#Sensor detects spoilage of food VTT has developed a sensor that detects ethanol in the headspace of a food package.
The sensor signal is wirelessly readable, for instance, by a mobile phone. VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd is searching for a partner so as to commercialize the sensor.
The sensor monitors ethanol emitted from the spoilage of foods into the headspace of a package.
Ethanol, in addition to carbon dioxide, was found to be the main volatile spoilage metabolite in fresh-cut fruit.
The information given by the sensor is transmitted from the package to the customer by means of a reader
This ethanol sensor can have potential in other applications, such as in alcometers. The sensor layer is part of a radio-frequency identification (RFID) tag,
and the sensor data can be read wirelessly using an RFID reader in for example, a smartphone.
The sensor transmits information about the freshness of the food in the package to the retailer or customer.
The freshness data can be stored in real time in the cloud, enabling the comparison of food quality with its previous or later condition.
A similar optical readout based on the colour change of the ethanol sensor was developed also for a smartphone.
The sensor and the RFID tag can be manufactured using printing techniques into a label or sticker and be attached easily to a food package.
The price of the sensor will then be low enough for use in food packages.
Using the sensor, it will be possible to control the food quality throughout the distribution chain and to prevent waste caused by spoilage.
"Surgeons often use bone chips or bone powder as a sort of putty during bone reconstruction to help areas of bone re-grow.
The researchers took these bone chips and treated them with a green dye called TAPP (which stands for 5, 10,15, 20-tetrakis-(4-aminophenyl)- porphyrin).
The platform is a disposable flexible polyester chip with implanted electrodes. HIV-1 antibodies are added to whole blood
When added to the flexible chip the aggregates change the electrical conductivity of the chip, which gives a simple electrical readout indicating that the sample contains HIV-1.
In addition to detecting early stage infection, the electrical readout is much simpler and less expensive than current assays.
which enable vision by stimulating surviving cells with an array of electrodes placed on the retina,
which each electrode produces a visible dot in space. Together, that collection of dots is intended to demonstrate what someone with restored vision will see.
paving the way for high-density storage to move from hard disks onto integrated circuits. The advance, to be reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
"However, the physics needed to create long-term storage are not compatible with integrated circuits.""Creating and switching polarity in magnets without an external magnetic field has been a key focus in the field of spintronics.
which is why magnets have not yet been integrated onto computer chips. Instead, there are separate systems for long-term magnetic memory.
or RAM, on the integrated circuits of the central processing unit, or CPU, where calculations and logic operations are performed.
Packing a sufficient number of nanomagnets onto a chip meant aligning them perpendicularly, but that vertical orientation negated the switching effects of tantalum."
For the first time, the researchers were able to show that this mechanical system can be used to coherently manipulate an electron spin embedded in the resonator--without external antennas or complex microelectronic structures.
It is conceivable that this diamond resonator could be applied to sensors--potentially in a highly sensitive way
#'Yolks'and'shells'improve rechargeable batteries One big problem faced by electrodes in rechargeable batteries, as they go through repeated cycles of charging
creating an electrode made of nanoparticles with a solid shell, and a"yolk"inside that can change size again and again without affecting the shell.
which use aluminum as the key material for the lithium-ion battery's negative electrode,
As a result, previous attempts to develop an aluminum electrode for lithium-ion batteries had failed.
"Li says,"that separates the aluminum from the liquid electrolyte"between the battery's two electrodes.
but the inside of the electrode remains clean with no buildup of the SEIS, proving the shell fully encloses the aluminum
The result is an electrode that gives more than three times the capacity of graphite (1. 2 Ah/g) at a normal charging rate
The superior performance of the new UED system is due to a very stable"electron gun"originally developed for SLAC's X-ray laser Linac Coherent light Source (LCLS), a DOE Office of Science User Facility.
The scattered waves then combine to form a so-called diffraction pattern picked up by a detector.
"LCLS expertise in electron gun technology and ultrafast laser systems gives our system the performance and stability needed to study much faster processes."
"For instance, the researchers studied a single atomic layer of a material that is interesting for future electronic devices."
The overwhelming majority of microchips that exist in electronics now are made from silicon, and they work extremely well.
However, as devices get smaller there is an increasing demand to shrink the size of the logic chips that make those devices work.
As the chips approach single or several atom thickness, (commonly referred to as 2-dimensional),
metal electrodes can be applied to it directly, saving any additional work of finding a way to attach metal leads.
The dual-phase Mote2 transistor looks promising for use in new electronic devices as demand for components increases for materials that are small, light and extremely energy efficient e
color light--have moved from the research lab into commercial products like high-end TVS, e readers, laptops,
including recording/stimulation electrodes, glass pipettes, and optogenetic fibers.""He added:""This has the potential to reduce invasiveness drastically
such as Microsoft's Kinect controller for video games, have become widely used 3-D sensors. Now, a new imaging technology invented by Carnegie mellon University and the University of Toronto addresses a major shortcoming of these cameras:
This is all done by the sensor.""One prototype based on this model synchronizes a laser projector with a common rolling-shutter camera-the type of camera used in most smartphones
noting that a robot's sensors expend a relatively large amount of energy because they are always on."
"Think about the thermostat in your house that controls temperature. If you want to make your house hotter,
"Our device works by loading a few microliters of a patient's urine sample into a tiny chip,
Quantum logic gates are the basic building blocks of a quantum computer, but constructing enough of them to perform a useful computation is difficult.
This means that two quantum logic gates A and B can be applied in both orders at the same time.
which the two quantum logic gates were applied to single photons in both orders. The results of their experiment confirm that it is impossible to determine which gate acted first
a technology applied to create electronic devices on a roll of flexible plastics or metal foils.
which are detected via sensors in their antennae. Now researchers reporting August 13 in Cell Reports have discovered that
not only sensitively by specialized antennal sensors, but almost all of the hydrocarbon components are detected, "said Anandasankar Ray of the University of California, Riverside."
#New optical chip lights up the race for quantum computer The microprocessor inside a computer is a single multipurpose chip that has revolutionized people's life,
Now, researchers from the University of Bristol in the UK and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) in Japan, have pulled off the same feat for light in the quantum world by developing an optical chip that can process photons in an infinite number
"A whole field of research has essentially been put onto a single optical chip that is easily controlled.
"The team demonstrated the chip's unique capabilities by reprogramming it to rapidly perform a number of different experiments, each
it took seconds to re-programme the chip, and milliseconds for the chip to switch to the new experiment.
We carried out a year's worth of experiments in a matter of hours. What we're really excited about is using these chips to discover new science that we haven't even thought of yet."
"The device was made possible because the world's leading quantum photonics group teamed up with Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT), the world's leading telecommunications company.
"We see possible applications in thermoelectrics, batteries, catalysis, solar cells, electronic devices, structural composites and many other fields, enabling a new level of engineering on the atomic scale
#Sensor mimics bats to detect dangerous structural cracks An ultrasound sensor for detecting dangerous cracks in structures such as aircraft engines,
they act as an amplifier for a slight increase in calcium concentration, triggering a gunshot-like release of neurotransmitters from one neuron to another.
discovered synaptotagmin-1 and showed that it plays an important role as a calcium sensor and calcium-dependent trigger for neurotransmitter release."
and range from paper-based tools to expensive, sophisticated electronic devices. Our AAC device uses analogue signals in continuous form,
#Close to the point of more efficient chips More efficient chips based on plasmonics are a step closer to reality through better control of the directional excitation of plasmons in a gold grating.
This demonstration is a step toward the development of plasmonic chips, so called because they use plasmons--collective excitations of electrons in a conductor--rather than electrons to transfer
Such chips promise to be much faster and potentially more energy efficient than current electronic chips.
This could prove useful for developing ways to replace wires between chips with optical connectors,
which will greatly speed up chip-to-chip communication in integrated circuits based on plasmonics rather than electronics.
"Potentially, we hope to achieve logic gates, which underpin all processing circuits, based on electrically driven plasmons,"says Dong g
two electrodes--one photoanode and one photocathode--and a membrane. The photoanode uses sunlight to oxidize water molecules,
and many toothpastes and sunscreens--onto the electrodes could prevent them from corroding while still allowing light
and more secure way to communicate information between wearable electronic devices, providing an improved alternative to existing wireless communication systems,
An application of this technology would be a wireless sensor network for full-body health monitoring."
Mercier also serves as the co-director of the UC San diego Center for Wearable Sensors.
which uses the body as a vehicle to deliver magnetic energy between electronic devices. An advantage of this system is that magnetic fields are able to pass freely through biological tissues,
The wearable technology combines motion sensors and the measurement of electrical activity generated by muscles to interpret hand gestures,
notes Jafari who presented his research at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 12th Annual Body Sensor Networks Conference this past June.
Jafari's system makes use of two distinct sensors. The first is an inertial sensor that responds to motion.
Consisting of an accelerometer and gyroscope, the sensor measures the accelerations and angular velocities of the hand and arm, Jafari notes.
This sensor plays a major role in discriminating different signs by capturing the user's hand orientations and hand and arm movements during a gesture.
However, a motion sensor alone wasn't enough, Jafari explains. Certain signs in American sign language are similar in terms of the gestures required to convey the word.
With these gestures the overall movement of the hand may be the same for two different signs
Jafari's system makes use of another type of sensor that measures muscle activity. Known as an electromyographic sensor (semg), this sensor non-invasively measures the electrical potential of muscle activities,
Jafari explains. It is used to distinguish various hand and finger movements based on different muscle activities.
working in tandem with the motion sensor to provide a more accurate interpretation of the gesture being signed,
In Jafari's system both inertial sensors and electromyographic sensors are placed on the right wrist of the user where they detect gestures
"The combination of muscle activation detection with motion sensors is a new and exciting way of understanding human intent with other applications in addition to enhanced SLR systems,
The discovery could lead to dramatic improvements and addresses one of the biggest challenges in flexible electronics, an industry still in its infancy with applications such as bendable batteries, robotic skins, wearable monitoring devices and sensors,
sensors and transparent electrodes using graphene.""This is an amazing material, '"says Bart Ludbrook, first author on the PNAS paper and a former Phd researcher in Damascelli's group at UBC."
sensors and transparent electrodes using graphene.""This is an amazing material, '"says Bart Ludbrook, first author on the PNAS paper and a former Phd researcher in Damascelli's group at UBC."
#Nano-dunes with the ion beam Many semiconductor devices in modern technology--from integrated circuits to solar cells and LEDS--are based on nanostructures.
#First realization of an electric circuit with a magnetic insulator using spin waves Researchers at the University of Groningen, Utrecht University,
the Université de Bretagne Occidentale and the FOM Foundation have found that it is possible to make an electric circuit with a magnetic insulator.
Their discovery is interesting for the development of novel, energy-efficient electronic devices, particularly integrated circuits. A device based on spin waves could theoretically operate more efficiently than ordinary electronic circuits.
The results of their research will be published online in Nature Physics on Monday 14 september. In our current electronic equipment, information is transported via the motion of electrons.
In this scheme, the charge of the electron is used to transmit a signal. In a magnetic insulator, a spin wave is used instead.
Duine from Utrecht University have succeeded to use spin waves in an electric circuit by carefully designing the device geometry.
and hence enables the spin waves to be used in an electric circuit. The spin wave circuit that the researchers built,
Multiplexers are devices that enable separate streams of data to travel through a single medium.
As a result, many of the components for a terahertz wireless network--including multiplexers--have not yet been developed.
The multiplexer that Mittleman and his colleagues have been working on makes use of what's known as a leaky wave antenna.
In this case the antenna is made from two metal plates placed in parallel to form a waveguide.
One of the plates has a small slit in it. As terahertz waves travel down the waveguide, some of the radiation leaks out of the slit.
"On the other end, a receiver could be tuned to accept radiation at a particular angle,
Hills and Potholes Many of these types of flexible electronic devices will rely on thin films of organic materials that catch sunlight
marking ACL for transport by the enzyme kinesin-1 to the neuron terminals. Once there
marking ACL for transport by the enzyme kinesin-1 to the neuron terminals. Once there
Analyst firm Alite Group estimates that this vulnerability is adding up to $8 billion in incurred losses per year in the U s. Solutions have been proposed--such as integrated circuit cards and mobile wallets systems.
and magnetic credit card chip. The disposable credit card information was acquired from Shopsafe by registering several disposable credit card numbers with Bank of america.
Besides its potential use in information transfer, the metamaterial might also prove useful in data storage or for sensors that measure magnetic fields.
Protein-based sensor could detect viral infection or kill cancer cells MIT biological engineers have developed a modular system of proteins that can detect a particular DNA sequence in a cell
The record peak brilliance of the light source makes it an ultrasensitive detector for the infrared molecular finger print region,
These characteristics, in combination with its coherence, make the light source a compact and ultrasensitive molecular detector.
That means the materials aren't durable enough for consumer electronics or biomedical devices.""Metallic materials often exhibit high cycle fatigue,
or organ surfaces, suggest the nanomesh"might be implanted in the body as a pacemaker electrode,
#Permanent data storage with light The first all-optical permanent on-chip memory has been developed by scientists of Karlsruhe Institute of technology (KIT) and the universities of Münster, Oxford, and Exeter.
and Exeter University have developed now the first all-optical, nonvolatile on-chip memory.""Optical bits can be written at frequencies of up to a gigahertz.
Permanent all-optical on-chip memories might considerably increase future performance of computers and reduce their energy consumption.
The achievement was made possible by advanced single-photon detectors designed and made at NIST.""Only about 1 percent of photons make it all the way through 100 km of fiber,
"We never could have done this experiment without these new detectors, which can measure this incredibly weak signal."
The teleportation method is novel in that four of NIST's photon detectors were positioned to filter out specific quantum states.
The detectors rely on superconducting nanowires made of molybdenum silicide. They can record more than 80 percent of arriving photons,
Thanks to the efficient detectors, researchers successfully teleported the desired quantum state in 83 percent of the maximum possible successful transmissions, on average.
#Highly flexible and wearable tactile sensor for robotics, electronics and healthcare applications A team of scientists from the National University of Singapore (NUS) Faculty of engineering has developed a wearable liquid-based microfluidic tactile
sensor that is small, thin, highly flexible and durable. Simple and cost-effective to produce, this novel device is very suitable for applications such as soft robotics, wearable consumer electronics, smart medical prosthetic devices,
as well as real-time healthcare monitoring. Tactile sensors are data acquisition devices that detect and measure a diversity of properties arising from physical interaction
and translate the information acquired to be analysed by an interconnected intelligent system. Conventional tactile sensors that are available today are typically rigid and in solid-state form
restricting various natural body movements when used and may also be subjected to plastic deformation and failure when pressure is exerted,
Addressing the limitations of existing tactile sensors, a team of researchers led by Professor Lim Chwee Teck from NUS'Department of Biomedical engineering achieves a significant technological breakthrough by adopting a liquid-based pressure sensing method in the design of such sensors.
Novel liquid-based pressure sensing element The newly developed microfluidic tactile sensor is fabricated on a flexible substrate like silicone rubber,
and uses non-corrosive, nontoxic 2d nanomaterial suspension in liquid form, such as graphene oxide, as the pressure sensing element to recognise force-induced changes.
From idea to market The team's invention will further advance the applications of tactile sensors
"This liquid-based microfluidic tactile sensor, which is the first of its kind, addresses an existing gap in the market.
the sensor gives a better fit when monitoring natural body movements. Its small size, durability and ease of production further differentiate this novel device from conventional tactile sensors.
With the rapid advancement of healthcare and biomedical technologies as well as consumer electronics, we are optimistic about new possibilities to commercialise our invention,
"said Prof Lim. The NUS team has filed already a patent for its creation and is also keen to explore licensing partnerships in commercial development.
and transmitted brain signals from a human to a rat, using electrodes inserted into animals'brains.
"We've demonstrated a two-qubit logic gate--the central building block of a quantum computer--and, significantly, done it in silicon.
Because we use essentially the same device technology as existing computer chips, we believe it will be much easier to manufacture a full-scale processor chip than for any of the leading designs,
which rely on more exotic technologies.""This makes the building of a quantum computer much more feasible,
--and thereby create a logic gate--using silicon. But the UNSW team--working with Professor Kohei M. Itoh of Japan's Keio University--has done just that for the first time.
"He said that a key next step for the project is to identify the right industry partners to work with to manufacture the full-scale quantum processor chip.
the development of new, lighter and stronger materials spanning consumer electronics to aircraft; and faster information searching through large databases s
#Liquid cooling moves onto the chip for denser electronics Using microfluidic passages cut directly into the backsides of production field-programmable gate array (FPGA) devices,
and more powerful integrated electronic systems that would no longer require heat sinks or cooling fans on top of the integrated circuits.
the researchers have demonstrated a monolithically-cooled chip that can operate at temperatures more than 60 percent below those of similar air-cooled chips.
The cooling comes from simple deionized water flowing through microfluidic passages that replace the massive air-cooled heat sinks normally placed on the backs of chips."
"Supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the research is believed to be the first example of liquid cooling directly on an operating high-performance CMOS chip.
Details of the research were presented on September 28 at the IEEE Custom Integrated circuits Conference in San jose,
Bakir and graduate student Thomas Sarvey removed the heat sink and heat-spreading materials from the backs of stock Altera FPGA chips.
"This may open the door to stacking multiple chips, potentially multiple FPGA chips or FPGA chips with other chips that are high in power consumption.
We are seeing a significant reduction in the temperature of these liquid-cooled chips.""The research team chose FPGAS for their test
because they provide a platform to test different circuit designs, and because FPGAS are common in many market segments,
However, the same technology could also be used to cool CPUS, GPUS and other devices such as power amplifiers,
Eliminating the heat sink could allow more compact packaging of electronic devices --but only if electrical connection issues are addressed also.
fabricated high aspect ratio copper vias through the silicon columns, reducing the capacitance of the connections that would carry signals between chips in an array."
"The moment you start thinking about stacking the chips, you need to have copper vias to connect them,
Karnik says graphene nanopores could be useful as sensors--for instance, detecting ions of mercury, potassium, or fluoride in solution.
The possibility to use arbitrary metallic electrodes significantly simplifies the fabrication and operation of such novel storage devices s
The physicists fired fast electrons into the miniature accelerator module using a type of electron gun provided by the group of CFEL Professor Dwayne Miller, Director at the Max Planck Institute for the Structure and Dynamics
including inexpensive printed electronics, intelligent packaging and disposable sensors. Developed by researchers at the University of Cambridge in collaboration with Cambridge-based technology company Novalia,
In addition to cheaper printable electronics, this technology opens up potential application areas such as smart packaging and disposable sensors,
Light goes infinitely fast with new on-chip material Electrons are so 20th century. In the 21st century, photonic devices,
will enhance or even replace the electronic devices that are ubiquitous in our lives today. But there's a step needed before optical connections can be integrated into telecommunications systems and computers:
or manipulated but this metamaterial permits you to manipulate light from one chip to another, to squeeze,
A zero-index material that fits on a chip could have exciting applications, especially in the world of quantum computing."
It can couple to silicon waveguides to interface with standard integrated photonic components and chips."
""This on-chip metamaterial opens the door to exploring the physics of zero index and its applications in integrated optics,"said Mazur r
which combines an antenna's function of receiving electromagnetic waves with a rectifier's function of outputting direct current.
The researchers also used computer modeling to design a bowtie-shaped antenna that would effectively capture the enhanced thermal emission.
Simulations predict that an antenna placed near the holey surface could capture 10,000 to 100,000 times more thermal energy than an antenna in open space.
and image sensor, cost less than $3, 000 to construct. At production levels upwards of 10,000 units,
reflectors, and USB detectors, combined with the all-plastic housing and lenses will allow for future versions of the prototype to be mass-produced d
#Internal fingerprint sensor peers inside fingertips for more surefire ID In the 1971 film Diamonds are Forever,
a main component of gummy sweets, could trick up to 80 percent of standard fingerprint sensors.
The sensors also sometimes fail to recognize legitimate prints when the finger being scanned is dirty,
"In the past years, the use of fingerprint sensors has expanded greatly beyond the field of forensics. Far from just being used for border security or passport registration,
current uses of these sensors allows access to mobile phones, computers and even gym facilities,"said Egidijus Auksorius, postdoctoral researcher, The Langevin Institute.
Despite the widespread use of commercial fingerprint sensors, problems with the devices persist, Auksorius said,
including up to 5 percent of the population having difficulties using the sensors because their fingerprints are flattened from old age
people attempting to escape identification might deliberately thwart the sensors by rubbing out their fingerprints,
to develop a new"internal fingerprint"sensor. Most optical fingerprint sensors today produce images by reflecting light from areas where the skin does not come in contact with a glass plate, a technique that captures details from only the very top layer of skin.
In contrast Auksorius and Boccara's device images the"internal fingerprints, "which have the same pattern as external fingerprints,
The new sensor uses a special variant of an imaging technology called optical coherence tomography (OCT). OCT is used already for medical imaging
While the price is still significantly higher than standard fingerprint sensors, Auksorius predicts that the new device could find a market dedicated to imaging problematic fingerprints
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