NEW Artificial Leaf Super Efficient

MIT scientist, Daniel Nocera, claims he has created an artificial leaf that simulates photosynthesis to generate electricity using just sunlight and water — reputedly doing so 10 times more efficiently than a real leaf.

The artifical leaf is said to operate at 76% efficiency (compared to around 10% efficiency in existing solar panels)

Placing the artificial leaf it in a single gallon of water in bright sunlight could produce enough electricity to supply a house in developing countries with its daily electricity requirement, Nocera has claimed.

Sources:
technewsworld.com
geeksaresexy.net
M.I.T SPECTRUM

SmartBird

SmartBird is an ultralight but powerful flight model with excellent aerodynamic qualities and extreme agility. With SmartBird, Festo has succeeded in deciphering the flight of birds - one of the oldest dreams of humankind.

This bionic technology-bearer, which is inspired by the herring gull, can start, fly and land autonomously -- with no additional drive mechanism. Its wings not only beat up and down, but also twist at specific angles. This is made possible by an active articulated torsional drive unit, which in combination with a complex control system attains an unprecedented level of efficiency in flight operation. Festo has thus succeeded for the first time in creating an energy-efficient technical adaptation of this model from nature.

Nanogenerators power Small Conventional Electronic Devices

"By simplifying our design, making it more robust and integrating the contributions from many more nanowires, we have successfully boosted the output of our nanogenerator enough to drive devices such as commercial liquid-crystal displays, light-emitting diodes and laser diodes," said Wang, a Regents' professor in Georgia Tech's School of Materials Science and Engineering. "If we can sustain this rate of improvement, we will reach some true applications in healthcare devices, personal electronics, or environmental monitoring."


more at... sciencemagnews.com

Biometric Eye Movement ID Tech

A small security company has developed a system which can identify people by the way they look at the world.
The system, created by the firm ID-U based in Israel, is said to be both simple and reliable. It asks the user to follow a target on a display while tracking the movement of his eyes with a low-resolution camera, reports Technology Review.
The eye movement pattern is as unique as fingerprints. At the moment the system is 97 per cent accurate, says ID-U CEO Palti-Wasserman, who holds a PhD from the faculty of biomedical engineering from the Technion Israel Institute of Technology.
A potential impostor would have trouble fooling the system. With a fingerprint or retina scanner it is possible to make an accurate copy of the biometrical feature and pass identification. But ID-U does a different test every time, so having a record of the rightful owner passing a test will not help.
As a bonus, the system only needs a display and a regular digital camera, both of which are already in many potential hosts like laptops or ATMs. Once the software is installed, it is ready to be used. The company is working on an iStore app using their algorithms.
However ID-U is yet to demonstrate its scalability. What works well for a small group may drop in performance significantly when hundreds or thousands of individuals are involved.