Stories
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Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition
Prescription drugs have enabled millions of Americans with chronic medical conditions to live longer and more fulfilling lives, but many promising new drugs never make it to the...
Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
Automated Fiber Placement (AFP) machines can be susceptible to tow-tape defects such as gaps and overlaps. These can reduce strength between 7% and 32%....
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Radiology workers are regularly exposed to low doses of radiation when they obtain patient imagery such as X-rays. While protective gear largely keeps workers within a safe range of...
Products: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Motor/Drive/Controller
Advanced Micro Controls (Terryville, CT) offers a size 17 PLC-based SMD Series integrated stepper motor/drive/controller system. The integrated solutions are suited for new machinery, retrofits, and rapid...
Articles: Electronics & Computers
As Industry 4.0 initiatives bring more and more industrial axes of motion into the realm of automation, the need for cost-effective control across them grows as well. Advances in robotics,...
Facility Focus: Test & Measurement
Ames Laboratory is a government-owned, contractor-operated national laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), operated by and located on the campus of Iowa State University in Ames, IA. For more than 70...
Briefs: Energy
Ionization-Based Multidirectional Flow Sensor
One significant area of research in fuel cell technology includes systems in which a fuel cell is combined with another power generation device (a turbine, for example) to create a hybrid system that combines the advantages of the two standalone systems, resulting in a high fuel-to-electricity...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Real-Time Ion Mobility Sensor System
A real-time ion mobility sensor developed to detect contaminants and explosives is reliable, sensitive, robust, and inexpensive. The technology improves sensitivity and reduces false alarms for threat agents, and can identify chemicals with a sensitivity of five parts per billion.
Articles: Software
The 2018 Nominees Are:
Each December, we ask our readers to cast their votes in the annual Tech Briefs’ Readers’ Choice Product of the Year Awards. Each month, our editors choose a Product of the Month that...
Briefs: Robotics, Automation & Control
The Inductive Non-Contact Position Sensor is a highly accurate sensor for motion control applications. The sensor was designed to monitor the precise movements of an optical inspection system that measured...
Briefs: Sensors/Data Acquisition
The detection and localization of gas releases, such as methane from leaking natural gas pipelines or nitrogen oxides from failing electrical equipment, require high sensitivity to the target gas and insensitivity to...
Briefs: Photonics/Optics
Active Pointing Monitor for a 2-Axis Optical Control System
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center has developed a pointing measurement detection and control system that monitors the real-time optical axis motions (such as tip and tilt) that affect image quality in aerial platforms. To date, there is no known real-time optical image alignment and control...
Briefs: Nanotechnology
It is relatively easy to measure small movements of large objects, but is much more difficult when the moving parts are on the scale of nanometers, or billionths of a meter. The ability to accurately...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
Spectrometers are widely used for applications such as chemical analysis, remote sensing, quality control, environmental monitoring, spaceborne measurements, and optical measurements. Most spectrometers are...
Products: Sensors/Data Acquisition
Yokogawa Corporation of America, Newnan, GA, released the WT5000 power analyzer that achieves accuracy of ±0.03% at 50/60 Hz, allowing precision evaluation of power consumption, loss, and efficiency of electrical and...
Technology Leaders: Manufacturing & Prototyping
The engineering and manufacturing world is rapidly changing — are you changing with it? The claim of “reinventing” the fundamental tools of an industry is a bold one, but...
Blog: Test & Measurement
InSight project manager Tom Hoffman spoke with Tech Briefs about the importance of digging deep in our knowledge of Mars.
Question of the Week: Mechanical & Fluid Systems
Can ‘The Ocean Cleanup’ Clean Up the Ocean?
The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit effort begun by Dutch inventor Boyan Slat, wants to clean up 50% of “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch” in five years, with the aim of a 90% reduction by 2040.
Using a 600-meter long floater, or collection platform, called System 001, the Cleanup technology acts a...
Articles: Energy
Internet of Things (IoT) applications — whether for city infrastructures, factories, or wearable devices — use large arrays of sensors collecting data for transmission over the Internet to a central,...
Articles: Materials
In order to make ultrafast pulses accessible to the broadest possible field of applications, Coherent has been implementing a comprehensive program of design methodologies, materials...
Articles: Sensors/Data Acquisition
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.
Briefs: Test & Measurement
An advanced, highly compact thermal camera that traces its heritage to one now flying on NASA's Landsat 8 has been mounted in a corner of NASA's next...
Blog: Imaging
Rivers Ingersoll spoke with Tech Briefs about why it is so important to have an up-close understanding of the hummingbird and nectar bat.
Question of the Week: Test & Measurement
Are You Currently Using Mechanical Test Equipment to Measure Strain?
One way to measure strain and deformation in a material is through digital image correlation and non-contact sensors. Next week, in a live webinar presentation, speakers from Trilion Quality Systems and MTS Systems Corp. will review how customers have used their imaging and...
Products: Materials
Multi-Voltage Motors
Simotics SD Pro low-voltage motors from Siemens (Munich, Germany) are suited for mains-fed operation or with a converter for voltages up to 690 volts. There is generally no need to use special filters at the...
Articles: Materials
NASA at 60: Celebrating Success
Over the past 60 years, NASA scientists and engineers have developed many advanced technologies and processes. But NASA has also partnered with industry, using commercially available products to complete its missions. Here, some of those companies join NASA in celebrating these collaborative successes.
Articles: Imaging
The benefits of NASA's space exploration efforts are not limited to the cosmos. NASA technologies provide innovative solutions for people around the world. NASA missions have generated thousands of spinoffs —...
Briefs: Defense
Power Line Detection System for Unmanned Aircraft Systems
Electrical power lines pose a serious crash hazard to helicopters and other air-based vehicles, especially small aerial vehicles such as unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). This is because power lines are so widespread, hard to see, and strung at roughly the same height above the ground at...
Briefs: Test & Measurement
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center is offering opportunities for its new fiber optic mass flow sensor system. Capable of measuring multi-phase flows in a pipe, the technology is minimally invasive,...
Top Stories
Blog: Manufacturing & Prototyping
2025 Holiday Gift Guide for Engineers: Tech, Tools, and Gadgets
Blog: Power
Using Street Lamps as EV Chargers
INSIDER: Semiconductors & ICs
Scientists Create Superconducting Semiconductor Material
Blog: Materials
This Paint Can Cool Buildings Without Energy Input
Blog: Software
Quiz: Power
Webcasts
Upcoming Webinars: AR/AI
The Real Impact of AR and AI in the Industrial Equipment Industry
Upcoming Webinars: Motion Control
Next-Generation Linear and Rotary Stages: When Ultra Precision...
Podcasts: Manufacturing & Prototyping
SAE Automotive Engineering Podcast: Additive Manufacturing
Podcasts: Defense
A New Approach to Manufacturing Machine Connectivity for the Air Force
On-Demand Webinars: Manufacturing & Prototyping
Streamlining Manufacturing with Integrated Digital Planning and Simulation

