Hasta La Gadget!

Harvard researchers have married a smartphone to a metal detector to create PETALS, a low cost way to improve mine detection in third-world countries. Traditionally, locating land mines has required a carefully trained ear to distinguish deadly explosives from, say, a can. This new system removes some of the guesswork by mapping the beeps on a cell phone screen, creating a silhouette of whatever is beneath the surface. Similar results have been accomplished using acoustic sensors, but so far they’ve been relegated to research projects and would likely be too expensive for use where they’re needed most. Not only should the simplicity of PETALS (which stands for Pattern Enhancement Tool for Assisting Land mine Sensing) make it cheap and easy to deploy but, in tests novice de-miners were able to improve their performance by 80 percent — that’s a least a few less brave humanitarians going “boom” in the field.

Metal detectors and smartphones make beautiful, mine-sniffing music together originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 05 May 2011 21:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Going green is de rigeur, so the sun is becoming a much-preferred source of power. However, solar cells’ inefficient harvesting of heliacal energies is a major reason they haven’t usurped the power of petroleum. Good thing the big brains at Oak Ridge National Laboratory are looking to change that with nanocone-based solar technology. The teeny-tiny cones are made of zinc oxide and create “an intrinsic electric field distribution” to improve electrical charge transport within solar cells. We aren’t sure what that means, but we do know the prickly-looking design provides a 3.2 percent light-to-power conversion efficiency that’s a substantial improvement over the meager 1.8 percent offered by today’s flat photovoltaics made of similar materials. That’s 80 percent more efficient, and 100 percent more awesome.

Nanocones make solar cells more efficient, sinister looking originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 May 2011 05:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Some would say that Tim Samaras is nuts. Why’s that? Because in 2003, Tim placed a couple cameras and three probes in front of an oncoming F4 tornado that was 100 yards away and blasting 200-mile-per-hour winds. And he did it all for science. More »

We’ve seen our fair share of prosthetic arms and computer interfaces operated with little more than the firing of a synapse, but legs? They’re a different story: balancing and propelling a sack of (mostly) flesh and bone is a much more complicated task than simply picking up a sandwich. Thankfully, the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago’s Center for Bionic Medicine is now one step closer to thought-controlled lower-limb prosthetics. As pictured here, the researchers’ early simulations showed that amputees could control a virtual knee and ankle with 91-percent accuracy, by way of pattern recognition software to interpret electrical signals delivered through nine different muscles in the thigh — patients think about moving, thus lighting up the nerves in varying patterns to indicate different motions. The ultimate goal is to hook up bionic legs through the same way, which would offer a greater range of motion than existing prosthetics, making tasks like walking up and down stairs safer. Now all we need is a quadruple amputee willing to pick up a badge and slap on an eye-tracking microdisplay.

Continue reading Researchers take one step closer to neural-controlled bionic legs for safer mobility

Researchers take one step closer to neural-controlled bionic legs for safer mobility originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Apr 2011 10:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Back in 2007, we told you about Restoration Robotics, an upstart research team using robots to perform hair transplants — a project whose details (you know, like how it works) were shrouded in secrecy. Four years later, the Artas System has won FDA approval for in-office procedures, with the inviting bot in the above photo harvesting individual hair follicles from the scalp. A few months after this robot operates on your cranium, hair will start growing back, a process that could take a year — and makes for a more gradual transformation than slapping on a toupee. Still, you’ll have to be a certain kind of man to take advantage of this technology — for now at least, it’s only been cleared for men with black or brown straight hair. Looks like the rest of you will have to find other, lower-tech ways to suffer for your beauty.

Continue reading Hair transplant robot gets FDA approval, men with straight brown hair rejoice

Hair transplant robot gets FDA approval, men with straight brown hair rejoice originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 21 Apr 2011 14:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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