: Coming into a humid environment from the cold causes eyewear, camera lenses, or windshields to quickly...

LED Lighting Improves Efficiency and Imaging

Rocket engine testing requires a lot of light since all tests are filmed with high-speed cameras to monitor performance; however, those cameras have to adjust to the bright plume from a firing...

Novel Techniques Trick Object Detection Systems

New adversarial techniques developed by engineers at Southwest Research Institute can make objects “invisible” to image detection systems that use deep-learning algorithms. These techniques...

Detect Ultra Rare Proteins in Blood Using a Cellphone Camera

One of the frontiers of medical diagnostics is the race for more sensitive blood tests. The ability to detect extremely rare proteins could make a life-saving difference for many...

Polarization Imaging Sensor for Enhanced Scene Analysis

Along with intensity and color, polarization is a property of light that can provide useful information for scene analysis; however, the human eye and most cameras cannot detect...

Products of Tomorrow

This column presents technologies that have applications in commercial areas, possibly creating the products of tomorrow. To learn more about each technology, see the contact information provided for that innovation.

New Products

Tracking Camera The Intel® RealSense™ T265 Tracking Camera from FRAMOS (Ontario, Canada) uses inputs from dual fisheye cameras and a Bosch IMU along with its own processor on board. The Movidius MA215x ASIC provides edge...

Driverless Forklifts

Although driverless forklifts have been around for about 30 years, it's only in the last 10 or so that they've been free to maneuver anywhere around their environment. In the early days, the machines followed a current in a...

New Products

Machine Vision Cameras Vision Research (Wayne, NJ) has introduced the Phantom® S210 and S200, 2Gpx/sec (16 Gbps) machine vision cameras. The S210 reaches 1,730 frames per second (fps) at full 1.3Mpx resolution, while the S200...

Deep Learning in Machine Vision

FLIR Systems has introduced their Firefly machine vision camera with open platform deep learning inference onboard. Deep learning makes it possible to easily develop high performance solutions for difficult...

Measuring Aging, Fat and Water Content in Meat Products Using Hyperspectral Imaging

The consumable component of muscle tissue in meat is approximately 75% water, 20% protein, 5% fat, carbohydrate, and minerals. The proportions vary depending...

New on the Market: March 2019

Controller and Datalogger Watlow, St. Louis, MO, introduced a batch processing feature for the F4T temperature and process controller and D4T datalogger. The new feature helps collect manufacturing part processing...

Facility Focus: Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory

Since 1967, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) has been the United States’ premier particle physics laboratory, working on the world's most advanced particle accelerators and...

Text Tech: Navy Vessels Use Shipboard Signal Lamps for Text Messaging

Sponsored by the Office of Naval Research's (ONR) TechSolutions program, the Flashing Light to Text Converter (FLTC) features a camera that can be mounted atop a signal lamp...

New Fast, Economical Bioimaging Technique

Researchers at Rensselaer Poytechnic Institute (RPI) have developed a new approach to optical imaging that makes it possible to quickly and economically monitor multiple molecular interactions in a...