http://phys.org/technology-news/hi-tech/ en-us PhysOrg Team Phys.Org provides the latest news on hi-tech, innovation and new inventions technology, computer news and information What happens when visual art comes into close contact with computer science? Stereoscopic magic. http://phys.org/news258044333.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-06-04T15:59:02-07:00 A pair of new studies by computer scientists, biologists, and cognitive psychologists at Harvard, Northwestern, Wellesley, and Tufts suggest that collaborative touch-screen games have value beyond just play. http://phys.org/news258025922.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-06-04T10:52:15-07:00 (Phys.org) -- The Flexible Display Center at Arizona State University announced that it has manufactured the world’s largest flexible color organic light emitting display (OLED) prototype using advanced mixed oxide thin film transistors (TFTs). Measuring 7.4 diagonal inches, the device was developed at the FDC in conjunction with Army Research Labs scientists. It also meets a critical target set by the U.S. Department of Defense to advance the development of full-color, full-motion video flexible OLED displays for use in thin, lightweight, bendable and highly rugged devices. http://phys.org/news258007773.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-06-04T05:49:45-07:00 (Phys.org) -- How do you determine who is doing the touching with a multi-user touch display? Microsoft Research has published a paper that presents a technique for doing so. The researchers make their attempt by fusing Kinect, mobile device inertial sensing, and multi-touch interactive displays. The technique can associate multi-touch interactions to individual users and their accelerometer-equipped mobile devices. ShakeID is the technique; it associates a specific user’s touch contacts on an interactive display to a mobile device held by the user. The phone’s on-board sensors and touch screen sensing go to work to drive the association. http://phys.org/news257925454.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-06-03T06:58:02-07:00 (Phys.org) -- A new kind of eyeglasses is now available from a British company that allows the wearer to adjust the prescription anytime, anywhere, via small thumb-dials on the sides. Called, Eyejusters, the glasses make use of a technology called a Slidelens, which very aptly describes how these glasses do their magic. Each lens is actually two lenses that have slightly different shapes; turning the thumb-dial causes one lens to move slightly left or right and that changes the focal point for the wearer. The lenses are moved until the person doing the focusing finds the sweet spot; which is exactly how users focus a pair of binoculars. http://phys.org/news257670750.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-31T08:12:47-07:00 (Phys.org) -- The well-known fact is that humans can teach robots, but the newer turn in educational circles is all about how robots can teach humans. The stepped-up robots are “animated” and "adaptive" agents that communicate effectively with humans by using subtle, human-like cues to engage their listeners. Two researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison have demonstrated that such robots can improve how much students remember from their lessons. http://phys.org/news257616358.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-30T17:06:06-07:00 (Phys.org) -- In the annals of “whatever happened to that big idea” is the 2009 announcement of road trains linking cars in a convoy, a scheme planned for Europe’s motorways. The lead vehicle would have the active driver and the rest of the cars in the convoy would be autonomously driven. Someone, possibly with a sense of humor, dubbed the undertaking as the Sartre Project, standing for Safe Road Trains for the Environment. This month comes the report that the idea has been successfully tested and is a step forward in a plan to change the way vehicles travel. http://phys.org/news257526161.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-29T16:03:07-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Ubi Interactive has developed a display system that will convert virtually any surface to a touchscreen display using a conventional projector, a Microsoft Kinect device, and proprietary software running on a Windows based computer. The company, which is currently just three guys, Anup Chathoth, David Hajizadeh and Chao Zhang, is one of eleven startups that have been given $20,000 by Microsoft to develop Kinect based applications. http://phys.org/news257412622.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-28T08:31:10-07:00 (Phys.org) -- SpotterRF has announced a special radar backpack kit designed to enhance situational awareness for soldiers on the ground. The company says its special radar is designed for warfighters as part of small expeditionary groups in austere and remote locations across the world. The company provides small and easy to use surveillance radar, the Spotter M600, for use by these soldiers. The military backpack kit announced this month is called Spotter Radar Backpack Kit (RBK). http://phys.org/news257239234.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-26T08:21:01-07:00 People incapable of reading and writing will have access to text messages from now on. A system using vocal synthesis, icons and contact management allows people to send and read text messages by those normally unable to read and write. It is already being used in Switzerland. http://phys.org/news256988185.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-23T10:36:31-07:00 (Phys.org) -- When most of us think of electronics, we think of the sturdy stability of silicon and plastic. Flexibility is a trait that belongs to the organic world, where materials come in all shapes and stiffness. However, advances in materials science and electrical engineering have paved the way for a new type of electronic device: one that can bend and fold just like a piece of paper. From flexible displays to disposable RFID tags, these new materials have enabled electronics to end up in places they never have before. They could even, thanks to Berkeley electrical engineering and computer science professor Ana Claudia Arias, end up in our own clothing. http://phys.org/news256980598.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-23T09:00:02-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Developers and end users both have been indicating they are ready to start saying long goodbyes to mouse and keyboard. In this touchscreen generation of mobile users, the big stir among gadget reviewers this week is the announcement by Leap Motion that you can not only say goodbye to mouse and keyboard, but goodbye to touchscreen, too. "That nice LED display remains clean and untouched, as it should be,” says the company. The San Francisco based company has announced it is accepting pre-orders for its new Leap, a small USB peripheral that performs motion control with in-the-air sweeps of hand and movements of fingers. The Leap creates a 3-D interaction space of eight cubic feet to interact with and control software on a laptop or desktop. This gesture-control device for computers is running rings, and orbs, and swirls, and curlicues, around Kinect, the most well known of technologies that help users interact with computers without mouse and keyboard. http://phys.org/news256964839.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-23T04:37:21-07:00 (AP) -- A London museum is putting the conductor's baton in visitors' hands, allowing guests to direct a virtual orchestra using three-dimensional motion sensors. http://phys.org/news256902642.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-22T11:00:04-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Google's September 2011 patent that was filed for a wearable display device was granted this week, which suggests that its envisioned heads-up display device can be controlled by infrared markers in the form of devices worn on the hands, such as fake fingernails or rings. The patent says, “A wearable marker may take the form of a ring, a bracelet, an artificial fingernail configured to be affixed to a fingernail, a decal configured to be affixed to a fingernail, or a glove, among other possible wearable items." http://phys.org/news256668446.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-19T17:47:39-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Electric Imp wants to revive the dream of All Things Internet with its new device launched this week. Its Imp is able to connect devices to the Internet, where you can monitor and control information from your phone, mobile computer, or any other Imp-enabled devices. The Los Altos, California, company has essentially managed to come up with a cloud-based home automation unit. The Imp looks like any standard user-installable SD card and is equipped with embedded processor and Wi-Fi capability. The card’s WiFi radio supports 802.11b/g/n, and has an integrated antenna. http://phys.org/news256490959.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-17T16:29:36-07:00 (Phys.org) -- A research team made up of members from Indiana University, Tufts and MIT and led by Erin Treacy Solovey, a has built a brain monitoring system that offloads some of the computer related activities a person is performing when multi-tasking begins causing stress. Called Brainput, the system makes use of functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) to monitor brain activity and a computer system to interpret the results and then to cause changes to tasks to reduce brain overload, i.e. when stress levels reach a certain point, the computer turns on autonomous computer activities that hopefully reduce the amount of stress the person is experiencing. http://phys.org/news256374254.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-16T08:40:01-07:00 One of two goal-line technology systems being tested for FIFA's rules body is to be used at two Danish league matches in the coming week, the world governing body said on Wednesday. http://phys.org/news256364145.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-16T05:16:16-07:00 Honda Motor today unveiled the new UNI-CUB personal mobility device. Featuring a compact design and comfortable saddle, UNI-CUB offers the same freedom of movement in all directions that a person enjoys while walking. http://phys.org/news256317281.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-15T16:16:33-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Sony has filed a patent with the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office for a glasses-free 3-D display that will adjust the picture so that the user gets an optimal view no matter how far or close to the screen. In its application, “Stereoscopic Image Processing Method and Apparatus,” Sony defined its patent intent: “A stereoscopic image processing method for a stereoscopic image pair forming a 3-D image comprises the steps of evaluating whether the distance of a user is closer or further than a preferred distance from a 3-D image display upon which the stereoscopic image pair is to be displayed, and if the evaluation indicates that the user is further than the preferred distance from the 3-D image display, adjusting the respective displacements between corresponding image elements in the stereoscopic image pair, thereby changing the stereoscopic parallax in the 3-D image.” http://phys.org/news256107831.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-13T06:04:42-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Most children at some point in their schooling are taught about the water table and many wind up being tasked with creating a model of some sort to represent how it all works. Some use clay, but many more likely use sand, as it’s far easier and faster than most anything else. Now researchers at UC Davis have taken that model to new extremes by building a sandbox system that is capable of automatically adding augmented reality real-time coloring to the sand to indicate altitude and moving water as changes are made to the terrain with a hand or small tool. http://phys.org/news255942033.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-11T08:04:30-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Today, electronic touch pads are widely found on laptops, tablets, and other computing devices. Less common uses, but gaining in popularity, are book covers and food labels. These and other low-tech applications become possible as touch pads become extremely inexpensive, with applications ranging from beer bottle labels to disposable medical device labels. Now a team of researchers from the US and France have developed paper-based electronic touch pads that cost just 25 cents per square meter, a price at which touch pads can simply be thrown away when no longer needed. http://phys.org/news255869344.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-10T11:49:20-07:00 Their very small displays sometimes make smartphones diffi cult to operate. In the future, a projector will help: if the cell phone is standing on a table, for instance, it can project a large-format display onto the table surface. The user will have the option of operating the smartphone via the projection function or from the display screen itself. http://phys.org/news255850660.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-10T06:50:01-07:00 (AP) -- Gov. Susana Martinez and a group of investors announced Tuesday that a city in the heart of southeastern New Mexico's oil and gas country will be the site of a new $1 billion scientific ghost town where researchers will be able to test everything from renewable energy innovations to intelligent traffic systems and next-generation wireless networks. http://phys.org/news255707329.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-08T14:49:05-07:00 Nevada drivers could soon be sharing the road with vehicles that don't need them. http://phys.org/news255625925.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-07T16:12:12-07:00 Critics' arguments over whether a film’s actors, screenplay, or music score are worth the price of the ticket have been overshadowed by controversy over the technology used for making the film. Comments are mixed, from lukewarm to thumbs-down. The movie-making technology in question involves a change from 24 frames per second (fps) to 48 fps. HFR (high frame rate) technology is the “future of film,” say proponents, and a controversy was set off at last month’s Las Vegas showing of director Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit. Like the famous director, James Cameron, Jackson believes that HFR films are the next important chapter in cinema. http://phys.org/news255310762.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-04T04:30:01-07:00 A doorknob that knows whether to lock or unlock based on how it is grasped, a smartphone that silences itself if the user holds a finger to her lips and a chair that adjusts room lighting based on recognizing if a user is reclining or leaning forward are among the many possible applications of Touché, a new sensing technique developed by a team at Disney Research, Pittsburgh, and Carnegie Mellon University. http://phys.org/news255313559.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-04T01:28:05-07:00 A Queen's University researcher has created a Star Trek-like human-scale 3D videoconferencing pod that allows people in different locations to video conference as if they are standing in front of each other. "Why Skype when you can talk to a life-size 3D holographic image of another person?" says professor Roel Vertegaal, director of the Human Media Lab. http://phys.org/news255272478.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-03T14:01:52-07:00 Northrop Grumman Corporation has test fired the first product in its next-generation FIRESTRIKE family of high-energy, solid-state lasers that meet goals for size and weight reduction and ruggedization for operational applications. http://phys.org/news255262507.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-03T11:16:29-07:00 Libraries could be a testing ground for new technology such as Google's augmented-reality glasses and advances enabled by the roll-out of the National Broadband Network, a QUT expert says. http://phys.org/news255069083.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-05-01T08:13:47-07:00 (Phys.org) -- Samsung phones of the future may tell if you are happy, sad, or altogether disgusted. Samsung has filed for a patent on a method and device that can tell a user’s emotions based on facial expressions. The patent, “Method and Apparatus for Recognizing an Emotion of an Individual Based on Facial Action Units” was filed at the USPTO back in October last year but came to light this month. Samsung’s approach will be to use “Action Units” (AUs) to recognize how a person feels. http://phys.org/news254720839.html Technology - Hi Tech & Innovation 2012-04-27T05:20:01-07:00