Impact Lab – Page 319 – A Laboratory of the Future Human Experience

AI

Researchers develop an AI light-field Camera that reads 3D Facial Expressions

January 31, 2022

The new technology can capture facial expressions from 3D images with an accuracy of over 80%.

Researchers from Korea’s one of the best science and technology universities, KAIST’s Department of Bio and Brain Engineering, have developed a new artificial intelligence-powered light field camera that can read 3D facial expressions.

The highly capable camera uses a technique that uses infrared light to read facial expressions. Professors Ki-Hun Jeong and Doheon Lee led the research team which developed this artificial intelligence-enabled technology.

The research named ‘Machine-Learned Light-field Camera that Reads Facial Expression from High-Contrast and Illumination Invariant 3D Facial Images’ was published in Advanced Intelligent Systems.

Prof Ki-Hun Jeong said, “The sub-miniature light-field camera developed by the research team has the potential to become the new platform to quantitatively analyze the facial expressions and emotions of humans.”

Medical Breakthrough

SCIENTISTS BUILD NEW DEVICE THAT MAY HELP PEOPLE WHO ARE BLIND ‘SEE’ IN INFRARED

January 31, 2022

Infrared goggles can even help wearers navigate in darkness, say researchers

By Vishwam Sankaran

A new device that can help blind people navigate and avoid obstacles was developed by scientists using infrared goggles and an array of vibrating pads on the forearm.

Unlike canes and many other tools commonly available to visually impaired people for navigation, the new device enables the full use of their hands, according to a yet-to-be peer-reviewed study on the device that was posted in the preprint repository arXiv this month.

“The most common tool available to them is the cane. Although the cane allows good detection of objects in the user’s immediate vicinity, it lacks the ability to detect obstacles further away,” researchers Manuel Zahn and Armaghan Ahmad Khan from the Technical University of Munich in Germany wrote in the study.

The new device also does not interfere with the user’s sense of hearing – which is extensively used by the visually impaired – according to the scientists.

It uses a pair of infrared cameras inserted in 3D-printed prototype goggles to capture a stereoscopic image that a small computer uses to create a map of the surrounding area.

Virtual Reality

New VR Boots Allow Users to ‘Physically’ Explore Virtual Spaces

January 30, 2022

They could solve VR’s ‘infinite walking’ problem.

By Chris Young

One of the surprising issues with virtual reality headsets to date has been user safety — get too immersed in the experience and you might find yourself leaping and bounding in virtual reality only to smash against the floor in your momentarily-forgotten physical reality.

One firm, Ekto VR, believes it may have a solution to this problem with its new “EKTO ONE” boots, a report from YankoDesign reveals. The company’s new technology allows users to walk on the spot in order to traverse a virtual space.

Alternative Transportation

Boeing Invests $450 Million in Wisk to Fund Moonshot Self-Flying Air Taxi Project

January 30, 2022

Wisk is developing an autonomous electric eVTOL that can seat three to four passengers.

By Sissi Cao

CERTIFICATION FOR SELF-DRIVING EVTOLS COULD BE YEARS AWAY.

Boeing said on Monday it has agreed to invest $450 million in the air taxi startup, Wisk Aero, to fund the development of a fully autonomous, electric aircraft that could one day fly millions of commuters in the world’s busiest cities. The funding around is one of the largest in the nascent eVTOL (electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing vehicle) industry.

Wisk was created in 2019 as a joint venture between Boeing and a unit of Kitty Hawk, the flying company founded by Google cofounder Larry Page that was developing an autonomous two-seater eVTOL called Cora. Cora is currently being tested as Wisk’s fifth-generation eVTOL. The investment from Boeing will fund the company’s development of the sixth-generation aircraft, a larger vehicle designed to seat three to four passengers, Wisk said.

Wisk seeks to certify the sixth-generation vehicle for urban taxi use in the U.S., Europe and Asia, CEO Gary Gyson told Observer in an interview last year.

The certification process could take years, however, especially for an unpiloted aircraft like Wisk’s. Wisk declined to disclose its estimated timeline for obtaining the FAA flight approval, but acknowledged that it may come after piloted eVTOLs get certified.

Blockchain

Opera Releases Web3 Browser to Let Users Seamlessly Link Crypto Wallets to Blockchain Services

January 30, 2022

Opera’s crypto browser will allow users to link wallets like Metamask, apart from its native crypto wallet that was launched in 2018.

By Shomik Sen Bhattacharjee

Opera’s new browser offers direct, frictionless access to Web3 services.

Opera has launched the beta version of its “Crypto Browser Project”
Opera’s Web3 browser features a news and data aggregator section
The beta is currently available for Windows, Mac, and Android

Opera, the team behind the popular multi-platform browser has now unveiled a new browser project which the company dubbed “Crypto Browser Project,” aimed at offering users direct access to Web3 services with beta versions already rolling out for Windows, Mac, and Android. With the crypto browser project, Opera intends to make it easier for crypto natives, as well as relative newbies to browse decentralised apps (dApps), access blockchain games and metaverse portals more seamlessly across platforms and devices.

Space Flight

SpaceX wins $102 million Air Force contract to demonstrate technologies for point-to-point space transportation

January 29, 2022

Rendering of a ‘rocket cargo’ vehicle set to launch and deliver supplies for the U.S. military. Credit: Air Force Research Laboratory

by Sandra Erwin

Program manager Greg Spanjers: ‘DoD is very interested in the ability to deliver the cargo anywhere on Earth to support humanitarian aid and disaster relief.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Air Force awarded SpaceX a $102 million five-year contract to demonstrate technologies and capabilities to transport military cargo and humanitarian aid around the world on a heavy rocket.

The contract is for the rocket cargo program, a new project led by the Air Force Research Laboratory to investigate the utility of using large commercial rockets for Department of Defense global logistics.

Greg Spanjers, rocket cargo program manager, said in a statement to SpaceNews that the contract formalizes a government-industry partnership to help “determine exactly what a rocket can achieve when used for cargo transport, what is the true capacity, speed, and cost of the integrated system.”

The contract, awarded Jan. 14, was not announced by the Air Force and was first reported by AviationWeek.com.

This is the largest contract awarded to date for rocket cargo. U.S. Transportation Command in 2020 signed cooperative research and development agreements with SpaceX and Exploration Architecture Corporation (XArc) to study concepts for rapid transportation through space. The command last month also signed a CRADA with Blue Origin.

Space Flight

Producers on a Tom Cruise film set in space are planning to launch the world’s first movie studio connected to the International Space Station

January 29, 2022

The exterior of an Axiom module, which the studio will be modeled after.

UK-based Space Entertainment Enterprise signed a deal to launch the first entertainment studio in space.
The ISS module is intended for creatives who want to film in low-orbit, micro-gravity environments.
The studio is tied to a highly-anticipated Tom Cruise-led project, which is working with SpaceX and NASA to shoot on the ISS.

“Adding a dedicated entertainment venue to Axiom Station’s commercial capabilities in the form of SEE-1 will expand the station’s utility as a platform for a global user base and highlight the range of opportunities the new space economy offers,” Axiom president and CEO Michael Suffredini said in a statement.

The Levenskys’ U.K. studio confirmed to CNBC it is currently in production on the Tom Cruise-led film, though it is not clear whether Cruise will wait for the debut of the SEE-1 studio to shoot.

drones, Science & Technology News

Berkeley researchers design self-folding in-flight drone arms

January 29, 2022

Researchers at UC Berkeley have developed a drone whose hinged arms can fold themselves from horizontal to vertical position in order to pass through tight spaces or carry light objects.

By Bruce Crumley

The objective of researchers at Berkeley’s High Performance Robotics Laboratory (HiPeRLab) was to design a quadcopter capable of raising and lowering its arms while in flight to adjust to limited spaces, or increase the tasks it could perform. To do that, they inserted hinges between the body of the square craft and its rotor-equipped appendages to enable their lowering and raising. In contrast to other experimental UAVs tricked up for similar folding movement, however, HiPeRLab scientists figured out a way for the drone itself to power all that flapping.

Previous limb-adjusting vehicles created by labs like Purdue University’s Engineering Technology school were outfitted with actuators that shifted the arms and rotors into different positions, making them more efficient in certain conditions like heavy winds. The HiPeRLab staff wanted to avoid inclusion of actuators, which draw off the drone’s batteries and thereby reduce its flight time. Their solution: use passive hinges whose up and down folding is powered by the rotors themselves.

Electric Vehicles

Self-propelled Airstream eStream is the future of travel trailers

January 28, 2022

Battery-powered camper is remote controlled

By Gary Gastelu |

Electric Ford F-150 Lightning revealed

The 2022 Ford F-150 Lightning pickup has been revealed with a starting price under $40G. The all-electric truck is the most powerful F-150 ever and offers a range up to 300 miles per charge.

This could really help put some punch in your campfire ghost stories.

The Airstream eStream concept travel trailer is battery-powered and self-propelled. (Airstream)

Airstream has built a self-powered electric travel trailer concept that can be maneuvered remotely without it being attached to a towing vehicle.

Amazon.com

Amazon is opening a real-world clothing store with high-tech fitting rooms

January 28, 2022

By Annie Palmer

Amazon is launching an apparel store, called Amazon Style, the company announced Thursday.
The first location, based in the Los Angeles suburb of Glendale, California, will open later this year.
Amazon has experimented with physical retail formats in grocery and books, but it has never sold clothing or shoes at those stores.

The stores will feature women’s and men’s apparel, shoes and accessories from a mix of well-known and emerging brands at affordable prices.Amazon

After upending brick-and-mortar retail, Amazon is opening a clothing store in the physical world.

The first Amazon Style store, located in the Los Angeles suburb of Glendale, California, will open its doors later this year, the company announced Thursday.

The store will feature women’s and men’s apparel, shoes, and accessories from a mix of well-known and emerging brands, with prices catering to a wide range of shoppers.

“You’ll find everything from the $10 basic to the designer jeans to the $400 timeless piece,” Simoina Vasen, managing director of Amazon Style, told CNBC. “We want to meet every budget and every price point.”

At roughly 30,000 square feet, the retail space is around the size of a typical T.J. Maxx location, but smaller than the average department store.

Space Flight

New AI navigation prevents crashes in space

January 28, 2022

University of Cincinnati engineering graduate Himadri Pandey holds a mockup cube satellite in a UC lab as part of a student club called the UC CubeCats. UC engineers are developing collision-avoidance systems that one day will help autonomous robots service, assemble or manufacture satellites in orbit.

By Michael Miller

What do you call a broken satellite?

Today, it’s a multimillion-dollar piece of dangerous space junk.

But a new collision-avoidance system developed by students at the University of Cincinnati is getting engineers closer to developing robots that can fix broken satellites or spacecraft in orbit.

UC College of Engineering and Applied Science doctoral students Daegyun Choi and Anirudh Chhabra presented their project at the Science and Technology Forum and Exposition in January in San Diego, California. Hosted by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, it’s the world’s largest aerospace engineering conference.

“We have to provide a reliable collision-avoidance algorithm that operates in real time for autonomous systems to perform a mission safely. So we proposed a new collision-avoidance system using explainable artificial intelligence,” Choi said.

He has been working on similar projects at UC for the past two years, publishing three articles in peer-reviewed journals based on Choi’s novel algorithms.

UC researchers tested their system in simulations, first by deploying robots in a two-dimensional space. Their chosen digital battlefield? A virtual supermarket where multiple autonomous robots must safely navigate aisles to help shoppers and employees.

“This scenario presents many of the same obstacles and surprises that an autonomous car sees on the road,” study co-author and UC assistant professor Donghoon Kim said.

“We can see unexpected human behaviors there and learn how well we can actually predict their follow-on motions,” Kim said. “Likewise, we can test how we can operate those robotic platforms autonomously without causing collisions.”

Driverless vehicles

PININFARINA DESIGNS SLEEK SEMI PACKED WITH LATEST AUTONOMOUS TECH

January 27, 2022

A quick-swap system can change the battery in six minutes.

By: Anthony Alaniz

Pininfarina has branched out far beyond its car design roots. The Italian design house has crafted a tractor, a driving simulator, and even Motor1.com‘s logo. Its latest, which hails from Pininfarina Shanghai, the company’s Chinese studio, looks like it could haul a fleet of Pininfarina creations. It’s called the DeepWay Xingtu, and it’s a sleek new semi-truck packed with the latest self-driving technologies and a stunningly futuristic cabin.

Fully autonomous vehicles that can go everywhere are still a dream and will remain one for several years. However, the road to that future will see the technology used in limited fashions, like in the trucking industry. The DeepWay Xingtu demonstrates what’s necessary to achieve it, designing the self-driving semi with 11 onboard cameras, an infrared detector, five millimeter-wave radars, and a LIDAR sensor. According to the company, the semi can achieve ultra-long-range detection of more than 1 kilometer.