Sony’s Latest OLED TV Only 1 Millimeter Thin

OLED, Organic Light Emitting Diode. A new type of viewing screen. Can be viewed in bright lighting conditions, at greater angles, unlike LCD’s. It uses an organic material that emits its own light, so no back light is neede. Sony has unveiled a prototype OLED (organic light emitting diode) television at the Ceatec 2008 electronics expo in Japan. The TV measures just 0.9mm.

Toshiba Places Methanol Cell in a CellPhone.

DMFCs (Direct Methanol Fuel Cell)produce electricity from a reaction between methanol, water and air. Toshiba showed a prototype cell phone with DMFC. The methanol cell is said to be provide 6 hours of battery life. Toshiba said the DMFC cellphone will be commercially available next year. Even though Methanol is flammable, the International Civil Aviation Organization’s (ICAO) Dangerous Goods Panel (DGP) allow passengers to carry and use micro fuel cells and methanol fuel cartridges when aboard airplanes to power laptop computers and other consumer electronic devices.

Cell Phones For Hearing Impaired

Researchers from University of Washington has created a software that for the first time helps deaf and hard-of-hearing people to use sign language over a mobile phone.

Imagine A World Without Wires

The power is everywhere, like god. You wouldn’t know where the power is coming from. You don’t need cords or batteries for your gadgets and computers. The laptop could be recharged when the machine gets within several feet of a transmit resonator. This reasoner could be embedded in tables, work surfaces, and even behind walls. This is one of the Intel’s technology which relies on an idea called magnetic induction. A principle similar to the way a trained singer can shatter a glass using the voice (frequency). Power can be put into magnetic fields at a transmitting resonator at the wall socket. The receiving resonator is tuned to absorb energy from the magnetic field.

In this research, Intel has built a sample light bulb to make a 60-watt glow from an energy source 3 feet away. This was achieved with high efficiency and only a quarter of the energy has been lost. Researchers admitted the technology will be on market in at least five year.

Image Credit: www.boisepubliclibrary.org

Microsoft PhotoSynth Goes Public

PhotoSynth a web service by Microsoft which has been available as a technology preview until now opens for everyone now. The technology takes a grouping of photographs and stitches them into a virtual 3D environment. Each user is given a 20 GB online storage for the PhotoSynth collection. Users have to download a special plugin to view the Synths. Previously, the process of combining photos together took days of processing on specially configured machines. PhotoSynth can be said as one of the innovative application from Microsoft after a long time.

Man soars above Alps with jet-powered wing

A Swiss pilot strapped on a jet-powered wing and leaped from a plane Wednesday for the first public demonstration of the homemade device above the Alps. Passing from free fall to a gentle glide, Rossy then triggered four jet turbines and accelerated to 186 miles per hour.

Teaching a robot to talk

Robotics experts and language development specialists at University of Plymouth will work on a project for the next four years to teach a humanoid robot to construct simple phrases. A humanoid robot called iCub will be used in the experiment. The project is believed to be the first of its kind.