Month: August 2012

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From Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now: Approved: The First Swallowable Electronic Devices

Smart Pills Proteus Biomedical
Digital pills that monitor you from withinNo matter how fast pharmaceutical companies can churn out drugs to prevent or cure illnesses, health insurance doesn’t cover the cost of hiring a person to follow you around and remind you to take your meds. So the FDA has approved a pill that can do it on its own by monitoring your insides and relaying the information back to a healthcare provider.

The pills, made by Proteus Digital Health, have sand-particle-sized silicon chips with small amounts of magnesium and copper on them. After they’re swallowed, they generate voltage as they make contact with digestive juices. That signals a patch on the person’s skin, which then relays a message to a mobile phone given to a healthcare provider. It’s only been approved for use with placebos right now, but the company is hoping to get it approved for use with other drugs (which would be where it would get the most use).

Even if there’s a slight whiff of dystopia about a pill that tracks your actions, it does help with a major problem. Patients aren’t the best at taking their pills, especially those suffering from chronic illnesses, so it’s one step of many toward a future where they don’t have to.

[Nature]

 

from Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now

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From Gizmodo: A Rocket Launcher and Flamethrower Fall in Love, and a Deadly Weapon Is Born

The M2 flamethrower utilized by Allied forces during WWII proved to be a devastatingly effective weapon against bunkers—and Axis psyches. However, walking around a firefight with a napalm-filled backpack and an effective range of 20m is a great way to become a crispy critter. So the US military developed the M202 FLASH rocket-propelled flamethrower. More »

from Gizmodo

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From Engadget: Kinect Toolbox update turns hand gestures into mouse input, physical contact into distant memory

Kinect Toolbox update turns our frantic gestures into mouse input

Using Microsoft’s Kinect to replace a mouse is often considered the Holy Grail of developers; there have been hacks and other tricks to get it working well before Kinect for Windows was even an option. A lead Technical Evangelist for Microsoft in France, David Catuhe, has just provided a less makeshift approach. The 1.2 update to his Kinect Toolbox side project introduces hooks to control the mouse outright, including ‘magnetic’ control to draw the mouse from its original position. To help keep the newly fashioned input (among other gestures) under control, Catuhe has also taken advantage of the SDK 1.5 release to check that the would-be hand-waver is sitting and staring at the Kinect before accepting any input. The open-source Windows software is available to grab for experimentation today, so if you think hands-free belongs as much on the PC desktop as in a car, you now have a ready-made way to make the dream a reality… at least, until you have to type.

 

from Engadget

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From Engadget: China’s new liquid oxygen and kerosene-fueled rocket engine lights up for testing

China's new liquid oxygen and kerosenefueld rocket engine lights up for testing

Liquid oxygen and kerosene, that’s what fuels China’s new — and freshly tested — rocket engine. When fired up on Sunday, it withstood temperatures as high as 5,432 degrees Fahrenheit (3,000 degrees Celsius) for 200 seconds and powered through almost 20,000 revolutions per minute in a rotational test. “The successful tests confirm the reliability of China’s LOX / kerosene engine,” test commander Lai Daichu told China Daily. According to China Central Television, the engine is non-toxic, pollution-free and the first of its kind for which China holds proprietary intellectual property rights — though similar engines have been used by other space agencies. The engine is on track to lend the upcoming Long March 5 rocket a total of 118 tons of thrust, giving it enough oomph to launch a 25-ton payload into low-earth orbit or 14-ton cargo into geostationary orbit. Its expected to haul additional portions of the country’s space station and aid lunar exploration, but the first voyage isn’t slated until 2014.

[Image Credit: China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation]

from Engadget

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From Droid Life: Amazon Cloud Player and MP3 App Receive Updates, Audiophiles in For a Treat

Today, Amazon has pushed an update to both their online Cloud Player and MP3 mobile applications. To say the updates are major is almost an understatement. For starters, you can now use Amazon’s scan and match feature that will make uploading your library to the cloud much faster, as well as the ability to add past MP3 purchases to the Cloud for free. The new feature that most music lovers will be happy about is that Amazon now offers to turn your library of music (as long as they have it) into high quality 256 Kbps audio files. Yes please.

New features include:

  • Import your music to Cloud Player faster with scan and match technology
  • Upgrade your music to high-quality 256 Kbps audio
  • Add your past Amazon MP3 purchases to Cloud Player automatically…for free
  • Edit song and album information
  • Import more types of music files

The updates are live now, so for anyone that has their music stored on the Cloud Player, go get your free high quality files!

Via: Amazon

from Droid Life