Despite the fact they are small cubes with no exterior moving parts, M-Blocks robots can propel themselves forward, jump on top of each other, and snap together to form more complex shapes. What makes them different from other examples of modular robotic cubes we previously wrote about is their simplicity because MIT researchers decided to… »

Researchers at Disney Research, Pittsburgh and at Carnegie Mellon University recently presented a simple system that could be used to harvest power of different gestures performed onto a paper surface. Named Paper Generator, the system exploits gestures such as tapping, touching, rubbing or sliding friction in order to run simple interactive applications involving books, posters… »

32 young scientists and designers from China and the UK took a challenge to take a week to develop a new type of low-cost scanning probe microscope, powerful enough to study the nano world. The world’s first low cost Atomic Force Microscope (AFM) has been developed in Beijing by an international group of students using… »

Back in the year 2000, a team consisting out of students mainly from the faculties of Aerospace Engineering and Mechanical Engineering from the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) joined Formula Student – a testing ground where students develop racing vehicles. The project evolved through time and DUT Racing team recently managed to break the… »

Engineers at the Fraunhofer Institute, Soitec, CEA-Leti and the Helmholtz Center Berlin joined forces to achieve a new world record for the conversion of sunlight into electricity. Using a new solar cell structure with four solar subcells, they managed to set a new record efficiency of 44.7% was measured at a concentration of 297 suns… »

Exoelectrogenic microbes are organisms evolved in airless environments which developed the ability to react with oxide minerals to create biological fuel needed for their survival. Although several research groups tried different approaches to tap into this source of energy since the turn of millennium, efficient use of these microbes as bio-generators proved to be challenging…. »

Currently, the process pipes that are at a height of more than two meters in offshore or onshore platforms must be inspected by human staff that climbs through scaffolding. In order to lower the risk, Mexican Corporation of Material Research (COMIMSA) designed RoboPipe – a robot prototype able to detect cracks or corrosion inside the… »

Increased interest for sensor networks in various applications are forcing research groups to come up with ways to power the individual sensor modules remains a sticking point in these sorts of applications. While wiring and batteries can be viable solutions for small-scale projects, researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute came up with tiny solar cells that… »