You already needed a scorecard to tell all the players in this convoluted streaming, cord-cutting era. Monday’s nationwide launch of AT&T TV not only ushers in a new player, but it invites even more confusion.
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Author: Abdul-Qadir
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Keeping up with the conversation
Most people find it difficult to concentrate on a specific voice in a busy environment, but for those who are hard of hearing it’s especially challenging. Now, however, a new type of hearing aid, developed with the assistance of Fraunhofer researchers, is designed to render speech more intelligible against a background of noise, thereby making it easier to follow a single speaker.
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Solar energy solutions for facades
Photovoltaic elements are usually found on rooftops—after all, that’s where solar irradiation is highest. However, as researchers at the Fraunhofer Center for Silicon Photovoltaics CSP have discovered, PV elements on facades can be a useful way to supplement the power supply. If appropriately designed, they can be attractively integrated and deliver 50 percent more energy than existing types of wall-mounted PV elements. Even concrete walls are suitable.
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Light, efficient, affordable – the shape of things to come in components
Lightweight technology has long been and is sure to remain a mainstay of automotive and aerospace engineering, shipbuilding and a host of other industries. Lighter materials and components could also help cut emissions that drive climate change. But lighter options are pricier, and the relatively steep cost has impeded their adoption. That is about to change thanks to the efforts of a consortium of automakers, suppliers and research institutes. Called ALLIANCE and coordinated by Daimler and the Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF, this project has some good news for designers: As it turns out, it is entirely possible to build components that are up to 33 percent lighter at an added cost of less than three euros per kilogram-saved.
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Wireless signals from ceiling lighting for connected manufacturing
WLAN and Bluetooth have limited bandwidth, making conventional wireless communication problematic in the production environment. Nevertheless, numerous components such as sensors and robots need to be wirelessly connected. To overcome this challenge, a team of researchers at Fraunhofer IOSB-INA in Lemgo is working on solutions with help from the Ostwestfalen-Lippe (OWL) University of Applied Sciences and Arts. Soon, it is hoped that machines in factory buildings will communicate with one another using light pulses. This technology is not new, but now it needs to be adapted for use in industry.
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AI and machine learning help scientists understand human face recognition
Scientists from Salk Institute (U.S.), Skoltech (Russia), and the Riken Center for Brain Science (Japan) investigated a theoretical model of how populations of neurons in the visual cortex of the brain may recognize and process faces and their expressions, and how they are organized. The research was recently published in Neural Computation and highlighted on its cover.
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Father, son bond over engineering a record-smashing roadster
Sandia National Laboratories manager Joel Wirth, a mechanical engineer by training, studied a problem with his car. The weight was too far back, making the car fishtail whenever he drove it faster than 200 mph.
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A model to design logic gates inspired by a single-cell organism
Natural phenomena and biological mechanisms can be great sources of inspiration for scientists developing mathematical approaches, computer systems and robots. Over the past few decades, research has repeatedly proved the value of replicating behaviors observed in nature through the introduction of many fascinating bio-inspired computational techniques and systems.
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Bifacial solar advances with the times—and the sun
Traditional solar modules convert light to electricity using photovoltaic (PV) cells on the top side of the panels. Now, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) researchers are shining a light on what lies beneath.
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Home genealogy kit sales plummet over data privacy concerns
Surprising news recently emerged from the personal genetics business. The two leading direct-to-consumer companies in North America, 23andMe and Ancestry.com, announced within a week of each other that they were laying off a significant proportion of their workforce as a result of a steep drop in sales.
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