Editorial

Esta é a Newsletter Nº 158 que se apresenta com o mesmo formato que as anteriores. Se gostar da Newsletter partilhe-a!

Todas as Newsletters encontram-se indexadas no link.

Esta Newsletter tem os seguintes tópicos:

• Novidades da Semana
• Ciência e Tecnologia
• Modelos 3D
• Documentação
• Projetos Maker

Faz hoje anos que nascia, em 1788, Augustin-Jean Fresnel. Este físico francês foi o primeiro a investigar o efeito da interferência da luz, com resultados conhecidos como franjas de Fresnel. Este trabalho decisivo, juntamente com outras experiências com luz polarizada, apoiou a teoria da luz de Thomas Young. Fresnel avançou a teoria das ondas identificando a luz como ondas transversais em vez das ondas longitudinais anteriormente assumidas por Young e Christiaan Huygens. O seu trabalho pioneiro em óptica incluiu mostrar que a luz branca é composta por um espectro de inúmeros comprimentos de onda que variam do vermelho ao mais curto comprimento de onde violeta. Ele também melhorou o sistema óptico de faróis de sinalização marítima substituindo reflectores de metal por lentes revolucionárias. Estas lentes foram posteriormente adoptadas para faróis de veículos automóveis, dispositivos para ampliar ecrans de televisão, semáforos, sistemas ópticos de aterragem em aeroportos e porta-aviões, etc.

Faz também anos hoje que nascia, em 1830, François-Marie Raoult. Este químico francês formulou uma lei sobre soluções (chamada lei de Raoult) que permitiu determinar os pesos moleculares das substâncias dissolvidas.

Faz igualmente anos hoje que nascia, em 1901, John Desmond Bernal. Este físico irlandês e cristalógrafo de raios-X contribuiu para a cristalografia de raios-X para determinar as estruturas atómicas de compostos sólidos. Depois de se formar em Cambridge, ele começou a pesquisar em 1923 na Royal Institution, em Londres, para William Henry Bragg, sobre a estrutura de grafite. Em 1927, ele voltou a Cambridge como o primeiro conferencista em cristalografia estrutural. O alcance da sua pesquisa expandiu-se em biologia molecular, a origem da vida e a estrutura e composição da crosta terrestre.

Por fim, faz anos hoje que nascia, e m 1903, Oleg Losev. Este cientista e inventor russo fez descobertas significativas no campo de junções semicondutores. Embora nunca tenha conseguido concluir uma educação formal e nunca tenha ocupado um cargo de investigador, Losev realizou algumas das primeiras pesquisas sobre semicondutores, publicando 43 artigos e recebendo 16 "certificados de autor" (a versão soviética de patentes) para suas descobertas. Ele observou a emissão de luz das junções de contacto ponto-carborundum, o primeiro díodo emissor de luz (LED), fez a primeira pesquisa sobre elas, propôs a primeira teoria correta de como elas funcionavam e usou-as em aplicações práticas como electroluminescência. Ele explorou a resistência negativa nas junções semicondutores e foi o primeiro a usá-las na prática para amplificação, construindo os primeiros amplificadores de estado sólido, osciladores electrónicos e receptores de rádio super-heteródino, 25 anos antes da invenção do transístor. No entanto, os seus feitos foram negligenciados, e desconhecidos por meio século antes de ter sido reconhecido no final do século XX e início do século XXI.

Esta semana a Google apresentou o Android Things que é um sistema operativo que permite criar e manter dispositivos do Internet of Things em grande escala. Trata-se de uma plataforma robusta que faz o trabalho pesado com hardware certificado, Com APIs avançadas de programador e actualizações seguras de software gerido usando a infraestrutura de back-end da Google, para que se possa concentrar na criação do produto. Foi anunciado o suporte para novos System-on-Modules (SoMs) baseados nas plataformas de hardware NXP i.MX8M, Qualcomm SDA212, Qualcomm SDA624 e MediaTek MT8516. Esses módulos são certificados para uso em produção com suporte de longo prazo garantido por três anos, facilitando a colocação de protótipos no mercado.

Nesta Newsletter foi introduzida a capacidade de ver vídeos associados aos artigos apresentados bastando para tal clickar em cima do vídeo. Nesta semana apresentamos diversos projetos de maker assim como um modelo 3D que poderá ser útil. São apresentadas as revistas Hello World e a newelectronics de 8 de Maio 2018.

João Alves ([email protected])

O conteúdo da Newsletter encontra-se sob a licença Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Say Hello to Android Things 1.0

"Android Things is Google's managed OS that enables you to build and maintain Internet of Things devices at scale. We provide a robust platform that does the heavy lifting with certified hardware, rich developer APIs, and secure managed software updates using Google's back-end infrastructure, so you can focus on building your product. After a developer preview with over 100,000 SDK downloads, we're releasing Android Things 1.0 to developers today with long-term support for production devices. Developer feedback and engagement has been critical in our journey towards 1.0, and we are grateful to the over 10,000 developers who have provided us feedback through the issue tracker, at workshop events, and through our Google+ community. Powerful production hardware Today, we are announcing support for new System-on-Modules (SoMs) based on the NXP i.MX8M, Qualcomm SDA212, Qualcomm SDA624, and MediaTek MT8516 hardware platforms. These modules are certified for production use with guaranteed long-term support for three years, making it easier to bring prototypes to market." [...]

Surefly passenger drone performs first manned flight

"The flying taxi scene is now a bustling place, but some are moving faster than others. Where some startups have taken years to move past the prototype stage, others are launching right into things. Workhorse first unveiled its Surefly flying car at the Paris Air Show in June last year, and has now sent it into the air with a person inside for the first time. Workhorse has a number of electric vehicles under development, including electric pickup trucks and delivery vans that launch drones from the roof to cover the last leg. The Surefly has to be the most ambitious, however, designed to use a mix of diesel and electricity to power eight contra-rotating propellors and carry up to 400 lb (180 kg) over a range of approximately 70 mi ( 112 km). Back in January, it received an Experimental Airworthiness Certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration, which enabled it to carry out controlled test flights in the US." [...]

China developing a reusable launch vehicle

"China’s Long March 8, one of the country’s future launchers, could have a reusable first stage, according to a statement made recently by a Chinese rocket designer. While not a lot of information has been disclosed so far by Beijing regarding its future boosters, Western experts expected that the new design would be an expendable rocket. The initial project called for a two-stage launch vehicle with an additional two or four solid rocket boosters. In such a configuration, the Long March 8 could be capable of lifting up to 4.5 metric tons into a Sun-synchronous orbit. However, more ambitious plans for this rocket were presented by Long Lehao, chief designer of carrier rockets at the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT), during an April 24, 2018, space conference in Harbin, China. According the state-run Xinhua press agency, Lehao said the first stage and boosters of the Long March 8 are expected to be retrieved through vertical landing, adding that if the project succeeds, the new partly-reusable rocket would provide commercial launch services to customers around the globe." [...]

Mbed OS 5.8.4 released

"We are pleased to announce the Mbed OS 5.8.4 release is now available. This is the latest patch release based on the feature set that Mbed-OS-5.8 introduces. Summary In this release we have updated the SDK TPM driver for the KW41Z. This fixes an issue where certain instances of the TPM are missing some registers. We have also updated the EFR32 15.4 driver. This includes, Updates driver library to v2.3.1 (2018q1) for bugfixes and convenience functions Provides library in correct format (2-byte wchar_t flag) for compiling with ARMCC (bug 6695 uncovered by PR6577) Reverts to using a statically-allocated packet buffer since malloc is not thread-safe (and the asserts have been turned on) The STM32L0 has been updated with CubeL0 V1.10.0." [...]

Google announces a new generation for its TPU machine learning hardware

"As the war for creating customized AI hardware heats up, Google announced at Google I/O 2018 that is rolling out out its third generation of silicon, the Tensor Processor Unit 3.0. Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the new TPU pod is eight times more powerful than last year, with up to 100 petaflops in performance. Google joins pretty much every other major company in looking to create custom silicon in order to handle its machine operations. And while multiple frameworks for developing machine learning tools have emerged, including PyTorch and Caffe2, this one is optimized for Google’s TensorFlow. Google is looking to make Google Cloud an omnipresent platform at the scale of Amazon, and offering better machine learning tools is quickly becoming table stakes. Amazon and Facebook are both working on their own kind of custom silicon." [...]

Penn Neurosurgeons and Otolaryngologists Perform First-in-World Robot-Assisted Spinal Surgery

"Robotic approach assists with a three-part, two-day complex procedure for rare tumor removal Noah Pernikoff is back to his life in New York City after becoming the first patient in the world to undergo a complex three-part, robotic-assisted surgery. The robotic arms made it possible for the multidisciplinary team at Penn to successfully remove a rare tumor from Noah’s neck, where the skull meets the spine. The ground breaking surgery was completed by a multi-surgeon team, led by Dr. Neil Malhotra, at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in August 2017 over a span of two days and more than 20 hours. Chordoma is a rare type of cancer that occurs in the bones of the skull base and spine. A chordoma tumor usually grows slowly and is often asymptomatic for years. In the case of 27-year-old Noah Pernikoff, a 2016 car accident revealed his surprising diagnosis." [...]

Mining For Gold With A Computer

"Engineers from Texas A&M University and Virginia Tech report important new insights into nanoporous gold–a material with growing applications in several areas, including energy storage and biomedical devices–all without stepping into a lab. Instead of conducting any additional experiments, the team used image-analysis software developed in-house to “mine” the existing literature on nanoporous gold (NPG). Specifically, the software analyzed photographs of NPG from some 150 peer-reviewed papers, quickly measuring key features of the material that the researchers then correlated with written descriptions of how the samples were prepared. One of the results? A recipe, of sorts, for how to make NPG with specific characteristics. “We were able to back out a quantitative law that explains how you can change NPG features by changing the processing times and temperatures,” said Ian McCue, a postdoctoral researcher in the Texas A&M Department of Materials Science and Engineering." [...]

Watching nanomaterials form in 4D

"Novel technology allows researchers to see dynamic reactions as they happen at the nanoscale When famed physicists Max Knoll and Ernst Ruska first introduced the transmission electron microscope (TEM) in 1933, it allowed researchers to peer inside cells, microorganisms and particles that were once too small to study. For decades, these high-powered instruments had been limited to taking static snapshots of specimens, which only tell part of the story. Now researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Florida are filling in the blanks to make this story more complete. The team is part of an effort to develop a new type of TEM that takes dynamic, multi-frame videos of nanoparticles as they form, allowing researchers to view how specimens change in space and time. Knowing how these particles form could change how researchers design future drug-delivery systems, paints, coatings, lubricants and other materials for which having control over nanoscale properties can lead to large effects on macroscale materials. “We have demonstrated that TEM does not have to be a microscopy method solely used to analyze what happened after the fact — after a reaction ends,” said Nathan Gianneschi, professor of chemistry, biomedical engineering and materials science and engineering at Northwestern, who co-led the study." [...]

Custom Silicon Microparticles Dynamically Reconfigure On Demand

"First demonstration of self-assembling and self-disassembling silicon microparticles could form the basis for designing artificial muscles and reconfigurable computer systems Researchers at Duke University and North Carolina State University have demonstrated the first custom semiconductor microparticles that can be steered into various configurations repeatedly while suspended in water. With an initial six custom particles that predictably interact with one another in the presence of alternating current (AC) electric fields of varying frequencies, the study presents the first steps toward realizing advanced applications such as artificial muscles and reconfigurable computer systems. The study appears online on May 3 in the journal Nature Communications. “We’ve engineered and encoded multiple dynamic responses in different microparticles to create a reconfigurable silicon toolbox,” said Ugonna Ohiri, a recently graduated electrical engineering doctoral student from Duke and first author of the paper. “By providing a means of controllably assembling and disassembling these particles, we’re bringing a new tool to the field of active matter.” While previous researchers have worked to define self-assembling systems, few have worked with semiconductor particles, and none have explored the wide range of custom shapes, sizes and coatings that are available to the micro- and nanofabrication industry. Engineering particles from silicon presents the opportunity to physically realize electronic devices that can self-assemble and disassemble on demand." [...]

Ultrafast Atomic Snapshots Reveal Energy Flow in Superconductor

"A team including SLAC researchers has measured the intricate interactions between atomic nuclei and electrons that are key to understanding intriguing materials properties, such as high-temperature superconductivity. Manipulating the flow of energy through superconductors – materials that conduct electricity with 100 percent efficiency – could radically transform technology, perhaps leading to applications such as ultrafast, highly efficient quantum computers. But that will require a detailed understanding of the energy flow and how it is affected by the interactions of electrons and atomic nuclei in superconducting materials. Now a research team, including scientists from the Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, has observed those interactions for the first time in copper-oxide superconductors. Using a combination of experimental techniques, including an ultra-high-speed “electron camera” at SLAC, they were able to measure the rapid interplay between atomic motions and changes in electron energy and momentum. “This breakthrough offers direct, fundamental insight into the puzzling characteristics of these remarkable materials,” said Brookhaven Lab scientist Yimei Zhu, who led the research." [...]

BGU Invents Portable Robot Chauffeur

"From the Grapevine – Imagine you’re out with friends at your favorite local bar. Drinks have been flowing all evening. The night winds down and it’s time to leave. You could hail a taxi or call an Uber, but what if you could take a portable robot out of your trunk, place it in the driver’s seat and have it shuttle you home? While that may seem like something a couple of guys might try to invent while drunk at a bar, the reality may be coming sooner than you think. Respected roboticist Prof. Hugo Guterman of BGU’s Laboratory for Autonomous Robotics and his team, including Ph.D. student Oded Yechiel, have developed an Intelligent Vehicle Operator – IVO for short, which acts as a portable robot driver." [...]

A step towards cheap aluminium batteries

"The energy transition depends on technologies that allow the inexpensive temporary storage of electricity from renewable sources. A promising new candidate is aluminium batteries, which are made from cheap and abundant raw materials. Scientists from Maksym Kovalenko’s research group, which is based at both ETH Zurich and in Empa’s Laboratory for Thin Films and Photovoltaics, are researching and developing batteries made from abundant raw materials. The researchers have now identified two new materials that could bring about key advances in the development of aluminium batteries. The first is a corrosion-resistant material for the conductive parts of the battery; the second is a novel material for the battery’s positive pole that can be adapted to a wide range of technical requirements. Aggressive electrolyte fluid As the electrolyte fluid in aluminium batteries is extremely aggressive and corrodes stainless steel, and even gold and platinum, scientists are searching for corrosion-resistant materials for the conductive parts of these batteries." [...]

Smart skin for flexible monitoring

"An electronic tag that stretches and flexes while it records location and environmental data can monitor marine animals in their natural habitat. A thin smart patch called Marine Skin could make studying the behavior of marine animals easier and more informative. This system for electronic tagging of animals is based on stretchable silicone elastomers that can withstand twisting, shearing and stretching, even when exposed to high pressures in deep waters. “The integrated flexible electronics can track an animal’s movement and diving behavior and the health of the surrounding marine environment in real time,” says Joanna Nassar. Now at California Institute of Technology, Nassar was a Ph.D. student in the KAUST team that developed the patch. Being able to monitor and record a range of environmental parameters is vital in the study of marine ecosystems." [...]

Scientists Pinpoint Energy Flowing Through Vibrations in Superconducting Crystals

"Interactions between electrons and the atomic structure of high-temperature superconductors impacted by elusive and powerful vibrations Manipulating the flow of energy through superconductors could radically transform technology, perhaps leading to applications such as ultra-fast, highly efficient quantum computers. But these subtle dynamics—including heat dispersion—play out with absurd speed across dizzying subatomic structures. Now, scientists have tracked never-before-seen interactions between electrons and the crystal lattice structure of copper-oxide superconductors. The collaboration, led by scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Brookhaven National Laboratory, achieved measurement precision faster than one trillionth of one second through a groundbreaking combination of experimental techniques. “This breakthrough offers direct, fundamental insight into the puzzling characteristics of these remarkable materials,” said Brookhaven Lab scientist Yimei Zhu, who led the research. “We already had evidence of how lattice vibrations impact electron activity and disperse heat, but it was all through deduction." [...]

Making meshes using Turing's mathematical model results in efficient water filters

"A team of researchers at Zhejiang University in China has used a mathematical model developed by Alan Turing to create a unique type of polyamide mesh. In their paper published in the journal Science, the group describes their process and how they discovered the mesh could be used to filter water. Alan Turing, famous cracker of the German Enigma machine, and developer of some of the foundations of computer science, also dabbled in chemistry. In 1952, he actually published a paper describing a mathematical model explaining how unique striped patterns in animals come about. His math described a process by which two chemicals, when mixed together, take turns interrupting the other's actions. In living beings, the chemicals are hormones that influence characteristics such as stripes on tigers." [...]

BGU Researchers Develop First Robotic System for Rehab That Plays a Game to Improve Real-Life Task Performance

"BGU researchers have demonstrated for the first time the feasibility of a robotic system that plays a game, specifically Tic Tac Toe, with rehabilitation patients to improve real life task performance. Designing a social robot to help rehabilitate a patient is a new field and requires much research and experimentation to determine the optimal conditions. Their findings were published recently in Restor​​ative Neurology and Neuroscience. The interdisciplinary research team designed a game with a robotic arm to simulate 3D Functional Activities of Daily Living—actions people undertake daily, like drinking from a cup, that are often the focus of rehabilitation. ​“Playing a game of Tic Tac Toe with a set of cups (instead of X's and O's) is therefore one example of a game that can help rehabilitate the upper limb – people pick up and place many cups in the process of the game, and improve their performance on the task while enjoying the game," says Dr. Shelly Levy-Tzedek of the BGU Department of Physical Therapy and the Zlotowski Center for Neuroscience, and the study's senior author. To test whether it is important to have an actual physical robot interact with the users during the game, the researchers compared the participants' motivation to play with the robot vs. a set of computer-controlled LED lights." [...]

Next-gen railway sleepers can produce electricity

"You may think that they’ve been around forever and you wouldn’t be wrong. Railway sleepers, the rectangular blocks that can be seen under railroad tracks, have not evolved much over the years. An Italian SME is looking to shake things up with a tailor-made, sustainable sleeper technology. Next-gen railway sleepers can produce electricity © Greenrail Traditionally, railway sleepers have been made of wood or, later, concrete. But whilst these both proved their worth, they are not without shortcomings. Not only are they a major source of noise and vibrations, but they also require expensive maintenance." [...]

Water-repellent surfaces can efficiently boil water, keep electronics cool

"Surfaces that repel water can support efficient boiling if all air and vapor is removed from a system first, according to research featured on the cover of the most recent issue of Physical Review Letters. Water is typically boiled off hydrophilic surfaces to cool nuclear reactors and high-power electronics, preventing them from overheating. Purdue University research has shown that the most water-repellent surfaces possible, superhydrophobic materials, not only can boil water efficiently under the right conditions, but also stay cooler than hydrophilic surfaces. “One of the ways to take heat out of a surface is to boil from it,” said Justin Weibel, associate research professor of mechanical engineering. “But no one typically considers using superhydrophobic surfaces to improve boiling.” Consumer electronics – including laptops and even some smartphones – have water within metal “heat pipes” that dissipate the heat generated when these devices are in use, cooling them off. High-power electronics used in electric vehicles, supercomputers and aircraft particularly call for more efficient means to prevent overheating." [...]

A reimagined future for sustainable nanomaterials

"Engineered nanomaterials hold great promise for medicine, electronics, water treatment, and other fields. But when the materials are designed without critical information about environmental impacts at the start of the process, their long-term effects could undermine those advances. A Yale-led team of researchers hopes to change that. In a study published April 30 in Nature Nanotechnology, Yale researchers outline a strategy to give materials designers the tools they need to make the necessary assessments efficiently and at the beginning of the design process. Engineers traditionally focus on the function and cost of their products. Without the information to consider long-term environmental impacts, though, it is difficult to predict adverse effects, said the researchers, and that lack of information means unintended consequences often go unnoticed until long after the product has been commercialized." [...]

Computer scientists have found the longest straight line you could sail without hitting land

"While they were at it, they found the longest straight path you could drive without hitting water. Back in 2012, a curious debate emerged on the discussion website Reddit, specifically on a subreddit called /r/MapPorn. Here the user Kepleronlyknows posted a map of the world purporting to show the longest navigable straight-line path over water without hitting land. The route began in Pakistan and followed a great circle under Africa and South America until it hit eastern Russia. The post generated huge debate, with much head-scratching and pawing over charts and globes. The big question was whether the claim was correct—could there be a different straight-line route over water that was longer but uninterrupted by land of any kind?" [...]

Research removes obstacle to lasers and computers working at speed of light

"By juxtaposing contrasting properties of two different nanomaterials, a team of Clemson University physicists has developed an optical diode that enables light to move in one direction, a step that could lead to high-energy lasers and optical computers capable of processing data at the speed of light. Presently, computers use the movement of electrons to process data. Through electrical components like transistors and diodes, the flow of electrons can be turned on and off or made to flow exclusively in a certain direction like a one-way street. Without these devices, computing as we know it would not exist. The drawback to electronic computing, however, is that the speed at which computers can perform calculations and process information is limited by how quickly electrons can navigate within solid devices like diodes and transistors. Ramakrishna Podila, a professor in Clemson’s department of physics and astronomy, equates the phenomenon to people trying to move about in a dense crowd." [...]

Unusual Magnetic Structure May Support Next-Generation Technology

"Magnetic materials that form helical structures—coiled shapes comparable to a spiral staircase or the double helix strands of a DNA molecule—occasionally exhibit exotic behavior that could improve information processing in hard drives and other digital devices. A research team from Colorado State University is using neutrons at the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to study one such material, Fe3PO7. Although helical structures are typically formed by magnetic moments that wind around an axis in a set direction, the researchers discovered that Fe3PO7 does not pick a particular direction and allows only short-range helical structures to form. These structures may provide novel technological capabilities. “Because the direction of the helix is varying in space, it has what we call a partial order, which means there is no set direction for the helical axis to point,” said assistant professor Kate Ross, who is also a former chair of ORNL’s SNS-HFIR User Group. By determining Fe3PO7’s magnetic structure using the Four-Circle Diffractometer instrument, beamline HB-3A at ORNL’s High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR), the researchers hope to identify the underlying factors contributing to this unusual helical magnetic structure." [...]

The apparent inner calm of quantum materials

"Physicists from UNIGE, University Grenoble Alpes, CEA and CNRS in Saclay and Grenoble have been the first to confirm a theory on topological phase transitions, a field of research initiated by the 2016 Nobel Prize-winners in physics. Transitions between different phases of matter are part of our day-to-day lives: when water freezes, for example, it passes from liquid to solid state. Some of these transitions may be of a different kind, resulting from so-called topological excitations that force all the particles to act in unison. Researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the CEA,CNRS and UGA have been studying BACOVO – a one-dimensional quantum material unknown to the general public – in collaboration with scientists from the neutronic centers ILL and PSI. They have discovered in this material a novel topological phase transition, governed not by a single type of topological excitation, but by two different ones. In addition, they were able to choose which of the two sets would dominate the other." [...]

U of T researchers develop portable 3D skin printer to repair deep wounds

"University of Toronto researchers have developed a handheld 3D skin printer that deposits even layers of skin tissue to cover and heal deep wounds. The team believes it to be the first device that forms tissue in situ, depositing and setting in place, within two minutes or less. The research, led by PhD student Navid Hakimi under the supervision of Associate Professor Axel Guenther of the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, and in collaboration with Dr. Marc Jeschke, director of the Ross Tilley Burn Centre at Sunnybrook Hospital and professor of immunology at the Faculty of Medicine, was recently published in the journal Lab on a Chip. For patients with deep skin wounds, all three skin layers – the epidermis, dermis and hypodermis – may be heavily damaged. The current preferred treatment is called split-thickness skin grafting, where healthy donor skin is grafted onto the surface epidermis and part of the underlying dermis. Split-thickness grafting on large wounds requires enough healthy donor skin to traverse all three layers, and sufficient graft skin is rarely available." [...]

Engineers studying nanodefects suspected of causing early failures of electrical materials

"Tiny defects in electrical insulating materials may lead to breakdowns, robbing the power grid and even cell phones of reliability and efficiency. Xiaoli Tan, an Iowa State University professor of materials science and engineering, is working to understand how those nanoscale defects, when subject to extreme electric fields, evolve into material failures. Those failures turn insulators, which do not conduct electricity, into materials that allow some current to flow. Such failures, called dielectric breakdowns, usually result in short circuits or blown fuses. These failures typically happen far below the insulating material’s theoretical strength and capacity. And so, to protect power systems and electronic devices, insulating materials are subject to voltages well below their theoretical capacity or they’re made thicker and heavier." [...]

Researcher develops a new generation of graphene

"The material graphene has many incredible properties, but to date it has been difficult to use on a large scale in industry, because it loses its unique properties and goes back to its origin graphite. Researcher Mamoun Taher has developed a new form of graphene that can solve the problem. “The challenge has been to scale up graphene’s outstanding properties from nanoscale at laboratories to macro-scale at industry without degradation,” says Mamoun Taher. He is a researcher at the Department of Chemistry at Uppsala University and CEO of start-up company Graphmatech. Graphene is one atom thick two-dimensional carbon material. It is flexible, 200 times stronger than steel, and has many other advantageous properties." [...]

Physicists at FAU generate attosecond electron pulses with laser light

"Processes in the atomic microcosmos are revealed Physicists at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) have successfully generated controlled electron pulses in the attosecond range. They used optical travelling waves that are formed by laser pulses of varying wavelengths. The movements of electrons in atoms were revealed using attosecond free-electron pulses. The findings of the researchers from Erlangen have been published in the acclaimed journal ‘Physical Review Letters’ (DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.120.103203). Scientists have been researching ways of generating packets of electrons in extremely short timescales for several years. Such pulses enable ultrafast movements to be tracked, for example vibrations in atomic lattices, phase transitions in materials or molecular bonds in chemical reactions." [...]

Infrared spectrometer on a chip

"Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectrometers, among the most frequently used research tools to identify and analyze chemicals, are too large to be used in the field to detect compounds. Several attempts have been made to develop miniaturized FTIR spectrometers for integration into drones to monitor greenhouse gases remotely, for example, or for integration into smartphones and other devices. However, current miniaturized devices are costly to produce and therefore cannot be widely used. Scientists at the University of Campinas’s Device Research Laboratory (LPD-UNICAMP) in Brazil, collaborating with colleagues at the University of California San Diego in the United States, have overcome these constraints by developing an FTIR spectrometer based on silicon photonics, the technology currently used to produce chips for computers, smartphones and other electronic devices. Resulting from Mário César Mendes Machado de Souza’s PhD research and a research internship abroad, supported by scholarships from FAPESP and supervised by Professor Newton Frateschi, the new spectrometer is described in an article published in Nature Communications. Souza is the article’s lead author and thought up the project." [...]

Theory for one type of superconductor solves puzzle in another

"‘Orbital-selective pairing’ theory applied to first ‘heavy fermion’ superconductor A 2017 theory proposed by Rice University physicists to explain the contradictory behavior of an iron-based high-temperature superconductor is helping solve a puzzle in a different type of unconventional superconductor, the “heavy fermion” compound known as CeCu2Si2. An international team from the U.S., China, Germany and Canada reported the findings this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The study focused on a cerium, copper and silicon composite whose strange behavior in 1979 helped usher in the multidisciplinary field of quantum materials. That year, a team led by Max Planck Institute’s Frank Steglich, a co-author on the PNAS paper, found that CeCu2Si2 became a superconductor at extremely cold temperatures. The mechanism of superconductivity couldn’t be explained by existing theory, and the finding was so unexpected and unusual that many physicists initially refused to accept it. The 1986 discovery of superconductivity at even higher temperatures in copper ceramics crystalized interest in the field and came to dominate the career of theoretical physicists like Rice’s Qimiao Si, a PNAS study co-author and the Harry C. and Olga K. Wiess Professor of Physics and Astronomy." [...]

Achieving Unprecedented Frequency Control in Miniature Lasers

"Only a few decades ago, finding a particular channel on the radio or television meant dialing a knob by hand, making small tweaks and adjustments to hone in on the right signal. Of course, we now take such fine tuning for granted, simply pressing a button to achieve the same effect. This convenience is enabled by radio frequency synthesis, the generation of accurate signal frequencies from a single reference oscillator. The need for better radar in World War II drove the development of radio frequency control, and its miniaturization in subsequent decades revolutionized a host of military and consumer applications. Today, precise, stable frequency synthesizers are found everywhere, from GPS systems to smartphones and TV remote controls. While radio frequency control has long since graduated, optical frequency control on the other hand still exists in the bygone “tuner knob” era." [...]

USTC Develops All-optically Controlled Non-Reciprocal Multifunctional Photonic Devices

"USTC Microcavity Research Group in the Key Laboratory of Quantum Information have perfected a 4-port all-optically controlled non-reciprocal multifunctional photonic device based on a magnetic-field-free optomechanical resonator is demonstrated for the first time. This achievement was published online in Nature Communications on May 4. Light has bidirectional transmission reciprocity in common dielectric material, and breaking this reciprocity, that is, achieving non-reciprocity in the direction of light transmission, is of great significance in classical and quantum information processing. Optical circulators, isolators, directional amplifiers, etc. are typical non-reciprocal devices. The optical circulator allows light to be transmitted in a unirotational fashion between its ports, which can be used for light source protection and precise measurement." [...]

Fundamental equations guide marine robots to optimal sampling sites

"New principled approach helps autonomous underwater vehicles explore the ocean in an intelligent, energy-efficient manner. Observing the world’s oceans is increasingly a mission assigned to autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) — marine robots that are designed to drift, drive, or glide through the ocean without any real-time input from human operators. Critical questions that AUVs can help to answer are where, when, and what to sample for the most informative data, and how to optimally reach sampling locations. MIT engineers have now developed systems of mathematical equations that forecast the most informative data to collect for a given observing mission, and the best way to reach the sampling sites. With their method, the researchers can predict the degree to which one variable, such as the speed of ocean currents at a certain location, reveals information about some other variable, such as temperature at some other location — a quantity called “mutual information.” If the degree of mutual information between two variables is high, an AUV can be programmed to go to certain locations to measure one variable, to gain information about the other. The team used their equations and an ocean model they developed, called Multidisciplinary Simulation, Estimation, and Assimilation Systems (MSEAS), in sea experiments to successfully forecast fields of mutual information and guide actual AUVs." [...]

Strain Improves Performance of Atomically Thin Semiconductor Material

"Researchers in UConn’s Institute of Materials Science significantly improved the performance of an atomically thin semiconductor material by stretching it, an accomplishment that could prove beneficial to engineers designing the next generation of flexible electronics, nano devices, and optical sensors. In a study appearing in the research journal Nano Letters, Michael Pettes, assistant professor of mechanical engineering, reports that a six-atom thick bilayer of tungsten diselenide exhibited a 100-fold increase in photoluminescence when it was subjected to strain. The material had never exhibited such photoluminescence before. The findings mark the first time scientists have been able to conclusively show that the properties of atomically thin materials can be mechanically manipulated to enhance their performance, Pettes says. Such capabilities could lead to faster computer processors and more efficient sensors. The process the researchers used to achieve the outcome is also significant in that it offers a reliable new methodology for measuring the impact of strain on ultrathin materials, something that has been difficult to do and a hindrance to innovation." [...]

MX Cherry OEM Profile Keycaps library (OpenSCAD)

"This is a simple library of parametric designs for all of the keycaps on a standard keyboard, conforming to the size profile of the MX Cherry OEM (bigger) keycaps. " [...]

Hello World issue 5

"Join us as we celebrate the Year of Engineering in Hello World #5. We’ve brought together a wide range of experts to share ideas, thoughts and advice on how to bring engineering to the classroom, and ways to inspire the next generation… Also in this issue: The bluffers’ guide to putting together a tech-themed school trip Inclusion, and coding for the visually impaired Getting students interested in databases Why copying may not always be a bad thing And much more…" [...]

newelectronics 8 Maio 2018

"New Electronics is a fortnightly magazine focusing on technological innovation, news and the latest developments in the electronics sector. Downloadable as a digital page turner or pdf file, or offered as a hard copy, the New Electronics magazine is available in a format to suit you. " [...]

Time Traveling Elevator - Theater Prop

"Our school show needed a time traveling elevator. The perfect prop was an Arduino driven prop with WS2811 LED lights and a servo. Each spring for the last 20 years, our grammar school puts on a show called Kapers. The show is a series of songs performed by the 3rd-5th graders, the faculty, and the parents. The songs are connected by short segments of dialog to create a story. In 2018, the show was titled "Back to the Present," as the flux capacitor somehow connected to the school elevator moving the entire school through time!" [...]

ATMEGA2560 Standalone Using Arduino UNO

"In this instructable we will learn how to bootload the ATMEGA2560 chip and how to upload Arduino Mega sketches to it. " [...]

DIY 2D Plotter Shield for Arduino Nano With L293d

"In this tutorial i will show you my shield for arduino based cnc. " [...]

Bluetooth Controlled 4wd Arduino Robot

"Most of us think of robotics as a rather difficult hobby. Well, it is not so. When we are getting started with Arduino we should never go for making the very tempting but difficult-to-make projects. Arduino is a rather easy to use prototyping platform which is recommended for beginners. You should first acquire some knowledge about the basic of C/C++ programming before making this project. " [...]

Remote Control Car w/ PocketBeagle and Arduino

"Have you ever wanted to use a PocketBeagle? And build a remote car? Well, I have! Here is how you can too! Introduction: I wanted to make my own remote car where I would be able to control it from my phone. I wanted a project that would incorporate both coding and hardwarde design." [...]

Infrared NEC Protocol Encoder and Decoder Board

"Receives a raw modulated or demodulated NEC IR signal and converts it into bytes that are sent out the serial port. The serial baud rate is selectable from two default speeds. The default usage mode transmits out a command sequence with framing bytes, address high, address low, and the validated command byte. This device is designed to remove the work load of protocol decoding from the main processor, which could be a PIC, Arduino, FTDI, or other similar serial capable device. It supports full duplex communication when using an I.R. transceiver." [...]

Intelli-Buoy II (Autonomous Floating Buoy for the Detection of Water Pollution in Bodies of Water)

"Abstract The world today is extremely dependent on the ocean, from sources of food to raw materials. However, recent studies show that an increase in pollution poses a danger to these large bodies of water. In order to aid the solving of this problem, we created an autonomous buoy that is able to collect a wide selection of data. Our buoy stays afloat in the ocean for extended periods of time and is entirely self-sufficient. It contains solar panels connected to an internal power module to provide power to run its electrical components. There is a turbidity sensor to measure the clearness and purity of surrounding water, which allows the determination of present contamination." [...]

Make your BeagleBone Black am355x magically turn itself on with the built-in alarm clock

"The am335x ARM chip in the BeagleBone Black has a Real Time Clock hidden inside that you can use to have the board spontaneously turn itself on anytime in the next 100 years. Here I present a new utility to manage that built-in clock from the Linux command line, and explain how to use it to keep time, shutdown, software power cycle, and more! tldr; Type these commands on your BBB running Debian and wait for about 10 seconds. You should see itself turn off… and then magically turn back on one minute later…. " [...]

ESP8266 SPI Spy

"I came across a very useful post by Thomas Scherrer that describes how to read data from a Peacefair PZEM-021 energy meter by spying on the SPI bus with an Arduino. I decided to do the same thing with an ESP-12F WiFi module so that I could view the results remotely and plot graphs, etc. It took me a lot longer to get this working than I anticipated due to a few problems along the way. The main hardware difference is the ESP8266 is a 3.3V device but the Arduino is 5V. The PZEM-021 is actually a mixture. The RN8208G metering chip is a 5V device." [...]

Stable FM Transmitter

"FM transmitter circuit projects are indeed quite popular among electronics hobbyists / students. But the frustrating part is most transmitters refuses to work at all, and secondly the internet is full of crappy transmitter circuits. Designing a stable FM transmitter circuit is rather a difficult job, many calculations are involved their. There are also some construction error and component value tolerance. Here you can find a reasonably stable and well tested transmitter that actually works. " [...]

Coughing Planter

"What's this then?A breathing, coughing, air-quality-sensing, Google-Sheets-logging, real-live-plant-having planter! Using an air-quality sensor and a hidden Raspberry Pi Zero W, this little planter personifies a plant to sense indoor air quality. Code and miscellaneous resources (laser cutter PDF and Fritzing model) are in the project's Github repository. Bill of MaterialsRaspberry Pi Zero W (other models should be fine, with small changes to the code and potentially wiring. The wifi is used to log to Google Sheets, but is otherwise optional.) An SGP30 air-quality sensor (we used the breakout board from Adafruit, but any similar one should work.)" [...]

Simple Easy Diy Light Following Robot Without Micro Controller. (anybody Can Make ROBOT)

"As the name offers this Robot finds brighter light source and automatically Goes to the bright light source. Yes you won't need to program it. If your're new to robotics and afraid of programming then this is the robot you can make as your 1st robot. Also if you're willing to make Arduino robots then you must make basic robots like this one as you must know the basic. The great thing about this robot is it only uses two components. LDR and TRANSISTOR." [...]

Hexagon Infinity Mirror With LED Lights and Laser Wire

"If you are looking to create a unique lighting piece, this is a really fun project. Because of the complexity, some of the steps really require some precision, but there's a few different directions you can go with it, depending on the overall look you're going for. The materials I used on this project are as follows: 2x6 Wood (From Home Depot) Wood Stain (Pick a color) Paint (Pick a color and finish - keep reading for my notes) LED Lights - I used 3 different kinds, Laser Wire, Smart Pixel LEDs and Pixel-Free LED (links at end) Power Supply - There are a lot of different types of supplies that will work. Just make sure to match up the voltage and wattage (message me if you want some help). Mirrored Acrylic - You can find at local plastic store like TAP Plastics or many sign shops. Clear Acrylic - Same as above - Both widths were 1/16" Two-Way Mirrored Film - Found mine at home depot." [...]

Temperature and Humidity Monitor Device With Arduino

"Hello guys!!! Okay this project was my final year project. The purpose of this project was to monitor room temperature and humidity at workshop of my University because some electronic component malfunction due to the unfavourable temperature and humidity. Just follow the step that being show below and hope you guys enjoy built it. " [...]

DIY Night Clock Projector

"A Clock Projector can project the time to a ceiling in the night. There are lots of commercial alarm clocks with integrated clock projector on the market but I thought, it would be fun to build one myself. Moreover it was a good project for becoming accustomed to the process of 3d-designing cases which can be 3d printed and to learn about designing tolerances. The principle is easy – basically it works like a video beamer (or any other projecting clock^^). " [...]

Solar Panel Monitoring Using Particle Photon

"Solar energy is the future of energy industry. The countries all around the world are focusing towards renewable and clean sources of energy. The sunlight is the most abundant resource available everywhere and each day. By generating energy using sunlight, the electricity generation can be done without any pollution. There are continuous research and innovations going on to improve the efficiency of solar cells, reduce cost of manufacturing solar panels and improving power distribution from solar plants. The aim of the project is to improve the efficiency of solar panels." [...]

QuadMeUp Crossbow

"QuadMeUp Crossbow is a DIY project that gives 5km (at least) of RC link for UAV (airplanes and drones) for a price below $40. I uses SX1278 (LoRa 868MHz/915MHz) compatible (like HopeRF RFM95W) radio modules connected to Arduino compatible boards. It can be regular Arduino connected via SPI to SX1278 or dedicated board like Adafruit Feather 32u4 RFM LoRa or LoRa32u4 II" [...]

Blackhole Lamp

"The idea with this project was to create a lamp that also functioned as a visual representation of a blackhole in a 2D universe. As predicted by Einstein's theory of general relativity, objects of mass distort the fabric of spacetime. Blackholes are points of such immense density that spacetime is distorted so much that neither light nor matter can escape. To recreate this effect I have used a piece of black lycra to represent the fabric of spacetime, around the edge the event horizon is displayed by a ring of white LEDs; any closer to the blackhole and light would be unable to escape. The longer you leave the lamp on, the bigger the blackhole grows since it is consuming more matter and energy. To achieve this a braided fishing line runs down the copper pipe to a motor hidden in the base." [...]

A 360 leds clock

"Previously I talked about a LED box. I explained how to operate a ws2812 led strip. Thoses strips can be connected together in serial. After a first try one year ago, I built this clock from scratch with 360 leds, divided in 3 parts. Mecanical My first try was not a success. I bought some 1cm wide bars." [...]

MSP430 Breadboard Audio Spectrum Analyser

"This project is microphone based and require minimal external components. 2 x LR44 coin cells are used so that I can have the whole structure working in the confines of a 170 tie-point mini breadboard. ADC10, TimerA interrupt LPM wake-up, TimerA PWM like output, button use, integer arithmetic are used and demonstrated. Features 8 bit integer FFT 16 samples at 500Hz separationshows 8 amplitudes of 1K, 1.5K, 2K, 3K, 4K, 5K, 6K, 7.5K non-linearpartial logarithm map to show amplitudes, limited as resolution has been reduced for 8 bit FFTTLC272 one stage mic amplifys at 100x times 100x gain (you can experience w/ 2 stages)menu selectable optional Hamming windowmenu adjust 4 levels brightnessmenu adjust 8 levels sample rate / response time2 x LR44 coin cell powered "on board"" [...]

Remote Controlled Strandbeest

"The easiest way to build a remote controlled Strandbeest Model! You've seen the kits available for around $10 or less for a Strandbeest wind walker, but what if there is no wind? In this tutorial, I go over how to easily add a pair of motors to the 'beest in order to remote control it like a tank. A full video of the build can be found here, and I'll embed it at the end for your viewing pleasure. The first step is to get and assemble a Strandbeest kit. If you're not in a rush, you can find them for sale for $5 or so, but I used this one from Amazon." [...]

ESP8266 WiFi Enabled Twitter Search Enabled LED Belt Buckle

"So a friend of mine gave me an LED Belt Buckle. It was always an intention of mine to WiFi enable it so that maybe people could send a message to it and it would display that message. I decided to instead have it display Tweets where it can display tweets of a particular search term, which still allows people to send it a custom message, albeit through Twitter. Since its WiFi and gets its power from batteries it makes a nice stand alone Twitter message display system, or even a small unit that can be used for events, performances and exhibitions providing audience interaction. The circuit is built using an ESP8266-01 WiFi module. These are very inexpensive and can be programmed using the Arduino IDE." [...]

pedalSHIELD MEGA Arduino Guitar Pedal

"pedalSHIELD MEGA is a programmable guitar pedal that works with the Arduino MEGA 2560 and MEGA ADK boards. It includes a 1.3 inches OLED screen, a True Bypass footswitch, 2 programmable push-buttons and an analog input/output stage. The project is Open Source & Open Hardware and aimed for hackers, musicians and programmers that want to learn about DSP (digital signal processing), guitar effects, and experiment without deep knowledge on electronics or hardcore programming. " [...]

Android On-The-Go (OTG) LC-Meter

"Several years ago I built a LC-Meter based on an open-source design of a "Surprisingly Accurate LC meter" by Phil Rice VK3BHR at http://sites.google.com/site/vk3bhr Presented here is a modified design based on a Microchip PIC18F14K50 USB Flash Microcontroller which is connected to an Android phone using the On-The-Go (OTG) mode. The phone provides power to the circuitry and an Android Application provides the Graphical-User-Interface (GUI). The following are the highlights of the design: - Single PIC18F14K50 microcontroller with USB interface and internal analog comparator - Simple c-code on the microcontroller implementing a basic frequency counter - GUI Test code in Qt Creator and Android application using Android Studio - All calculations carried out in higher level language - Low power consumption ~ 18 mA at +5V - Design verified by building a bread-board and engineered unitI wish to acknowledge use of the Usb serial controller for Android v4.5 example code in implementing the OTG connectivity. " [...]

Arduino Persistance Of vision Clock

"Hi guys. Wellcome back to a new awesome tutorial. POV or persistance of vision refers to the optical illusion that occurs when visual perception of an object does not cease for some time after the rays of light proceeding from it have ceased to enter the eye. The illusion has also been described as "retinal persistence", "persistence of impressions", simply "persistence" and other variations. In this project we will learn how to use a Hall sensor in order to detect rotations. We will count the time it takes to make a full rotation of the POV propeller and by dividing the measured value by 360 we get time per degree." [...]

555 PWM Motor Controller

"I often face a situation when I want to test a motor, sometimes for my projects, sometimes just to see if it works. The simplest solution is just to connect it to a battery or some kind of power supply and that's ok but what if you want to control motor speed for example by PWM? You have to use Arduino with motor controller, connect all of that, program it and then you can use it, but that's a lot of work. What if there is simpler solution for that. So I started thinking if I can use something else then microcontroller to create PWM signal, and I thought about world's most popular integrated circuit (IC) the 555 timer. I already made few things with 555 timer like my useless machine, so I thought that it can also be used to create a 555 PWM motor controller." [...]

IOT123 - Assimilate Sensor: Max9812

"Microphone Amplifier Sound MIC 3.3V / 5V Fixed Gain 20dB. If you need adjustable gain, I recommend swapping this sensor out for the MAX4466. ASSIMILATE SENSORS are environment sensors that have an added hardware and software abstraction layer, making it possible for completely new types to be added to a ASSIMILATE SENSOR HUB and the readings be pumped to a MQTT server without added coding. This ASSIMILATE SENSOR dumps 3 properties: audMin (0-1023) - lowest value inside the 50ms (20Hz) sample window audMax (0-1023) - highest value inside the 50ms (20Hz) sample window audDiff (0-50) - a value derived from the difference of aMin and aMax" [...]

Blood Pulse Monitor

"I introduce to you my second project for my university. This project can be used to monitor heart beat rate and oxygen levels using the MAX 30100 module and print them to the Nokia 5110 LCD. It also stores these values in a text files using an SD card module. It also gives a warning buzzer sound in case of the values being off the normal needed values according to your age, Which you can enter using the capacitive TTP 229 16x button pad. It also uses the I2C communication function to send these values from one Arduino to another. " [...]

IR Thermal Camera

"Have you ever watched a sci-fi or action movie, where the characters move into a pitch black room and switch on their thermal vision? Or have you ever played Metroid Prime and remember the thermal visor that the main character got? Well I have done both of those things and think its rather neat. Visible light is an excellent way for us to utilize our eyes to see the world around us, but there are some shortcomings of our current evolutionary iteration of a lens eyeball, namely that it doesnt work without visible light having been introduced to our system. It can also reflect weird and distort the image captured by it. Thermal cameras dont have these problems, they detect the infrared wavelengths of light that are naturally emitted by any warm body." [...]

A Micro:bit Directional Indicator for Bicycle Helmets

"I had been playing a bit with the micro:bit and mu, a micro python editor with a specific "mode" for the micro:bit. In it's latest version it comes with a serial plotter and I wanted to understand how to use it (hint: send data as tuples: print((x, y, z)), with double brackets). As a side result, the concept of the micro:bit based bicycle helmet directional indicator, as described in the following, was developed. Four patterns are displayed on the micro:bit's 5x5 LED display: In the resting state a nice, randomized "firefly" pattern is generated. You may adjust the parameters to make it run faster or slower, or more or less dense. Then there are "turn right" or "turn left" indicators in form of moving arrows." [...]

Use A Comparator Or Op-amp To Simplify Light Dependent Resistor Output

"If your project calls for light sensitivity, it’s hard to beat light dependent resistors (LDRs), also known as photoresistors. They’re available for a few cents each, and their resistance varies based on how much light they receive. In the dark, these devices produce resistances in the megohm range, and can fall to hundreds of ohms or even less when exposed to sufficient light. You first instinct when prototyping this type of device is likely to use an analog input on an Arduino or similar dev board to sense voltage levels. This works quite well in many situations, but you may also want to consider a comparator or operational amplifier (op-amp) to turn this analog input into a simple on/off signal. You could also use one of these components by itself to produce a usable output without the use of a microcontroller." [...]

IOT123 - I2C Max9812 Brick

"The IOT123 BRICKS are DIY modular units that can be mashed up with other IOT123 BRICKS, to add functionality to a node or wearable. They are based on the inch square, double-sided protoboards with interconnected through holes. A number of these BRICKS are expected to be on multiple nodes (Master MCUs - ESP8266 or ATTINY84) on a site. The MCU needs no prior knowledge of the sensors purpose or software needs. It scans for I2C nodes then requests a property dump (sensor data) from each slave. These BRICKs supply 5.0V, 3.3V and another AUX line which is customizable." [...]

Pi1541

"Pi1541 is a real-time, cycle exact, Commodore 1541 disk drive emulator that can run on a Raspberry Pi 3B (or 3B+). The software is free and I have endeavored to make the hardware as simple and inexpensive as possible. Pi1541 provides you with an SD card solution for using D64, G64, NIB and NBZ Commodore disk images on real Commodore 8 bit computers such as;- Commodore 64 Commodore 128 Commodore Vic20 Commodore 16 Commodore Plus4 Background Like most people I was a little disappointed in the SD2IEC offerings (being very hit and miss with their compatability) and the hard to order, FPGA solutions were out of my budget. Inspired by projects such as Peter Edwards' Tapuino and David Banks' PiTubeDirect I set about implementing a 1541 on a Raspberry Pi. My the goal was to make a highly compatable, inexpensive SD card solution for all Commodore 8 bit machines. I am yet to get it to work on a Pi Zero (as this would be a truly inexpensive solution), but maybe one day." [...]

Fast SSD1306 OLED drawing with I2C bit banging

"The SSD1306 OLED displays are very popular with hobbyists due to their low cost and easy interfacing. The majority of the ones sold expose a two wire interface (TWI) aka I2C. The default speed for I2C is 100Khz and the "fast" mode is 400Khz. These are the 2 standard speeds supported by most AVR Arduinos. An I2C clock rate of around 800Khz is also possible on AVR MCUs, but not supported directly by the Wire library. The I2C standard recently added some higher speeds (1Mhz and 3.4Mhz)." [...]

Low Cost DDS Function Generator for Makers

"Generating Sine, Square, Triangular, Sawtooth Waveform with Direct Digital Synthesizer method using PSoC 4 MCU and few passive components. Ever drooled over Oscilloscope, Function Generator, Logic Analyzer but can't afford those cool stuffs? Then, here is the good news! Build a fully functional decent Function Generator under 10$. This project is about making a Direct Digital Synthesizer Function Generator that can sprout Sine, Square, Triangular, Saw waveforms. It's also possible to program other random waveform patterns." [...]

IR Remote Wand

"The IR Remote Wand is a universal remote control that you can program with up to five codes to control a variety of different products: IR Remote Wand universal remote control based on an ATtiny85. It supports some of the most popular IR remote control protocols: Philips RC-5, NEC, Samsung, and Sony. It's based on an ATtiny85, and the circuit goes to sleep when you're not using it, to avoid the need for an on-off switch and to prolong the battery life. You can use my earlier IR Remote Control Detective [Updated] to discover the codes for the functions you want to support. Introduction I need to use three different remote controls to operate my television, DVD player, and audio system. However, I typically only use one or two buttons on each remote control for the functions I need regularly." [...]

Publish an Event with ESP8266 via Wia's MQTT API

"In this tutorial, we'll go through setting up an ESP8266 board, and publishing an Event to Wia via our MQTT API. Connecting the board Note: If your board has a micro USB port, you can probably skip this step. Connect your board to laptop/desktop via a USB to TTL cable/adapter. Here's a pinout showing the different connections. " [...]

Make a Countdown Timer With Micro:bit

"Countdown Timer is very common in our daily life. It helps to remind you to do something on time in case of any possible delay or error. For example, a pedometer or a baking timer. Today we are going to use micro:bit, power:bit and an acrylic base board with nylon watch band to create a simple countdown timer. " [...]

ESP8266, BMP280, MQTT Weather Station

"This will guide you trough making a simple weather station with good accuracy. Here we use a ESP8266 WIFI development board to connect the sensor to the internet to save the data. A lot of flavorous exist and will work and I will use the one I have at home: Homefixer ESP8266 There are many different sensors, but according to http://www.kandrsmith.org/RJS/Misc/Hygrometers/calib_many.html the BME280 delivers the best results out of common low-cost hygrometers. (Due to the seller sending me the wrong part, this guide will be using BMP280 but the steps are similar. The sending of data will be trough MQTT. " [...]

QuizzPi

"QuizzPi is an arcade type trivia game. QuizzPi was born becasuse I had the need to give my daughter an entertainment. She is 7 years old and she already demands the use of new technologies, the idea was to create something that was both fun and educational. Requirements of the project: Easy to use Portable Easy to upgrade the set of questions and answers High scores tableMultiple items are configurables. You can create your own database of questions/answers or you can use one of the multiple servers which offers a database, where you decide the type of questions, difficult, ... I created for my daughter a database of first grade questions, but we can change configuration to get trivia questions from an oline server." [...]

How to Hack and Upgrade Your Car, Using CAN Bus

"This document is aimed at those unfamiliar with CAN bus or the reverse engineering process, it will cover some very basic and advanced concepts. It is assumed that the reader has moderate programming knowledge and basic electronics knowledge, however, links to resources will be provided in each section for those that need additional information. In this tutorial you will cover:What is CAN bus? The basics of an Arduino microcontroller. Basic electronics knowledge. CAN bus electronics." [...]

Motorized Turntable

"When you think of the word turntable, you might think of something that you play a record on, but for this project, at least, we're going to build a different type of turntable. A turntable, in the video and photography world, is a flat platform on a stand that spins around, allowing you to get a 360 degree view of an object. This is great for adding movement to video, focusing on details that you otherwise might miss, and to raise an object up for better lighting. Turntables, much like other pieces of production equipment, can carry a premium price tag with minimum features. For this project, we'll go over how to build your own turntable with the ability to have adjustable rotation speed, rotate both clockwise and counterclockwise, and 3D print interchangeable platforms. Electronics by Liz Clark The circuit for this project is fairly simple, using only five main components including the Itsy Bitsy board." [...]

Arduino Door Bell With VU Meter

"Basic idea is - upon pushing the door bell push button, LEDs will start to rhythmically glow along with buzzer sound, after a time two events will automatically stop. The LEDs can be outside the door for entertaining the visitor or inside. In this instructable, I am demonstrating the basic project keeping it quite simple. I described the basic of this project as door bell project on my technology blog, shared on Hackstar, Fritzing etc places. Reader unlikely to face trouble building it. On Instructables, I will add more ideas to improve, customize this project for real life usage." [...]

Autonomous Fire Hazard System

"The time has come to automate our good old fire alarms and make them part of an interconnected world. Story Imagine your on vacation or out of town and there's a fire in your house. You'll probably be informed about it if you're lucky within 20 to 30 minutes from a neighbor, but at that point it's a bit late to reverse the damage. What if we could be informed of a house fire within a few seconds or minutes? Well, I believe that can be accomplished using the Particle Photon and Particle web services. Step 1: First thing will have to do is set up our Particle Photon." [...]

A Maze Running Game for PIC16F18313 Microcontrollers

"The point of the maze game is to find a path out of the maze. David's version used 4 LEDs to display the player's immediate surroundings and provided 4 buttons to select which direction to move in. I decided to make my version a tiny bit more immersive. I more than doubled the screen resolution and added colour in the process by using nine WS2812 LEDs, and changed to a joystick for input. This actually reduced the number of pins needed, compared to David's charlieplexed masterpiece. The PIC16F18313 chip I used is also an 8 pin device, like the original." [...]

The Artificial Plant Emotion Expressor (A.P.E.X.)

"What is APEX? APEX is a smart (not to mention cute) plant monitoring device. Just plug it into any plant and it will display the "happiness" level of the plant! This is a great reminder to water your plants if you have a bad habit of forgetting to water them. How does it work? Magic." [...]

An Arduino Based Moped Display

_"I brought a rundown old moped from my auntie a while ago, although it was a little beaten up she ran just fine, so i gave her a breath of life and now shes once again road worthy ( MOT guy was happy with the moped ;) ) Anyway, i'm sure your all thinking thats all good and well but this is a micro-controller contest dude... So Lets Begin..... The Atmega328p-pu needs no introduction >> heres a data sheet https://www.dropbox.com/s/6hwf2xzwuaeqevf/Atmel-42... My bike instrument panel had only the battery voltage monitor and the speedometer working, the bendy circuit behind the panel was toast due to the water ingress from p**ggios pants seals..ehm and the good news is the wiring was "OK" ... suddenly i morphed into multimeter man!! So with my meter in hand i probed... "_ [...]