Cutting Edge- Page 258

Pressure-sensitive keyboard? Let the fun begin

I can tell you my computer password, but unless you type it in exactly the way I do, you won't be allowed entry. That's the idea behind Safelock, one of the just-announced winning entries in the UIST 2009 Student Innovation Competition, a Microsoft-sponsored contest aimed at inspiring keyboard innovation. About a month ago, the company sent out prototypes of pressure-sensitive keyboards to 40 international teams, which had four weeks to cobble together their creations. Here are just a few of the cool ideas they came up with:

First place, most useful: Safelock Safelock, by Jeff Allen and John Howard of Southern Methodist University, biometrically authenticates a user with just eight characters entered. The key (forgive the pun) is that the user has to enter that relatively short password just right. To create a machine-learning algorithm that discovers the unique way each person types, the team measured four keystroke attributes: flight time (the interval between each keystroke); hold time (the amount of time the key was held); maximum pressure; and a curve fit to the pressure over time as a user pressed each key.

The team conducted extensive tests of their system and say it's "extremely robust." Says Howard: "99.4 percent of the time, if you're not me, you're not able to log into my account."

First place, most creative: Hidden Forces This innovation lets users control multiple cursors by waving magnets above the keyboard but not touching it. A four-person team from Carnegie Mellon University accomplished this by placing one small magnet underneath each of the keyboard keys, with the north side facing up.

Julia Schwarz, Brian Lim, Stephen Oney, and Kevin Huang then used a larger magnet (north side facing down) as a cursor. The larger magnet repelled nearby magnets, pushing them against the pressure-sensitive pads and allowing the computer to know where the magnet was located above the keyboard. The innovators were able to control multiple cursors with this technique, turning the keyboard into a multipoint, in-air interaction device. … Read more

Mini robot can cruise through burning buildings

South Korea's Hoya Robot is developing a mini firefighter helper bot that can enter burning buildings to conduct reconnaissance and check for people.

The Firefighters Assistant Robot can apparently operate for up to 30 minutes in fires, and can withstand temperatures up to 320 F. It can also survive falls of more than 6 feet. It's water-resistant, as seen in this experiment video.

It may look like a tank up close, but the bot can nearly fit in the palm of your hand and weighs only 3 pounds.

The remote-controlled rover can scoot into a blaze and transmit … Read more

These flexible RFID tags can take the heat

With radio frequency identification tags already showing up in school uniforms, it makes sense they'd make their way into other types of uniforms as well.

But what to do when said uniforms are worn in manufacturing plants where garments have to be sterilized with heat so microorganisms and other outside pollutants don't contaminate the goods? Wouldn't the RFID tags turn into goop?

Funny you should ask. Fujitsu has come up with a flexible, ultra high frequency (UHF)-band RFID tag that can withstand temperatures up to 250 degrees Fahrenheit (much, much hotter than CNET's New York … Read more

Have mythbusters proven the Turin Shroud is fake?

If you were brought up a Catholic, as a child, you were taught about the power of mysteries.

One mystery that I used to always find perplexing was how the face of Jesus Christ was superimposed on the Turin Shroud, a burial cloth that measures 14 feet, 4 inches by 3 feet, 7 inches.

Somehow, the face looked a little too much like the Jesus in all the religious pictures. It all seemed a little too perfect. And, as one grew up, one began to learn that nothing was quite that perfect. Not even priests.

Now an Italian scientist and … Read more

Eolas sues corporate giants over Web technology

Eolas Technologies, a company that ground through a years-long patent infringement lawsuit against Microsoft, now has sued a large swath of corporate powers for infringement of that same patent and another related patent concerning interactive programs on Web sites.

The list of defendants includes many high-profile companies inside and outside the tech world: Adobe Systems, Amazon, Apple, Blockbuster, Citigroup, eBay, Frito-Lay, Go Daddy, Google, J.C. Penney, JPMorgan Chase, Office Depot, Perot Systems, Playboy Enterprises, Staples, Sun Microsystems, Texas Instruments, Yahoo, and YouTube.

Eolas' suit is not to be taken lightly. Although the earlier Microsoft case took many years to … Read more

Tech pioneers win 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics

The 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded for "two revolutionary optical technologies."

Charles K. Kao, who discovered how to transmit light through fiber optics, and the team of Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith, who designed the first digital-imaging sensor, split the Nobel Prize, announced by the Nobel Foundation on Tuesday.

Born in Shanghai, Charles K. Kao made a discovery in 1966 that would lead to today's fiber optics. A man ahead of this time, Kao calculated how it would be possible to transmit light over 100 kilometers (62 miles), compared to only 20 … Read more

IBM Research jumps into genetic sequencing

It took 13 years for researchers to catalog all the information in a human genome the first time. Now IBM believes it can do better--somewhat perversely by equipping a newer genetic sequencing method with brakes.

Big Blue is among those who believe electronics technology can be applied to the task of sequencing a person's genes, thereby bringing genetic testing into the computing era and lowering its cost to something like $100 to $1,000.

IBM is working on prototype DNA-processing electronics that slurps strands of DNA through an extremely small hole called a nanopore, measuring the electrical properties of … Read more

Hadron collider restart set for November

The world's largest particle accelerator is on course for a November restart. Six out of eight superconducting sectors are down to working cryogenic temperatures, according to CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.

James Gillies, head of communications for CERN, told ZDNet UK on Monday that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) would probably be ready to collide beams of particles by mid-November.

"Things are going well," said Gillies. "We hesitate to say 'hurray' just yet, but things are going smoothly."

Gillies said CERN plans to restart the giant experiment in incremental stages.

Nissan's robot cars mimic fish to avoid crashing

Nissan has developed a mini robotic car that can move autonomously in groups while avoiding crashing into obstacles (including other cars).

The Eporo, Nissan says, is the first robot car designed to move in a group by sharing its position and other information. The aim is to incorporate the technology into passenger cars to reduce accidents and traffic jams.

Although a group of Eporos may look like a gang of cybernetic Jawa, Nissan says the cars' design was inspired by the way fish move in schools.

An evolution of the bumblebee-inspired BR23C robot car unveiled last year, the Eporo uses … Read more

Ig Nobel winners: Knuckle cracking to panda poo

Have you ever worried that knuckle cracking will give you arthritis or wondered why pregnant women don't tip over? Me too.

Research into those topics--as well as studies finding that diamonds could be created from tequila and giant panda feces are good for composting--received Ig Nobel Prizes in a ceremony on Thursday night at Harvard University.

The prizes, awarded to scientific achievements that "cannot and should not be reproduced," are presented in the week before the real Nobel prizes are announced and are sponsored by the science humor magazine "Annals of Improbable Research."

A Thousand … Read more