Reporte #109
Betão superhidrofóbico poderá aumentar durabilidade das nossas pontes e edifícios para 120 anos
EngenhariaCivil.com
Uma equipa de investigadores da Universidade de Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) está a estudar novas formas de aumentar a durabilidade do betão, através da criação de linhas de defesa contra um dos mais temíveis inimigos das estruturas de betão armado, a água.
Stretching the boundaries of neural implants
MIT News – Engineering
Implantable fibers have been an enormous boon to brain research, allowing scientists to stimulate specific targets in the brain and monitor electrical responses. But similar studies in the nerves of the spinal cord, which might ultimately lead to treatments to alleviate spinal cord injuries, have been more difficult to carry out. That’s because the spine flexes and stretches as the body moves, and the relatively stiff, brittle fibers used today could damage the delicate spinal cord tissue.
“Virtual batteries” could lead to cheaper, cleaner power
MIT News – Engineering
Coordinating smart appliances and electric cars may help balance supply and demand in the power grid.
Noruega vai construir o primeiro túnel do mundo para navios
EngenhariaCivil.com
A Administração Costeira da Noruega divulgou imagens do projeto de construção daquele que será o primeiro túnel do mundo para embarcações de grande dimensão. Atualmente em fase de estudos de viabilidade, o Túnel para Navios de Stad, terá cerca de 1700 metros de comprimento, 37 metros de altura e 26,5 metros de largura, devendo custar ao Governo norueguês mais de 250 milhões de Euros. A infraestrutura tem como principal objetivo tornar as condições de navegação mais seguras, permitindo evitar rotas de navegação externas à Península de Stad.
Intel Now Packs 100 Million Transistors in Each Square Millimeter
IEEE Spectrum Recent Content
I’ll admit it: journalists like milestones. Nice round numbers and anniversaries make for good headlines. So my ears certainly perked up on Tuesday when Intel said that it can now pack more than 100 million transistors in each square millimeter of chip “for the first time in our industry’s history,” said Kaizad Mistry, a vice president and co-director of logic technology at the company. Delivering more transistors in the same area means the circuitry can be made smaller, saving on cost, or it means that more functionality can be added to a chip without having to make it bigger.
Toward printable, sensor-laden “skin” for robots
MIT News – Engineering
New 3-D-printed device mimics the goldbug beetle, which changes color when prodded.
Nanostructures Move From Water Purification to Uranium Extraction
IEEE Spectrum Recent Content
Last August, we reported on work out of the U.S. Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University in which the nanomaterial molybdenum disulfide was used to kill 99.999 percent of bacteria in water within just 20 minutes—a process that would otherwise take up to two days if only the ultraviolet (UV) light from the sun were used as a disinfectant.
Solar-Powered Graphene Skin Enables Prosthetics to Feel
IEEE Spectrum Recent Content
Cochlear implants can restore hearing to individuals with some types of hearing loss. Retinal implants are now on the market to restore sight to the blind. But there are no commercially available prosthetics that restore a sense of touch to those who have lost a limb.
IEEE Global Initiative Aims to Advance Ethical Design of AI and Autonomous Systems
IEEE Spectrum Recent Content
Algorithms with learning abilities collect personal data that are then used without users’ consent and even without their knowledge; autonomous weapons are under discussion in the United Nations; robots stimulating emotions are deployed with vulnerable people; research projects are funded to develop humanoid robots; and artificial intelligence-based systems are used to evaluate people. One can consider these examples of AI and autonomous systems (AS) as great achievements or claim that they are endangering human freedom and dignity.
Graphene probe gives new insight into brain activity
The Engineer
Researchers at the EU’s Graphene Flagship have developed a graphene-based neural probe that could help our understanding of diseases such as epilepsy.