This is a prototype touch panel that was demonstrated at the 11th International Nanotechnology Exhibition & Conference in Tokyo. It is unique because it knows who has touched it.
Apparently, it was developed to help arcade table games. Apparently, you the user need to touch one of the four electrodes located around the touch panel, and then use the other hand to input the information.
I believe that I can see where this technology is headed: We want our touchscreen devices to identify our finger. Yeah, just think about the security that would give! Also, wouldn’t it be cool if you unlocked your phone, and it would know that you were you. Yeah, I want to see this, very soon.
Oxford Nanopore Technologies has created the MinION, which is used to sequence an entire genome of micro-life in seconds. Considering that it was a major scientific event in 1995 to sequence a genome of bacteria for the first time, this MinION, which looks like a USB stick, is quite a leap, actually.
This could be used for all sorts of uses like identifying viruses in just seconds, as well as other ways of identifying larger genomes. Personally, it is pretty easy where this is going. That Human Genome took 13 minutes to map out the entire human genome, and so we clearly want the MinION to identify human genes.
I know it doesn’t take long to get a DNA test on CSI, but in actuality, it takes quite a while. If you wanted the MinION to map it out, it would take 12 hours. Perhaps we will have a method to map it faster with new versions of the MinION, and then it will be fun just to take DNA samples from anywhere. Think of it as a new hobby like geocaching.
I suppose that we will be seeing a great many advancements in DNA sequencing that will work better than what Oxford Nanopore Technologies or their MinION will do.
It seems like every day I am realizing how the world is becoming some sort of science fiction world. With robot astronauts, cyborgs, and now the Avatar project.
In case you are wondering why the Avatar project sounds familiar, it is because it was the name of the biggest film of all time. If you need a refresher course, it is about a guy who “downloads” himself into a cloned body of an alien. In this case, DARPA a company that is always doing terrific and speculative projects, is thinking of doing a project similar to the hit movie, but instead of downloading one into a cloned body, a soldier would control a robot.
Here’s what my Source had to say:
the Avatar program will develop interfaces and algorithms to enable a soldier to effectively partner with a semi-autonomous bi-pedal machine and allow it to act as the soldier’s surrogate.
I guess we are looking at an age where human controlled robots will be doing are dirty work. Perhaps they will use the TouchMe augmented reality controls that we previously discussed.
So, are we looking at a world where robots are going to be a puppet for humans? It is better than robots taking over.
It seems like everywhere that I turn, there is some sort of concept or real device that comes out that really feels like something from science fiction. This next technology would impress Dr. Beverly Crusher or “Bones” McCoy.
This is the concept of some Swedish designers Ergonomidesign, and they have a video that you can watch after the jump. As you can see, the future is full of touchscreens, smartphone apps, and small mobile medical devices.
What you are seeing here is the Citroren Taranis, and it is one of those awesome concept cars that I would love to see. In fact, all I have is pictures of this from my sources.
Yeah, it does bear a strong resemblance to the Tumbler from the recent Batman films. I wonder if it will appear in the most recent one, coming this summer, as it was destroyed in The Dark Knight. Oh wait, it wasn’t destroyed, one of the tires became the bat-cycle.
So, if you can’t get your hands on the Tesla Model X, I suppose this is the next best thing.
I think that we all thought that the future was going to give us skies filled with flying cars, but that just hasn’t really happened yet. Could it with the Sky Voyage?
The Sky Voyage is essentially a hybrid glider-airship that can take off vertically as a blimp. While it is airborne, its gas envelope rotates 90 degrees to form an airfoil, for more lift. By the way, the Sky Voyage is designed for only one, and it can partially collapse into something that can be easily stored.
Considering that this image from my source has a clear date of 2031 on it, I can’t help but wonder if this will live up to its date. Considering that every science fiction movie that has given me a date (think 1984) has always been wrong, I am pretty certain the age of the Sky Voyage won’t come early.
Yes, this is one of these gadgets that I probably will never see in my lifetime, but it is worth it to dream. Actually, I take that back, as I don’t want to limit someone else’s dream. I believe the designer Jet Shao has actually created a physical prototype, or something. I’m not certain if it actually flies, but you can see more of it at my Source link.
I always like seeing what is new with cellular phones. Considering all of them have touchscreens and are shying away from buttons, it makes you wonder if we have done everything as far as cell phones are concerned.
Then designer John Anastasiadis comes up with this BlackBerry Wrap-around BB concept. I’m not really certain how this works, but I believe that we are soon to be in an age where foldable or bendable displays will be on every phone. That tech has been under development for years.
I’m not certain how this BlackBerry wraparound phone would work. I mean, would you flick programs that you wanted to keep open to the spine? Perhaps the spine works like the menu bar at the bottom of my computer.
I suppose that there is one side of the phone devoted to apps your are running, and then the other side with apps running in the background?
Personally, I would love to try a phone like this. I’m not certain what place BlackBerry has in the iOS/Android world, but I’m guessing that it could use a little more innovation in the smartphone marketplace.
What you see in the photo here is the Hagent. I believe that its name is some sort of mashup of the words “heat agent”.
The Hagent is a robot programmed for one thing: to bring the heat into cold places. For example, if you have a fireplace in your home that is piping hot, the Hagent will warm itself by it, and then redistribute that heat to a drafty place in your household. I believe that it is black because this is a color that absorbs heat the best.
It looks like the Hagent is pretty small yet pretty big, but hopefully it has some moderately loud alert system so I don’t trip over it. Then again, I guess we are used to those Roombas that go around and clean our house.
Now here’s the big question: is it easier to built a house that keeps in warmth, or just make a robot so all the warmth within it is redistributed?
For some reason, I seem to be reporting on the neatest stuff lately that makes me really believe that the future really is going to be as fantastically futuristic as the ones that we have watched in science fiction for years.
Take a look at this new augmented reality video that I found this morning. If you aren’t familiar with augmented reality, it is when you have a camera that manipulates the images seen in the display in real-time. Generally, most AR has a jerky effect as the computer scans the object in question and hurries to put the pre-programmed image in place. This Obvious Engine system has created some software that really isolates the software from the rest of the scene, and makes the Dr. Pepper can do a lot. Watch the video above, and listen to more about what Google might be planning on doing with augmented reality.
Some of you might remember when we discussed Corning when I was at CES. There is something about the idea of Gorilla Glass 2 and their super strong glass on our mobile devices gave me a sense of hope for the future.
The company has just made this video called “A Day Made of Glass 2″, which is apparently a sequel to a video that “captured the imaginations of millions”. Yeah, I haven’t seen it, but this sequel makes me want to check out the original. Feel free to watch the newest version above, but I will tell you after the jump that I kind of had mixed feelings about it.
I remember one time I was listening to my headphones, and a friend of mine wanted to try them out. He then asked which one is the left and which is the right, and I honestly didn’t know.
Personally, I don’t usually even look when it comes to headphones. Maybe I have some hearing disorder, I don’t know. Still, researchers at Igarashi Design Interfaces Project in Tokyo are working on “Universal Headphones”, and the pair has the ability to automatically switch channels when placed in the wrong ear.
Here’s how it works: If the headphone is in your right ear, the sensor will point to the back of your head, and in the left it points to open air. The sensor interprets the information and relays to an embedded audio circuit that swaps the stereo channel to the proper ear if the headphones are mismatched.
That is a quote from my source, but I wonder if this could be a standard for headphones in the future. I suppose that we will see.
Here’s a little phone of the future for today. It is a phone that stays on the tabletop, and then it will turn toward you and nod when you receive a phone call.
This concept phone, designed by Mac Funamizu, is perfect for those offices that are always flurry with ringing phones.
Well, we’ll see if this one is the wave of the future.
This is an interesting concept PC that clearly heralds back to an era when TVs looked like this.
Even the keyboard and its base look like something from the fifties. Is that a dial that I see on the right? I am guessing that the button on the left is for power.
Of course, this comes from Yanko Design, which is usually good at creating concept devices that usually don’t end up seeing the light of day.
Some people at Belgium’s Hasselt University has designed the Twoddler, it is one of those activity boards with the spinning dials, bells, and whatnot that links to the baby’s Twitter account.
That’s right, so when the baby hits something, it sends an automatic message. Now, can a baby communicate this way? Perhaps if they see a photo of a parent, and hit the photo, maybe.
Does this show that a baby is missing us? I don’t know, honestly. I’m not certain you should try and get a baby to tweet. I mean, what is next, turning a rattler into a mobile phone? How about Facebook on the activity board.
Every once in a while, I like to check out a site known as Yanko Design. Many tech blogs love it because it has all these cool concept gizmos that will probably never see the light of day.
Case in point, the Scirbblebot. See this three legged thing with the pen down the middle. Well, if you were to draw with it, you can save that shape, which is in this case, a bird. Once you have this drawing program saved, you can get another piece of paper out and let the Scribblebot do the drawing.
You can see the video after the jump to get a better idea of what this is all about.
Last January at CES, it felt like every major electronics company was trying to do some sort of 3D of some type. Panasonic was flexing their muscles with a 3D capable television set, and other companies were proud of their 3D video games.
Just so you know, the 3D that uses the dark glasses and not the red and blue ones can’t be made for just any television. No, you need something HD and up, and you may require some special glasses that have to be hooked up with a blinker light to make it work. I’ve seen it in action, and I can see it catching on in the average home.
The company 3M has recently come out with a new optical film that has small dome-shaped lenses on the surface that can combine with prism-like structures on the underside to create a 3D effect, sans glasses.
I have seen foldable bikes before, but the biggest problems that they have are the wheels. You see, they can’t really fold, because they are full of air.
Unless you want to inflate and re-inflate them, those wheels will usually take up the same amount of area and will refuse to be compacted.
Until Victor Aleman’s design, which allows the tires to be compacted in a very small radius. Check out the folded version after the jump.
Okay, today I have discovered one of the greatest technologies that I have ever seen.
It essentially works by drawing something in a paint program, and then label your drawings what they are supposed to be. From there, photoshop will fill in the gaps of what you have created.
So, as the illustration shows, a drawing of a cheetah chasing a motorcyclist in the desert produces a somewhat realistic photo of a cheetah chasing a motocross rider going through the desert.
By the way, the user got to pick what cheetah, what rider, and what desert he or she wanted to use.
This technology comes from several universities working together, and I think it is the wave of the future, baby!
Some of you remember when I wrote that piece on Augmented Reality. It’s that little technology that allows you to put an image in front of a camera (usually a webcam) and cause another, usually three-dimensional image, to appear on the display.
Right now, it is being used for advertisements, trading cards, and even on bags of Doritos. It would appear that someone has figured out how to get the augmented reality off the food wrapper and get it on the food itself.
See these cookies in the picture here? They look like ordinary cookies with an L on them, right? Check out what they look like with a little camera, and a lot of augmented reality after the jump.
Hopefully, you have seen the film Minority Report, where Tom Cruise has those special gloves to interface with a giant screen in front of him. To this day, I still want the computer he was using.
A company called Funai has developed similar technology with a projector that can actually recognize the user’s finger movements.
So, like Tom Cruise, you can make gesturing for rotating, zooming, and flicking through projecting images. Apparently, it uses a special new sensor for this technology.
This is a prototype touch panel that was demonstrated at the 11th International Nanotechnology Exhibition & Conference in Tokyo. It is unique because it knows who has touched it. 
Oxford Nanopore Technologies has created the MinION, which is used to sequence an entire genome of micro-life in seconds. Considering that it was a major scientific event in 1995 to sequence a genome of bacteria for the first time, this MinION, which looks like a USB stick, is quite a leap, actually. 
It seems like every day I am realizing how the world is becoming some sort of science fiction world. With 
It seems like everywhere that I turn, there is some sort of concept or real device that comes out that really feels like something from science fiction. This next technology would impress Dr. Beverly Crusher or “Bones” McCoy. 
What you are seeing here is the Citroren Taranis, and it is one of those awesome concept cars that I would love to see. In fact, all I have is pictures of this from my sources. 
I think that we all thought that the future was going to give us skies filled with flying cars, but that just hasn’t really happened yet. Could it with the Sky Voyage? 
I always like seeing what is new with cellular phones. Considering all of them have touchscreens and are shying away from buttons, it makes you wonder if we have done everything as far as cell phones are concerned. 
What you see in the photo here is the Hagent. I believe that its name is some sort of mashup of the words “heat agent”. 
I remember one time I was listening to my headphones, and a friend of mine wanted to try them out. He then asked which one is the left and which is the right, and I honestly didn’t know. 
Here’s a little phone of the future for today. It is a phone that stays on the tabletop, and then it will turn toward you and nod when you receive a phone call. 
This is an interesting concept PC that clearly heralds back to an era when TVs looked like this. 
I really wish I could afford one of those fancy-schmancy DSLR cameras, and I really wish I could buy the NOVA DSLR. 
Every once in a while, I like to check out a site known as 
Last January at CES, it felt like every major electronics company was trying to do some sort of 3D of some type. Panasonic was flexing their muscles with a 3D capable television set, and other companies were proud of their 3D video games. 
Hopefully, you have seen the film Minority Report, where Tom Cruise has those special gloves to interface with a giant screen in front of him. To this day, I still want the computer he was using. 