THE INNOVATION HUB 2K19

Opinion: What will the world look like when COVID-19 crisis is over? Scientists throughout the Bay Area are helping to work on a treatment or vaccine for COVID-19. (Photo by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) While the world shelters in place from the coronavirus and we all are riveted to the daily news cycle, planning is already starting for what the world will look like when today’s crisis is over. Will the virus kill Silicon Valley’s seemingly unstoppable engine? How will industries change, and which sectors will emerge from the crisis stronger? While the answers for the macroeconomy remain unclear, patterns for technology are starting to emerge. Technology companies have taken hits on issues ranging from online privacy to their impact on the cost of housing, but today’s crisis makes clear the centrality of technology to our economy and society. It also brings home the critical importance of the innovation that is happening in Silicon Valley. While working fro...

IBM has developed what is reported to be one of the fastest graphene-based integrated circuits (IC) to date, with an overall performance that is up to 10,000 times better compared to similar devices developed previously. IBM built the graphene-based IC as a radio frequency receiver that can perform signal amplification, filtering, and mixing. The circuit was able to process text messages without any distortion in a series of tests performed by the IBM research team. One of the first examples of the use of graphene in electronic applications took place in 2010 when Big Blue researchers engineered a graphene device with a band gap large enough to be used in infrared (IR) detectors and emitters. This development was followed up a year later when IBM developed a graphene transistor that can operate with frequencies up to 100 GHz. After another six months, IBM developed the first graphene-based IC circuit, which was the predecessor of the model discussed in this article. Th...

What are car proximity sensors and how do they work? We’re celebrating Star Wars Day by taking a look at the automotive technology that gives vehicles Force-like abilities. Much as the  Force sense  can be used to identify impending danger, proximity sensors can detect when your vehicle is too close to an object for comfort. With proximity sensors playing a key part in  autonomous driving , we take a look at how they work. TV commercials for new cars were once primarily focused on impressive horsepower, or a slick new design.  Now, automakers looking to advertise their new vehicles are highlighting other features, not available until very recently. From  parking assist , which helps the user complete that most nightmarish of manoeuvres – the parallel park – to  adaptive cruise control  (ACC), which allows your vehicle to slow down or speed up depending on the traffic around you, the way cars are being built, used and sold is being revolutionis...

Generating electricity from speed breakers next time on the roads, don’t scoff at the speed breakers. They could actually light up small villages off the highway. An amateur innovator in Guwahati has developed a simple contraption that can generate power when a vehicle passes over a speed breaker. Kanak Gogoi, a small time businessman, has developed a mechanism to generate power by converting the potential energy generated by a vehicle going up on a speed breaker into kinetic energy. The innovation has caught the eye of the Indian Institute of Technology ( iit ), Guwahati, which will fund a pilot project to generate electricity from speed-breakers. The idea is basic physics. Gogoi has welded five-metre-long metal plates into the speed-breaker instead of the conventional bitumen-and-stone-chip rumble strip. The plates are movable and inclined with the help of a spring-loaded hydraulic system. The fulcrum-...

Supercapacitor Introduction:-   A  supercapacitor  ( SC ), also called an  ultracapacitor , is a high-capacity  capacitor  with a capacitance value much higher than other capacitors, but with lower voltage limits, that bridges the gap between  electrolytic capacitors  and  rechargeable batteries . It typically stores 10 to 100 times more  energy per unit volume or mass  than electrolytic capacitors, can accept and deliver charge much faster than batteries, and tolerates many more  charge and discharge cycles  than  rechargeable batteries . Benefits of Super-Capacitor or Ultra-Capacitor The demand of  Supercapacitors  is rising day by day. The main reason for the rapid development and demand is due to many other benefits of Supercapacitors, few of them are stated below: It provides a very good life of approx 1million charge cycles. The operating temperature is -50 degrees to 70 degr...