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MIT Engineers Develop Autonomous “Selfie Drone”

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If you’re a rock climber, hiker, runner, dancer, or anyone who likes recording themselves while in motion, a personal drone companion can now do all the filming for you — completely autonomously. Skydio MIT  alumni, is commercializing an autonomous video-capturing drone — dubbed by some as the “selfie drone” — that tracks and films a subject, while freely navigating any environment. , a San Francisco-based startup founded by three Called R1, the drone is equipped with 13 cameras that capture omnidirectional video. It launches and lands through an app — or by itself. On the app, the R1 can also be preset to certain filming and flying conditions or be controlled manually. The concept for the R1 started taking shape almost a decade ago at MIT, where the co-founders — Adam Bry SM ’12, Abraham Bacharach PhD ’12, and Matt Donahoe SM ’11 — first met and worked on advanced, prize-winning autonomous drones. Skydio launched in 2014 and is releasing the R1 to consumers this week. ...
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System to Minimize Injury and Damage When Self-Driving Vehicles Crash

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Engineers have developed decision-making and motion-planning technology to limit injuries and damage when self-driving vehicles are involved in unavoidable crashes. After recognizing that a collision of some kind is inevitable, the system works by analyzing all available options and choosing the course of action with the least serious outcome. “What can we do in order to minimize the consequences?” said Amir Khajepour, a professor of mechanical and mechatronics engineering at the  University of Waterloo . “That is our focus.” The first rule for the autonomous vehicle (AV) crash-mitigation technology is avoiding collisions with pedestrians. From there, it weighs factors such as relative speeds, angles of collision and differences in mass and vehicle type to determine the best possible maneuver, such as braking or steering in one direction or another. “We consider the whole traffic environment perceived by the autonomous vehicle, including all the other vehicles and obsta...
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The best new Mobile World Congress 2019 smartphones and gadgets

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If you follow the technical news, you've probably noticed many new smartphones in the last few days. In fact, the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona is underway and the producers are fighting for your attention. There are many new features to record, so here's a simple overview of the new things you need to know about MWC 2019. Samsung started with the folding phone Last week marked the announcement of a whole series of Samsung gadgets just before the start of the MWC. The most practical announcement was the Galaxy S10 with a practical fingerprint sensor located under the screen itself. The most interesting new device, however, was the Galaxy Fold, which opens to reveal a 7.3-inch screen that works like a tablet. Huawei Mate X is a thinner folding phone with a larger screen Although the Huawei phone folds, it is very different from that of Samsung. Mate X has a 6.6-inch main screen in the front and a 6.38-inch screen in the back. Open the device and it becomes an 8 inc...
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New Technology Can Instantly Identify Airborne Chemicals – Down to Parts-Per-Billion

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A Raman laser shining on the special chip, which traps gases and amplifies the laser signals, allowing for rapid analysis. Credit: NTU Singapore Scientists at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have developed a device that can identify a wide range of airborne gases and chemicals instantly. The new prototype device is portable and suitable for rapid deployment by agencies to identify airborne hazards, such as from tiny gas molecules like sulfur dioxide. It can also identify larger compound molecules such as benzene, known to be harmful to human health. It can provide real-time monitoring of air quality such as during haze outbreaks, and assist in the detection of gas leaks and industrial air pollution. Developed by a research team led by Associate Professor Ling Xing Yi at the School of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, the new technology was reported last month in science journal  ACS Nano . Current methods of identifying...
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Over 25 positive and negative effects of video games

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Are video games good or bad for you? It could be both. Video games are dismissed by parents as a waste of time and, worse still, some education experts believe that these games damage the brain. Playing violent video games is easily due to the media and some experts as the reason why some young people become violent or show extreme anti-social behavior. But many scientists and psychologists believe that video games can actually have many advantages: the most important thing is to make children smart. Video games can even teach children the high-level thinking skills they will need in the future. "Video games made your brain," said University of Wisconsin C. Shawn Green psychologist. Playing video games changes the physical structure of the brain in the same way as learning to read, play the piano or navigate with a map. Just as exercise can create muscles, the powerful combination of concentration and gratifying fluctuations of neurotransmitters like dopamine strengthens t...
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IPhone XS Camera Review: complicated technology for easier photography

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Every time you take a photo with the new iPhone, you activate billions of edits. Learning the art of photography has always entailed at least some math. Whether it was the relatively simple calculations that were needed to understand the exposure parameters or the almost impenetrable combination of numbers needed to navigate through the parameters in an old-fashioned flash, there were always numbers behind the process. What is a candle? Modern cameras, however, bring even more math than anything else in the past. In fact, Apple's new iPhone XS Max camera makes "billions" of calculations, but you, the shooter, never see them. In fact, it is only thanks to a new functionality (which has nothing to do with the real mechanics of photography) that the camera of the iPhone even mentions a photographic concept of a fundamental time such as the number f, which tells you how much light your lens passes through can leave the aperture. I filmed for a few days with the iP...
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What's Inside a Smart Ring?

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Since very few smart rings are actually being sold, it's hard to know exactly what's inside these finger-mounted devices, but we do have some clues. The backbone of every smart ring is Bluetooth technology. Bluetooth is a close-range wireless technology that allows any two Bluetooth-enabled devices to communicate with each other as far away as 328 feet (100 meters) [source: Bluetooth]. You've probably seen hands-free Bluetooth headsets that let you make cell phone calls without actually holding the phone. Like those headsets, smart rings contain a Bluetooth chip, which is really a small radio that can transmit and receive signals from nearby devices. Like many Bluetooth-enabled devices, smart rings need to be paired with a smartphone to work. Once your phone recognizes and pairs with the smart ring, the two devices can talk to each other. Bluetooth makes it possible for smart rings to function as notification devices, and also as remote controls for Bluetooth-enab...
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