Category Technology/Electronics

Engineers create Hybrid Chips with Processors and Memory to run AI on Battery-powered devices

A digital rendering of a computer chip illuminated
Hardware and software innovations give eight chips the illusion that they’re one mega-chip working together to run AI. | Stocksy/Javier Pardina

Transactions between processors and memory can consume 95% of the energy needed to do machine learning and AI, which severely limits battery life. A team of engineers has designed a system that can run AI tasks faster, and with less energy, by harnessing eight hybrid chips, each with its own data processor built right next to its own memory storage.

Smartwatches and other battery-powered electronics would be even smarter if they could run AI algorithms...

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A Better Pen-and-Ink system for Drawing Flexible Circuits

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A pen containing conductive ink can draw circuits on a variety of surfaces — even a loofah (seen here).
Credit: Adapted from ACS Applied Electronic Materials 2020, DOI: 10.1021/acsaelm.0c00866

Conductive ink is a great tool for printing flexible electronic circuits on surfaces. But these inks can be costly, they do not work on some materials, and devices to apply them can plug up. Now, scientists report in ACS Applied Electronic Materials that they have developed inexpensive conductive inks for clog-free ballpoint pens that can allow users to “write” circuits almost anywhere — even on human skin.

Flexible electronics are widely used in applications such as biosensors, electronic skin and energy storage...

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Breaking through the Resolution Barrier with Quantum-limited Precision

Photo (Paderborn University, Besim Mazhiqi). 

Researchers develop new method of measurement. Researchers at Paderborn University have developed a new method of distance measurement for systems such as GPS, which achieves more precise results than ever before. Using quantum physics, the team led by Leibniz Prize winner Professor Christine Silberhorn has successfully overcome the so-called resolution limit, which causes the “noise” we may see in photos, for example. Their findings have just been published in the academic journal Physical Review X Quantum (PRX Quantum).

Physicist Dr Benjamin Brecht explains the problem of the resolution limit: “In laser distance measurements a detector registers two light pulses of different intensities with a time difference...

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Supercapacitors challenge Batteries

graphene hybrid

Powerful graphene hybrid material for highly efficient supercapacitors. A team working with Roland Fischer, Professor of Inorganic and Metal-Organic Chemistry at the Technical University Munich (TUM) has developed a highly efficient supercapacitor. The basis of the energy storage device is a novel, powerful and also sustainable graphene hybrid material that has comparable performance data to currently utilized batteries.

Usually, energy storage is associated with batteries and accumulators that provide energy for electronic devices. However, in laptops, cameras, cellphones or vehicles, so-called supercapacitors are increasingly installed these days.

Unlike batteries they can quickly store large amounts of energy and put it out just as fast...

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