Technut News

Open source 3D printer copies itself

Based in the Waitakeres, in West Auckland, software developer and artist Vik Olliver is part of a team developing an open-source, self-copying 3D printer. The RepRap (Replicating Rapid-prototyper) printer can replicate and update itself. It can print its own parts, including updates, says Olliver, who is one of the core members of the RepRap team. The 3D printer works by building components up in layers of plastic, mainly polylactic acid (PLA), which is a bio-degradable polymer made from lactic acid. The technology already exists, but commercial machines are very expensive. They also can’t copy themselves, and they can’t be manipulated by users, says Olliver.

RepRap has a different idea. The team, which is spread over New Zealand, the UK and the US, develops and gives away the designs for its much cheaper machine, which also has self-copying capabilities. It wants to make the machine available to anybody — including small communities in the developing world, as well as people in the developed world, says Olliver.

Accordingly, the RepRap machine is distributed, at no cost, under the GNU (General Public Licence).

Digital Tattoo Interface Turns Flesh Into An LCD

Imagine this: your phone rings and you lift your sleeve and push a tattooed button on your forearm. Next thing you know there is a digital video of the caller, moving in full video on your arm. After you hang up the tattoo completely fades away to leave nothing but your bare skin.

The Digital Tattoo Interface is a Bluetooth device that is inserted into the skin via a small incision. After inserted as a tube, it unrolls as a flat silicon base. It rests between skin and muscle. Glucose and oxygen in your blood fuel the implant via an attached artery and vein.

A special tattoo on the surface of your skin would interact with the field created by the device. Touching it through your skin would make it react similar to a touch screen display. Implications are limitless. Telephones, TV, the Web and just about everything else we rely on could be literally embedded in your skin.

Edit:
This thing doesn’t actually exist but is a gadget design for a competition. I could exist. In the future. Just not now.

Light-powered Toothbrush Could Eliminate Need For Toothpaste

The Shiken Company of Japan is making a prototype solar-powered toothbrush, which causes a chemical reaction in your mouth, with the hopes of improving the elimination of harmful plaque and bacteria.

Dr. Komiyama designed the first model of this type of toothbrush more than 15 years ago: It contained a titanium dioxide rod in the neck of the brush, just below the nylon bristles. Any light falling on the wet rod would release electrons, which would react to the acid typically found in the mouth, helping break down plaque.

The latest model, the Soladey-J3X, works in much in the same way, except that it’s twice as powerful.

The brush also has a solar panel at the base, which transmits electrons to the top of the toothbrush through a wire.

Scientists Invent 30 Year Continuous Power Laptop Battery

Your next laptop could have a continuous power battery that lasts for 30 years without a single recharge thanks to work being funded by the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory. The breakthrough betavoltaic power cells are constructed from semiconductors and use radioisotopes as the energy source. As the radioactive material decays it emits beta particles that transform into electric power capable of fueling an electrical device like a laptop for years.Although betavoltaic batteries sound Nuclear they’re not, they’re neither use fission/fusion or chemical processes to produce energy and so (do not produce any radioactive or hazardous waste). Betavoltaics generate power when an electron strikes a particular interface between two layers of material.

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The reaction is non-thermal which means laptops and other small devices like mobile phones will run much cooler than with traditional lithium-ion power batteries.

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The best part about these cells are when they eventually run out of power they are totally inert and non-toxic, so environmentalists need not fear these high tech scientific wonder batteries. If all goes well plans are for these cells to reach store shelves in about 2 to 3 years.

Update: this turned out to be a hoax.

Technologies Changing Copywriting, Advertising and Marketing

From the Get In Writing site:

There is no doubt that we are in the midst of many changes in the world of marketing and advertising as new technologies are changing the way we view and interact with businesses and products.As copywriting professionals, we feel these changes too. Attention spans are shrinking, new mediums are developing and competition is increasing. Staying on top of it all has become essential in staying competitive.

Their article has some cool videos to go along with it:

Hypersonic Speakers (direct sound at any position in 3D)

Flexible OLED Displays

Bottle makes dirty water drinkable

The way fresh water is supplied to disaster-hit regions could be revolutionised after an Ipswich-based businessman invented a £190 bottle that makes foul-smelling water drinkable in seconds.Michael Pritchard hopes that the bottle could be a life-saver for refugees in disaster regions where access to clean drinking water is vital.

However, the military are already latching on to his idea. Four hours after Mr Pritchard launched his new “Life Saver” bottle at the DESI defence show in London yesterday, he sold out his entire 1,000 stock. “I am bowled over,” he said.

Military chiefs are excited because the bottles, which can distill either 4,000 litres or 6,000 litres without changing the filter, will have huge benefits for soldiers who hate drinking iodine-flavoured water.

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Conventional filters can cut out bacteria measuring more than 200 nanometres but not viruses, which typically are 25 nanometres long.

Mr Pritchard’s bottle can clean up any water - including faecal matter - using a filter that cuts out anything longer than 15 nanometres, which means that viruses can be filtered out without the use of chemicals.