Month: May 2018

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Scientists Are Using AI to Painstakingly Assemble Single Atoms

Scientists Are Using AI to Painstakingly Assemble Single Atoms

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Forget ruby-encrusted swords or diamond-tipped chainsaws. The scanning probe microscope is, quite literally, the sharpest object ever made. Hidden under its bulky silver exterior is a thin metal wire, as fine as a human hair. And at one end, its point tapers to the width of a single atom.

Scientists wield the wire not as a weapon, but as an intricate paintbrush—using its needlelike tip to position single atoms on a tiny semiconductor canvas. Ever since scientists at IBM invented the scanning probe microscope some 35 years ago, researchers have used it to create designs both goofy and groundbreaking. They’ve written nanometer-sized letters and Chinese characters. They’ve produced a stop-motion film out of individual carbon monoxide molecules. And they’ve used the machine to make the tiniest transistor of all time—out of a single atom.

A tungsten wire, a quarter milimeter at its base, sharpened to a single atom wide.

Robert Wolkow/University of Alberta

But it’s hard to use the scanning probe microscope. Single atoms are finicky, so using the machine requires patience and precision. Over the last few years, Bob Wolkow has been working to tame this temperamental tool—and now, he thinks he’s streamlined its operation enough for manufacturing. His grand plan: use the machine to make new types of chips that could usher in a new era of computing.

His chip design involves assembling minute circuits, atom by atom, on conventional silicon computer chips. These circuits offer many perks for the next generation of computers, says Wolkow, a physicist at the University of Alberta in Canada—including energy efficiency.

Currently, transistors in computer chips represent binary information by holding onto electrons (a “1”) or dumping them to ground (“0”). This means that as you write and record information, your computer has to shuttle a lot of electrons around, which uses a lot of energy. Wolkow’s team has developed a circuit design that encodes information in the atoms’ patterns. Atoms arranged in different ways correspond to different binary numbers. So to record data, you just need enough energy to rearrange the atoms, which is much less than what you’d need to move around torrents of electrons,.

They know how to perform most of the steps for efficiently assembling these circuits now. So here’s Wolkow’s pitch: Give his team $20 million to buy a fleet of scanning probe microscopes, and they’ll put all the steps together, plopping single atoms on chips at scale. “For the first time, I’m openly saying that I think I can manufacture a million chips per year,” says Wolkow, who also serves as the chief technology officer at an Alberta-based company, Quantum Silicon. “I couldn’t make one per year a few years ago.”

So what’s changed? Wolkow has, in some form, worked to make single atom circuits for 30 years now—studying promising materials to death, tinkering with his microscope, and making incremental progress. But in the last few years, researchers have developed tools to streamline the scanning probe microscope. Wolkow’s group has developed what they call “atomic whiteout,” a technique for correcting errors when laying single atoms. Dallas-based company Zyvex Labs has created software packages for automating the atom-plopping. And publishing in ACS Nano on Wednesday, Wolkow’s research group has developed an automated method for sharpening the machine’s wire tip using machine learning. This moment, he says, could be a turning point where companies could actually start to make viable products, atom by atom.

Wolkow’s machine learning algorithm distinguishes between a wire tip that is a single atom wide (left) and a blunted tip (right).

Robert Wolkow/University of Alberta

Wolkow’s not alone in his excitement. European scientists have used scanning probe microscopes to construct computer memories from single atoms. Australian researchers have made quantum computer components by precisely positioning phosphorus atoms on a silicon chip. Chemists want to use the machine to manufacture catalysts from individual atoms. And in the last few years, the Department of Energy has singled out projects that use atomically precise technology for funding. “People are taking this much more seriously,” says engineer John Randall of Zyvex Labs.

These automated processes could benefit other realms of science, too. In addition to its atom-arranging capabilities, the machine can capture high-resolution magnified images when you hover its delicate wire tip over cells and molecules. But it’s boring work, says physics graduate student Sara Mueller of Ohio State University, who uses the machine to research properties of new materials. She spends a lot of time examining the end of her microscope tip, to make sure it’s a single atom thick. An automated sharpening process would speed her work significantly.

The scanning probe microscope.

Robert Wolkow/University of Alberta

But not everybody is convinced that single-atom mass manufacturing is imminent. Chemist Paul Ashby of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, who studies molecules with scanning probe microscopes and works on the machinery itself, says that the instrument has some significant hardware limitations. Right now, with a single wire tip, you can only arrange atoms on a tiny 0.1 millimeter square. To draw a circuit bigger than that, you’d need multiple wire tips next to each other in close proximity, which would interfere with each other and lower the precision of the entire machine. Researchers don’t know how to fix that yet, and it’s the key bottleneck, says Ashby. “Automation does not address this at all,” he says.

Still, Wolkow is optimistic. “People still say, ‘Bob’s crazy,’” he says. “But we have so much single atom control now, and the tools have advanced so much.”

And even if Wolkow doesn’t pull off his manufacturing vision, he’s making it easier for other researchers to use scanning probe microscopes. Right now, Mueller has to keep checking—and double-checking—that the machine tip is operating properly before she can trust the data she takes. “There’s no high-level thinking involved,” she says. “It’s just tedious.” Automation frees researchers from the most mind-numbing tasks—so they can focus on the cool stuff.

More Great WIRED Stories

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May 23, 2018 at 07:06AM

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Boeing’s new 777x planes have wings so wide they need to fold just to fit at the gate

Boeing’s new 777x planes have wings so wide they need to fold just to fit at the gate

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When airborne, the forthcoming Boeing 777x aircraft will have a majestic wingspan of 235 feet. Unfortunately, that’s too big to fit at the type of airport gate intended for 777s. So rather than clipping the plane’s wings—or asking airports to make bigger gates—Boeing engineers gave them hinges, so the tips could fold up and down. That reduces the wingspan to a mere 212 feet.

Boeing received official approval for the innovative new design on May 18, when the FAA published a document in the Federal Register explaining the “special conditions” the aircraft maker has to follow with the new aircraft design.

Boeing 777 aircrafts are twin-engine, wide-body planes that currently have wings that stretch just under 213 feet. So why endure the added length, and thus the complexity that goes with the folding mechanisms, when making new aircraft?

These longer wings, which are made of carbon fiber, are more fuel-efficient. “It’s all because it lowers the drag,” says Gary Ullrich, an associate professor at the John D. Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences at the University of North Dakota and a former Air Force pilot. He’s also a coauthor of the textbook Aerodynamics for Aviators.

Longer wings, Ullrich says, cut down on the vortices, or wake turbulence, that can form at the wingtips, which is why these lengthy wings slice through the air with less drag, saving fuel and thus money.

Think of a fighter jet, which has short stubby wings, and compare it to a glider’s, he says. The fighter’s short wings are going to create bigger vortices, and more drag, than the glider’s. “They have a 777, and they want to turn it into a glider,” Ullrich says. In fact, he says that with two identical aircraft, both with wingspans of the same surface area, a longer wing will have less drag, and be more efficient, than a shorter one. (Technically this type of drag is called “induced drag.”)

But since these new 777s—which will be called the 777-8 and 777-9, and will be able to seat as many as 375 and 425 people, respectively—need to fit at the gate, those long wings fold up. But that comes at a cost, one of which is additional complexity, Ullrich says.

The FAA points out in its Special Conditions document that the folding wing ability will only work when the plane is on the ground, and that the company does not plan to store fuel in the folding sections. And since it would be disastrous if the wingtips were to fold in flight, or if the plane were to try to take off with the wings not in the proper position, Boeing has to take the design aspect of this new feature very seriously.

“We think about the redundancy of the actual fold mechanism—the locking pins, the latches—we have a primary and secondary latch system,” Boeing engineer Terry Beezhold said in a video. “We have multiple layers of redundancy, and layers of protection, to ensure that the folding wingtip always remains extended in flight, and only folds when it’s commanded [when the plane is on the ground].”

Military airplanes on carriers have already been using folding wings to take up less space. Ullrich says that he finds its use in the commercial realm “refreshing.”

“This is something that’s been looked at for a long time,” he says. “Due to weight issues, and complexity issues, it’s been hard to implement this in the world of civilian flying.” The plane is scheduled for delivery in 2020.

Tech

via Popular Science – New Technology, Science News, The Future Now https://ift.tt/2k2uJQn

May 22, 2018 at 04:43PM

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iPhone owners can now use Yubikey NFC tags to unlock apps

iPhone owners can now use Yubikey NFC tags to unlock apps

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Yubico

Digital security has always been paramount, but the advent of tablets and smartphones has allowed us take much more data with us on the go. A combination of two-factor authentication and effective password management is usually enough to keep nefarious types away from your accounts, but Yubico has introduced an extra layer of safety for iOS that lets you seamlessly log into apps by hovering a YubiKey behind your phone.

YubiKey is a small USB authentication device which acts as a second line of defence. It removes the need to toggle between apps and jot down temporary codes, and reduces the potential risks associated with mobile and SMS notifications. And depending on your typing speed, YubiKey is up to four times quicker than entering a one-time password (OTP) yourself.

While Yubico’s hardware based authentication supported Android devices for a number of years, iPhone support was made possible thanks to iOS 11, which rolled out last year. It enabled NFC (near-field communication) tag reading — a feature which lets developers construct apps that utilize an OTP. To coincide with the launch, password management service LastPass has integrated YubiKey NEO support inside the most recent version of its iOS app.

A large majority of hacking breaches are due to weak passwords, but OTP solutions like YubiKey make your apps significantly harder to crack into. LastPass isn’t the only service taking advantage of YubiKey’s added physical security. Internet giants like Google are fond of it as well, and Facebook and Mozilla have recently opened their platforms to support the hardware security solution.

Tech

via Engadget http://www.engadget.com

May 23, 2018 at 08:54AM

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Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 review: Meet the child of Intel and AMD’s unholy union

Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 review: Meet the child of Intel and AMD’s unholy union

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  • The Dell XPS 15 2-in-1. It’s pretty thin for a 2-in-1.


    Samuel Axon

  • The side of the Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 with the lid open.


    Samuel Axon

  • The laptop from behind.


    Samuel Axon

  • The Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 with the lid closed.


    Samuel Axon

  • The bottom of the machine, with a large fan vent.


    Samuel Axon

  • The back with the lid closed. This is the laptop’s thickest point.


    Samuel Axon

  • One side, so you can see the tapered design.


    Samuel Axon

  • This is the other side.


    Samuel Axon

  • The left side has two Thunderbolt 3 ports with four PCIe lanes.


    Samuel Axon

  • The other side just has USB-C.


    Samuel Axon

  • It’s difficult to determine thickness from a photo with the device on its own, so here’s a 2016 15-inch MacBook Pro with Touch Bar stacked on top of the Dell XPS 15 2-in-1.


    Samuel Axon

  • This is another angle on the two machines for comparison.


    Samuel Axon

This new Dell XPS 15 2-in-1 is the first convertible in the XPS 15 line, but that’s not the most interesting thing about it.

Since 2010, Dell’s XPS 15 has been a reliable, 15-inch performance workhorse and a light gaming option for users who aren’t impressed by the over-the-top designs of dedicated gaming laptops. Last year’s model, for example, impressed with strong performance from the discrete GeForce GTX 1050 GPU. But discrete GPUs have many downsides. They take up space, use lots of energy, and generate a lot of heat, which impacts both portability and battery life.

Tech

via Ars Technica https://arstechnica.com

May 23, 2018 at 06:33AM

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The Tesla Model X’s Sand Rollover Test Is Fascinating

The Tesla Model X’s Sand Rollover Test Is Fascinating

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Tesla tweeted out a video Sunday morning of its Tesla Model X rolling over after being shoved onto a sandbox by a sled. But even if the tweet read “…the first and only SUV to achieve a NHTSA 5-Star safety rating in every category…” this rollover isn’t the test conducted by the U.S. government, it seems to be a “Soil-Trip” rollover test done internally. Here’s how it works.

My coworkers and I were curious to learn more about this sandbox rollover test after seeing this video Tesla posted on Twitter:

I’ve reached out to Tesla to learn more, but even though they haven’t gotten back to me, a bit of research shows that this is not the government’s rollover test—which I’ll describe in a bit—but rather a “soil trip” test likely meant to simulate what would happen if the Model X left the road and slid sideways onto a soft surface like sand or dirt. (InsideEVs also describes this as an internal test.)

We don’t know how fast Tesla’s tests were conducted, but this 30 mph test of a 2003 Ford Expedition is pretty gnarly:

Such a test isn’t uncommon in the auto industry, with BMW showing off its crash test facility a few years back—a facility that included a sand pit for this very soil-trip test:

In a Siemens research paper on vehicle rollover protection, authors Linstromberg, Scholpp and Sherf describe a typical soil-trip test involving a “flying floor” ramming into energy-absorbing “deformation tubes,” writing:

The soil-trip rollover is a lateral movement of the car into a sand bed. The car is placed on a flying floor and slides laterally into the sand after a sharp deceleration of the sled with deformation tubes.

To describe why such a test is relevant, the report cites a 2003 SAE paper on the importance of various rollover tests in simulating real-world crashes—a paper whose abstract reads, in part:

Rollovers were most commonly induced when the lateral motion of the vehicle was suddenly slowed or stopped. This type of rollover mechanism is referred to as “trip-over”. Trip-overs accounted for 57% of passenger car and 51% of light truck vehicle (LTV) rollovers. More than 90% of trip-overs were initiated by ground contact.

The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration says that, according to its data, 95 percent of “single-vehicle rollovers” are tripped, with the organization including an animation of such a crash on its website, and describing how it occurs:

This happens when a vehicle leaves the roadway and slides sideways, digging its tires into soft soil or striking an object such as a curb or guardrail. The high tripping force applied to the tires in these situations can cause the vehicle to roll over.

So it seems like such a test makes sense if you really want to simulate the most likely real-world rollover conditions. What exactly Tesla is measuring with this test shown in the video, I’m unsure, but a paper written by Nissan Engineers for the Society for Automotive Engineers gives a clue of why an automaker might be conducting such a test.

According to the paper, automakers could use such a test to ensure compliance with Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 226, whose aim it is to reduce occupant ejection from cars during crashes.

Vehicle manufacturers have to define their own test procedures, because FMVSS 226 does not define any rollover test methods.The soil trip rollover test is a vehicle rollover test method in which a vehicle is propelled into a soil pool to measure its rollover characteristics.

So perhaps Tesla is testing out their occupant ejection mitigation tech, here. Or maybe not. Who knows. In either case, this test is very much not what got the Model X its five-star rating from NHTSA, because the feds running markedly different tests to get their rollover star-rating.

You can see the Tesla Model X’s rollover rating above: It’s five stars (thanks to that low-mounted battery pack), making it the only SUV to score top marks in all categories, according to a NHTSA representative. Under the rating, you’ll see a “rollover resistance” of 9.3 percent and a dynamic tip result of “No Tip.”

The tests done to come up with these results are not what’s shown in Tesla’s video. In fact, NHTSA’s “Rollover Resistance” percentage isn’t really the result of a crash test. It stems from something called the “Static Stability Factor,” which is based on two geometric measurements: track width and vehicle center of gravity:

Measuring the track width, T, is fairly straightforward, with the test facility using two “Tire Edge Determination Tools” and a tape measure, with the final result being the average of a bunch of different track width measurements to minimize error.

The center of gravity, H, of the vehicle is a little more complex, requiring the vehicle to be driven or loaded onto a pendulum device like a “Vehicle Inertia Measurement Facility.” Here’s NHTSA’s full description of how this H value is determined:

The platform is connected to a pivot that is above the combined vehicle and platform center-of-gravity height. The platform and vehicle are then tilted in a stable manner by applying known weights at either end of the platform. Detailed error analyses have indicated that this method provides very good results for H measurement?

Once researchers have T and H, that’s all that’s needed to come up with a Static Stability Factory, an “at-rest laboratory measurement” that NHTSA says is an indicator of how top-heavy a vehicle is.

For a while, NHTSA’s rollover rating was based solely on this geometry-based calculation, but in 2004, the feds added the “dynamic tip result” that you see under the Model X’s five-star rating. That came about after Congress asked NHTSA to devise a dynamic test in the “Transportation Recall, Enhancement, Accountability and Documentation (TREAD) Act of November 2000.”

What NHTSA came up with was the “Fishhook” test, which is meant to represent an avoidance maneuver done at speeds up to 50 mph, with The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety describing it in their contemporary press release, saying:

Under the new rating system, a vehicle can improve its score based on static measurements if it successfully undergoes the fishhook maneuver without tipping up on two wheels. Vehicles are tested with a simulated five-passenger load starting at 35 mph and then in 5 mph increments up to a maximum of 50 mph.

Here’s IIHS’s graphic of how the current government rollover test works by including both the static stability factor and the fishhook maneuver:

In any case, while it’s not a government-mandated test but an internal one and while Tesla’s tweet sort of implies that one relates to the other, the Model X inarguably fares pretty well. I’d rather be in that than the Explorer, government test or internal one.

I’ll update this post if Tesla gets back to us on the details of the test.

Tech

via Gizmodo http://gizmodo.com

May 22, 2018 at 12:15PM

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Xfinity website bug revealed home addresses and Wi-Fi passwords

Xfinity website bug revealed home addresses and Wi-Fi passwords

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RiverNorthPhotography via Getty Images

This week, ZDNet reported that a Comcast website used to activate Xfinity routers was leaking personal data, including a person’s home address, the name of the Wi-Fi network and password. This bug was first uncovered by two researchers, Karan Saini and Ryan Stevenson.

Saini and Stevenson found that they only needed a customer ID and house or apartment number (not the full address) in order to force the website to deliver the information. This, in spite of the fact that the form did request a full address. This information can be obtained from a discarded bill, or if an attacker only has the ID, they can guess a house/apartment number.

ZDNet was able to confirm that the bug indeed returned home addresses, as well as Wi-Fi username and password information in plain text. For one user they tested who didn’t use Xfinity’s router, the website returned the home address but not the username or password of the Wi-Fi network (another reason to always use your own router). If this wasn’t bad enough, it’s possible someone could have used this method to rename a Wi-Fi network or change the password, locking someone out of their own network.

Comcast is aware of the issue and has removed the option from its website. “There’s nothing more important than our customers’ security,” a Comcast spokesperson told ZDNet. “Within hours of learning of this issue, we shut it down. We are conducting a thorough investigation and will take all necessary steps to ensure that this doesn’t happen again.” Still, considering that the service just introduced its mesh routers last night, the timing of this discovery isn’t great. It’s good that the company acted quickly, but it doesn’t change the fact that this breach of security happened in the first place.

Tech

via Engadget http://www.engadget.com

May 22, 2018 at 12:18PM

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A ‘Solid’ Idea for Powering Spacecraft: Thermoacoustics

A ‘Solid’ Idea for Powering Spacecraft: Thermoacoustics

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Billy Hurley, Digital Editorial Manager

Applying heat to a liquid or gas will cause the spontaneous generation of sound waves – a thermoacoustic power that has long supported machines like engines and refrigerators.

At the 175th Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, researchers from Purdue University demonstrated that thermoacoustics properties could theoretically occur in solids too.

Temperature gradients, when applied to liquids, produce waste heat or mechanical vibrations that be converted into other useful forms of energy.

Refrigerators, for example, use vibrating motion to make cold areas colder and warm areas warmer. Waste heat generates the necessary mechanical vibrations for engines.

The thermoacoustics machines, however, have been fluid-based.

The Purdue researchers developed a theoretical model – a solid one – demonstrating that a thin metal rod exhibits self-sustained mechanical vibrations when a temperature gradient is periodically applied.

According to the team, the solids can be engineered to achieve necessary thermoacoustics performance.

“Fluids do not allow us to do this,” said lead researcher and Purdue assistant professor of mechanical engineering Fabio Semperlotti.

Like fluids, the solids were shown to contract when cooled down, and expand when heated. If the solid contracts less when cooled and expands more when heated, the resulting motion will increase over time.

Semperlotti spoke with Tech Briefs about why his concept is a solid one, perhaps especially for applications in space.

Tech Briefs: Regarding an engine, what are the advantages of solids vs. fluids?

Semperlotti: Material properties of solids are much more controllable and “tailorable” than fluids: one can think of engineering the structure of a solid to meet certain design constraints (particularly, sound and thermal transport properties) – doing the same with a fluid is much more difficult, if not unfeasible most of the times.

Tech Briefs: In what settings do you envision this kind of solid-based design being most valuable?

Semperlotti: We envision using these systems for low-power niche applications. This is mostly a system for the use of waste (or low-grade) thermal energy. Ideal applications for this technology involve scenarios where large temperature gradients are available and where the reliability of the energy conversion system is critical. As an example, this technology could be a viable candidate to build low-power on-board electric generators for space systems, such as satellites or orbiting stations. The large thermal gradients available in space together with the need for long-lasting and ultra-reliable systems could make this technology very competitive in this market.

Researchers envision thermoacoustics in solids eventually harnessing the extreme temperature gradient of outer space for electricity on satellites. (Image Credit: Purdue University/Mo Lifton)

Tech Briefs: What inspired this idea?

Semperlotti: Fluid-based thermoacoustic engines have been studied and developed for several decades. The concept of a solid-state engine operating on a similar principle appeared a reasonable extension given that waves in solids are governed by physical laws mathematically similar to the ones of fluids dynamics.

Tech Briefs: How do you envision this technology progressing?

Semperlotti: We envision the future of this technology going hand in hand with materials specifically designed to achieve optimal properties for thermoacoustic energy conversion. The rapid development of additive manufacturing capabilities suggests that this scenario could be in reach in the very near future.

There are also some other advantages that could be useful for specific applications. A solid-state thermoacoustic engine not only does not have any part in motion, but does not need any fluid that could eventually leak and reduce the operating life of the device.

Tech Briefs: Why do you think this idea hasn’t been tried before?

Semperlotti: In general, it is not natural to think of a solid as the ideal medium to obtain motion from static energy sources, like a thermal gradient. In addition, there are some drawbacks of solids compared to fluids. The response of fluids to thermal gradients is stronger than in solids (i.e., their thermoelastic response) and the mechanical energy dissipation is lower. Also, the experimental verification in solids is still a challenging task because it requires the implementation of simultaneous thermal and mechanical boundary conditions that are not easy to achieve.

Tech Briefs: What’s most exciting to you about this research and the possibilities?

Semperlotti: The idea that – after more than a century of thermoacoustics – there are still new treasures to be discovered is very exciting. At the same time, we believe that this idea can open a complete new range of applications, and we are excited to see what kind of applications the community will explore. In fact, we do not think of this technology as a replacement of fluid-based thermoacoustics, but instead as something that will complement it.

Tech Briefs: What’s next regarding your research?

Semperlotti: Time will tell. The idea was well received at the recent ASA conference in Minneapolis, MN. After all, fluid-based thermoacoustic devices are sufficiently mature technologies, so envisioning a fully solid-state implementation is quite reasonable.

At this stage, our study did not produce an experimental validation yet. This is the most important next step in order to bring the community on board with this concept. Once the concept is experimentally validated, we will work on integrating this technology in practical solid-state devices and – why not? – maybe testing this technology in space.

What do you think? Will solid-based thermoacoustics be used to someday power spacecraft? Share your questions and comments below.

Semperlotti developed the research with Professor Mihir Sen from the University of Notre Dame; Carlo Scalo, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue; and Purdue graduate research assistant Haitian Hao.

Tech

via NASA Tech Briefs https://ift.tt/2BVPq4O

May 21, 2018 at 02:47PM