Aasemoon'z Cluster

RoweBots Research, Inc., a supplier of tiny embedded POSIX RTOS products, today announced the launch and release of UnisonTM Version 5 and the open-source version of Unison Version 4. These two ultra-tiny embedded-Linux and POSIX compatible RTOSs open Renesas Technology Corp.’s SH-2A Microcontroller (MCU) family to Linux and POSIX compatible development for the first time.

The potential for the QTC material to transition from an insulator to a conductor (i.e. change its electrical property) is influenced by how much deformation the material is experiencing as a result of the applied mechanical pressure. QTC can be used to produce low profile, low cost, pressure activated switches or sensors that display variable resistance with applied force and return to a quiescent state when the force is removed. The difference between a QTC switch and a QTC sensor is arguably only the speed and amount of physical input required to achieve the required switching point or resistance range.

Scientists have great expectations that nanotechnologies will bring them closer to the goal of creating computer systems that can simulate and emulate the brain's abilities for sensation, perception, action, interaction and cognition while rivaling its low power consumption and compact size. DARPA for instance, the U.S. military's research outfit known for projects that are pushing the envelope on what is technologically possible, has a program called SyNAPSE that is trying to develop electronic neuromorphic machine technology that scales to biological levels. Started in late 2008 and funded with $4.9 million, the goal of the initial phase of the SyNAPSE project is to "develop nanometer scale electronic synaptic components capable of adapting the connection strength between two neurons in a manner analogous to that seen in biological systems, as well as, simulate the utility of these synaptic components in core microcircuits that support the overall system architecture."

Not so long ago, artists routinely made their own paints using all sorts of odd ingredients: clay, linseed oil, ground-up insects—whatever worked. It was a crude and rather ad hoc process, but the results were used to create some of the greatest paintings in the world. Today I and other scientists are developing our own special paints. We’re not trying to compete with Vermeer or Gauguin, though. We hope to create masterpieces of a more technical nature: optoelectronic components that will make for better photovoltaic cells, imaging sensors, and optical communications equipment. And we’re not mixing and matching ingredients quite so haphazardly. Instead, we’re using our blossoming understanding of the world of nanomaterials to design the constituents of our paints at the molecular level.

A class of molecules whose size, structure and chemical composition have been optimized for photonic use could provide the demanding combination of properties needed to serve as the foundation for low-power, high-speed all-optical signal processing.

Robots have revolutionized the factory. What about the field? Over the past century, agriculture has seen an explosion in productivity, thanks to things like mechanization, synthetic fertilizers, selective breeding, and, of course, pesticides -- lots of it. But it remains to be seen what role robots will play in working the fields. Automation was possible in factories because tasks were repetitive and the environment well-defined. A robot arm welding a car chassis does the exact same job over and over. When it comes to crops, though, everything changes: the environment is unstructured and tasks -- like picking a fruit -- have to be constantly readjusted.

Ever since graphene was first produced in a lab at the University of Manchester in 2004, researchers around the world have been fascinated with its potential in electronics applications. Graphene possessed all the benefits of carbon nanotubes (CNTs), namely its charged-carrier mobility, but it didn’t have any of the down sides, such as CNTs’ need for different processing techniques than silicon and the intrinsic difficulty of creating interconnects for CNTs. But all was not easy for applying graphene to electronics applications. One of the fundamental problems for graphene was its lack of a band gap, which left it with a very low on-off ratio measured at about 10 as compared to in the 100s for silicon. Now this fundamental hurdle has been overcome. Based on research led by Phaedon Avouris at IBM’s IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, New York, IBM is reporting that they have created a significant band gap in graphene.

It’s hard enough to set up a reliable wireless network at home on Earth, let alone space. I harbor a personal grudge against my two-foot-thick 19th century brick/plaster wifi-killing walls and don’t get me started with my router or my ISP. So how does NASA connect with the ISS 300 to 400 kilometers above the Earth travelling at nearly 28000 km/h? In this case, engineers took advantage of the station’s existing communication link, which relies on the Ku radio band. The Ku band is the most common portion of the frequency spectrum used for satellite communication and is not reserved for restricted use. Among the companies that use the Ku band for commercial purposes are satellite internet providers and news networks broadcasting on satellite from remote locations.

The ARM Cortex™-M4 processor is the latest embedded processor by ARM specifically developed to address digital signal control markets that demand an efficient, easy-to-use blend of control and signal processing capabilities. The combination of high-efficiency signal processing functionality with the low-power, low cost and ease-of-use benefits of the Cortex-M family of processors is designed to satisfy the emerging category of flexible solutions specifically targeting the motor control, automotive, power management, embedded audio and industrial automation markets. The Cortex-M4 processor features extended single-cycle multiply-accumulate (MAC) instructions, optimized SIMD arithmetic, saturating arithmetic instructions and an optional single precision Floating Point Unit (FPU). These features build upon the innovative technology that characterizes the ARM Cortex-M series processors…

NI LabVIEW Robotics is a software package that provides a complete suite of tools to help you rapidly design sophisticated robotics systems for medical, agricultural, automotive, research, and military applications. The LabVIEW Robotics Software Bundle includes all of the functionality you need, from multicore real-time and FPGA design capabilities to vision, motion, control design, and simulation. Watch an introduction and demonstration of LabVIEW Robotics.

King Tut, depicted here by a gold funerary mask, was a frail pharaoh, according to a new DNA study. Tutankhamun was beset by malaria and a bone disorder—and possibly compromised by his newly discovered incestuous origins, researchers say. (Read the full story: "King Tut Was Disabled, Malarial, and Inbred, DNA Shows.")Released Tuesday by the Journal of the American Medical Association, the report is the first DNA study ever conducted with ancient Egyptian royal mummies. It apparently solves several mysteries surrounding the 14th-century B.C. pharaoh, including how he died and who his parents were."He was not a very strong pharaoh. He was not riding the chariots," said study team member Carsten Pusch, a geneticist at Germany's University of Tübingen. "Picture instead a frail, weak boy who had a bit of a club foot and who needed a cane to walk."

Microsoft Research who brought us some wonderful technologies such as the incredible Photosynth continue to impress with a much improved web mapping application integrated with the company's new Bing search engine. During the TED 2010 conference, Microsoft engineer Blaise Aguera y Arcas demoed the new Bing augmented reality maps showing real-time registration of video taken with a smart phone and street-view type maps. He showed how the live video can be overlayed over the static images and additional information about the area can be accessed via a Web interface. Much of this is made possible because of the advanced computer vision technology that has been developed in the past decade at Microsoft Research. The Seadragon technology is the back-end that makes it possible to manipulate such vast amounts of data in real-time. Microsoft has also integrated Photosynth and Worldwide telescope into their maps product. You are probably wondering what does this have to do with robotics other than the fact that it is a very impressive application? I can imagine robots using Bing maps to keep localized within a city. One of the most difficult and important problem in robotics is that of Simultaneous Localization and Mapping. Bing maps solve the mapping problem and the new vision techniques (with a bit of help from GPS) can be used to solve the localization problem. The registered video can be used by a robot to localized itself when it goes out to buy your weekly groceries.  You can watch the 10-minute demo below; I bet that it won't be long before Microsoft makes these new features available to us all for free.

Multisim 11 is the latest version of its circuit simulation software, with specialized editions for both hands-on learning and professional circuit design. The easy-to-use Multisim software delivers a graphical approach that abstracts the complexities of traditional circuit simulation, helping educators, students and engineers employ advanced circuit analysis technology. The academic edition of Multisim 11 incorporates specialized teaching features and is complemented by circuits textbooks and courseware. This integrated system helps educators engage students and reinforce circuit theory with an interactive, hands-on approach to investigating circuit behavior. Multisim 11 Professional helps engineers optimize circuit designs, minimize errors and reduce prototype iterations. When combined with the new NI Ultiboard 11 layout and routing software, Multisim provides engineers a cost-effective, end-to-end prototyping platform. Its integration with NI LabVIEW measurement software also helps engineers define custom analyses to improve design validation…

Hardware modifications and gadgets for ZX Spectrum and compatibles

Opus is Octasic's high-performing, ultra low-power, asynchronous DSP technology optimized for basestations, video processing and media gateway solutions. Asynchronous designs deliver similar computing performance to synchronous designs, but use less silicon and less power. No clock tree No state-elements Less sensitive to process and temperature variations

For some years now, an unorthodox idea has been gaining favor among astronomers. It contradicts old teachings and unsettles thoughtful observers, especially climatologists. "The sun," explains Lika Guhathakurta of NASA headquarters in Washington DC, "is a variable star." But it looks so constant... That's only a limitation of the human eye. Modern telescopes and spacecraft have penetrated the sun's blinding glare and found a maelstrom of unpredictable turmoil. Solar flares explode with the power of a billion atomic bombs. Clouds of magnetized gas (CMEs) big enough to swallow planets break away from the stellar surface. Holes in the sun's atmosphere spew million mile-per-hour gusts of solar wind.

We describe a practical method for reasoning about realistic concurrent programs. Our method allows global two-state invariants that restrict update of shared state. We provide simple, sufficient conditions for checking those global invariants modularly. The method has been implemented in VCC, an automatic, sound, modular verifier for concurrent C programs. VCC has been used to verify functional correctness of tens of thousands of lines of Microsoft's Hyper-V virtualization platform and of SYSGO's embedded real-time operating system PikeOS.

The fortress-like Coptic monastery of St Anthony the Great stands at an oasis spring in the Red Sea Mountains, 155 km (100 miles) south east of Cairo. It was founded in the mid-4th century, on Saint Anthony's burial site. He, along with St Pachomius (the first monk to organise hermits into groups) were two of the first exponents of Christian monasticism, which originated in the Egyptian desert. The Coptic orthodox monastery, presided over by an abbot, is the oldest Christian monastery in the world. The church is one of Egypt's great treasures - some of the wall paintings here date from the 6th and the 9th centuries, and among them is a picture of the founder, St Anthony himself. He lived in a tiny cave, high above the desert, for 40 years soon after AD 300, and the monastery - really a city in the desert - was built in the 360s. Amazingly, the monks who live here still speak Coptic, a language directly descended from the language of the ancient Egyptians.

No currently accepted scientific theory makes use of the notion of causality. Scientists may interpret some math equations involved in a scientific theory to denote causality—but unlike, say, “force” or “attraction”, causality is not really part of the formal language of modern science. Roughly, causality consists of “predictive implication, plus assumption of a causal mechanism.” Predictive implications are part of science: science can tell us “If X happens, then expect Y to happen with a certain probability.” But science cannot tell us whether X is the “cause” of Y, versus them both habitually being part of some overall coordinated process.

The goal of Long Term Evolution (LTE) is to achieve higher data rates through more efficient transmission, and thus improving the cellular phone user experience by enabling powerful new devices. The changes required in this technology present new challenges for base station vendors and their suppliers. Supporting 4G systems efficiently requires a number of innovations in DSP design; these innovations are moving the industry toward SoC architectures to support such systems. This paper will explore how TI's new architecture enables the key features in 4G systems.