Zmirror all-in-one smart mirror acts as a personal assistant

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The revolutionary Zmirror all-in-one smart mirror eliminates the need for all other vanity desk products. Its superiority is defined in the high-quality Harman Kardon speakers often found in luxury cars like BMWs and Range Rovers, but it doesn’t stop there.

As a CES 2020 Innovation Awards Winner, Zmirror takes smart speakers to the next level. That’s thanks to its seven-inch LCD touchscreen on the nine-inch diameter tempered glass mirror. If you don’t feel like touching the mirror or your hands are full, easily use Amazon Alexa voice control. That means this all-in-one smart mirror can even tell you the weather, search YouTube, read Kindle books, and more.

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Versatile building blocks make structures with surprising mechanical properties

by David Chandler, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Four types of discretely assembled mechanical metamaterials. Left to right: Rigid, compliant, auxetic, and chiral. (A) As-molded face parts. (B) Single voxel, front view. (C) A 2 × 2 × 2 cube, front view. (D) Single voxel, oblique view. (E) A 2 × 2 × 2 oblique view. Scale bars, 10 mm (A), 25 mm (B and D), and 50 mm (C and E). Photo credit: Benjamin Jenett, MIT. Credit: Science Advances (2020). doi/10.1126/sciadv.abc9943

Researchers at MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms have created tiny building blocks that exhibit a variety of unique mechanical properties, such as the ability to produce a twisting motion when squeezed. These subunits could potentially be assembled by tiny robots into a nearly limitless variety of objects with built-in functionality, including vehicles, large industrial parts, or specialized robots that can be repeatedly reassembled in different forms.

he researchers created four different types of these subunits, called voxels (a 3-D variation on the pixels of a 2-D image). Each voxel type exhibits special properties not found in typical natural materials, and in combination they can be used to make devices that respond to environmental stimuli in predictable ways. Examples might include airplane wings or turbine blades that respond to changes in air pressure or wind speed by changing their overall shape.

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The Best Bitcoin Debit Cards To Use In 2021

Want to buy with cryptocurrency in any shop? You can—sort of. All you need is a crypto debit card; we’ve picked out the best options.

Robert Stevens – December 2,2020

  • Crypto debit cards enable you to pay using cryptocurrency at any store that accepts debit cards.
  • You can use crypto debit cards at ATMs, in shops, and on online merchants.
  • There are a number of different options available, supporting a range of cryptocurrencies and offering a selection of fees and cashback incentives.
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Web Summit 2019: This is what the house of 2025 could look like

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The way we sleep, eat and retreat from the world around us is poised for significant transformation, David Eun, Samsung’s Chief Innovation Officer, told this week at Web Summit.

Eun presented a sketch of Samsung’s vision for the house of the future. The aim is to foster experiences on a foundation of technology and innovation, he said, “the likes of which we have never seen before.”

With the advent of 5G, the percentage of connected devices in the home will continue to grow, “and in the near future, the question won’t be how many devices are connected. The question will actually be, how many devices are not connected.”

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Construction tech startups are poised to shake up a $1.3-trillion-dollar industry

 Rebar Construction

Rebar is laid before poring a cement slab for an apartment in San Francisco CA.

In the wake of COVID-19 this spring, construction sites across the nation emptied out alongside neighboring restaurants, retail stores, offices and other commercial establishments. Debates ensued over whether the construction industry’s seven million employees should be considered “essential,” while regulations continued to shift on the operation of job sites. Meanwhile, project demand steadily shrank.

Amidst the chaos, construction firms faced an existential question: How will they survive? This question is as relevant today as it was in April. As one of the least-digitized sectors of our economy, construction is ripe for technology disruption.

Construction is a massive, $1.3 trillion industry in the United States — a complex ecosystem of lenders, owners, developers, architects, general contractors, subcontractors and more. While each construction project has a combination of these key roles, the construction process itself is highly variable depending on the asset type. Roughly 41% of domestic construction value is in residential property, 25% in commercial property and 34% in industrial projects. Because each asset type, and even subassets within these classes, tends to involve a different set of stakeholders and processes, most construction firms specialize in one or a few asset groups.

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AI warning : Robot soldiers only 15 years away from ‘changing face’ of warfare – expert

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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE (AI) empowered fighting robots will soon transform combat, a military expert has warned.

General Sir Nick Carter, the UK’s Chief of Defence last week suggested the British Army may one day fill its ranks with “robot soldiers”. This may seem like a daunting prospect, and one that will never come to fruition – but a military expert has now predicted such highly-intelligent military robots are actually a mere 15 years away from “changing the face” of warfare.

The high-tech machines will employ cutting-edge AI to inform strategy concerning the “layout of the land and possible threats” in real-time, Charles Glar has revealed.

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Mini Urbanaut concept hints at how its cars could look in a decade

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Mini Urbanaut concept hints at how its cars could look by the time new petrol and diesel vehicles are banned – and it can convert into a living room on wheels at the push of a button

  • Mini has unveiled an electric and self-driving compact car concept it sees as a vision for vehicles sold in 2030
  • At a turn of a switch, the Urbanaut mini-MPV doubles as a relaxing sanctuary for drivers and passengers
  • It features a comfortable sofa in the rear, fold-down dashboard day-bed, rotating chairs and a dining table
  • The windscreen swings open from the top hinges to provide what designers have called a ‘street balcony’

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China built the first electric car designed exclusively for ride-hailing

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The D1 is a partnership between Didi Chuxing and BYD

Two of China’s top companies have joined forces to design, develop, and build an electric car for the express purpose of ride-hailing.

The vehicle is an adorable green hatchback called the D1, and it was developed by Didi Chuxing, the top ride-hailing company in China that notoriously defeated Uber in 2016, and BYD, one of the leading electric vehicle manufacturers. The D1 will have a range of 418 km (260 miles) as judged by NEDC (New European Driving Cycle). They also explained some of the more interesting design touches that make this vehicle particularly well-suited for app-based ride-hailing.

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The first camera for blind people

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2C3D is a camera that enables the blinds to see. The camera, is a development and design of a tactile camera concept for the vision impaired. The camera creates 3D photos and videos and has a 3D screen. The screen, inspired by “Pin Toy,” is built by numerous 3D pixels that shift depending on the photo to forms the 3D shot on the screen surface (giving the term “touch screen” a new and more literal interpretation).

The user can touch the screen while photographing and feel what the camera is seeing, in real time. When the users like what they feels, they can click and save the photo. The saved 3D file can be felt again later. The 2C3D performs as a camera for blind and as physical-digital photo album.

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India is in the middle of a much-needed start-up revolution

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India now has 38,756 officially-recognised start-ups –– with 27 unicorns, eight of which achieved this status in 2020 –– and is the third-largest tech start-up hub globally.

Entrepreneurs today are utilising the unprecedented advances from technology, operating on the demands of our demography, and inadvertently steering citizen welfare.

Five years since Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Start-Up India initiative, we are witnessing a golden chapter in the history of Indian entrepreneurship.

India now has 38,756 officially-recognised start-ups –– with 27 unicorns, eight of which achieved this status in 2020 –– and is the third-largest tech start-up hub globally.

According to Praxis Global Alliance, start-ups are growing at an average rate of 12–15% annually. Start-ups have raised $63 billion between 2016–20 in funding, $20 billion of which was raised in 2019 over 1,854 deals. Investments in start-ups are growing incrementally each year ($12 billion, $25.2 billion, $26.3 billion, and $34 billion invested in the last four years, respectively), with $16.7 billion till May 2020. Start-Up India kickstarted an entrepreneurship revolution. Several policy interventions were since announced, giving the entrepreneurial ecosystem a much-needed launchpad. The overhaul of the digital payments ecosystem is being led by State innovation, with Aadhaar, Jan Dhan, UPI, and India Stack. The Atal Innovation Mission, Niti Aayog, has built an ecosystem of 8,800 tinkering labs, 4,000 mentors and over two-and-a-half million students, and acted as a conduit for over 3,500 innovations while supporting 1,500 start-ups.

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Tesla opens world’s largest Supercharger station

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It is located between two of Tesla’s biggest markets.

Tesla has been quickly expanding its Supercharger network lately and it just reached another milestone by opening the world’s new largest Supercharger station.

Tesla’s fleet is growing at a fast pace and the automaker is adding more electric vehicles to the road than any other automaker.

At the same time, the company is trying to keep up its infrastructure, like service centers, mobile service fleet, and charging infrastructure in order to support its growing fleet.

Tesla’s charging infrastructure mainly consists of the Supercharger network, arguably one of the company’s greatest assets.

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Smart concrete could pave the way for high-tech , cost-effective roads

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 Every day, Americans travel on roads, bridges, and highways without considering the safety or reliability of these structures. Yet much of the transportation infrastructure in the US is outdated, deteriorating, and badly in need of repair.

Of the 614,387 bridges in the US, for example, 39 percent are older than their designed lifetimes, while nearly 10 percent are structurally deficient, meaning they could begin to break down faster or, worse, be vulnerable to catastrophic failure.

The cost to repair and improve nationwide transportation infrastructure ranges from nearly US$190 billion to almost $1 trillion. Repairing US infrastructure costs individual households, on average, about $3,400 every year. Traffic congestion alone is estimated to cost the average driver $1,400 in fuel and time spent commuting, a nationwide tally of more than $160 billion per year.

I am a professor in the Lyles School of Civil Engineering and the director of the Center for Intelligent Infrastructures at Purdue University. My co-author, Vishal Saravade, is part of my team at the Sustainable Materials and Renewable Technology (SMART) Lab. The SMART Lab researches and develops new technologies to make American infrastructure “intelligent,” safer, and more cost-effective. These new systems self-monitor the condition of roads and bridges quickly and accurately and can, sometimes, even repair themselves.

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Discover the Hidden Patterns of Tomorrow with Futurist Thomas Frey
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By delving into the futuring techniques of Futurist Thomas Frey, you’ll embark on an enlightening journey.

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