Category Technology/Electronics

Can buildings learn to save all by themselves? Researchers think so. In their experiments, they fed a new self-learning heat­ing control system with temperature data from the previous year and the current weather forecast. The ‘smart’ control system was then able to assess the building’s behavior and act with good anticipation. The result: greater comfort, lower energy costs.

Factory halls, airport terminals and high-rise office buildings are often equipped with automated “anticipatory” heating systems...

North Carolina State University engineers have demonstrated a flexible device that harvests the heat energy from the human body to monitor health. The device surpasses all other flexible harvesters that use body heat as the sole energy source.

In a paper published in Applied Energy, the NC State researchers report significant enhancements to the flexible body heat harvester they first reported in 2017. The harvesters use heat energy from the human body to power wearable technologies – think of smart watches that measure your heart rate, blood oxygen, glucose and other health parameters – that never need to have their batteries recharged...

To further shrink electronic devices and to lower energy consumption, the semiconductor industry is interested in using 2D materials, but manufacturers need a quick and accurate method for detecting defects in these materials to determine if the material is suitable for device manufacture. Now a team of researchers has developed a technique to quickly and sensitively characterize defects in 2D materials.

Two-dimensional materials are atomically thin, the most well-known being graphene, a single-atom-thick layer of carbon atoms.

“People have struggled to make these 2D materials without defects,” said Mauricio Terrones, Verne M...

Scientists have developed a multiplexed meta-hologram device operating at visible light. The newly developed technique can transmit information to multiple users from different locations. This can be employed in many hologram applications such as performance, exhibitions, automobiles and more.

Hologram techniques are already used in our everyday life. A hologram sticker to prevent from counterfeiting money, Augmented Reality navigation projected in front mirror of a car to guide directions, and Virtual Reality game that allows a user to play in a virtual world with a feeling of live are just a few examples to mention...