I enjoy reading about how technology enables innovative solutions. Here are a list of some interesting links
E-textiles to Monitor Your Health
Virginia Tech (VT) researchers have been busy developing efficient e-textiles — electronic textiles and clothing with embedded wires and sensors — for six years now. Their computerized clothing can monitor your movements, sensing if you’re walking, running, standing, or sitting down.
Bridge Traffic Powers Its Monitoring Sensors
Researchers at Clarkson University, NY, have developed wireless bridge sensors which work without batteries. Instead, they are powered by the vibrations caused by passing traffic. This is good news for all the people in charge of maintaining bridges, who will no longer to have to replace batteries installed in hard-to-access locations.
Many research teams around the world are building nanodevices of some kind. But these very small devices need very small sources of power to be fully functional. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) have shown that a single nanowire can produce power by harvesting mechanical energy from its environment. ‘Made of piezoelectric material, the nanowire generates a voltage when mechanically deformed.’