Tag Archives: smart materials

Harnessing the Fourth Industrial Revolution We are already in the path of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the one characterised by a merging of the physical, digital and -at least for some- biological world. Personally I tend to limit the characterisation to the merging of physical and digital leaving the merging …

We have already moved quite a long way from Henry Ford’s famous statement: “Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black.” He didn’t actually wanted to limit customer’s choice, he wanted to produce a car that could be affordable for (mostly) …

The early success of personal computers among hobbyists was driven by actuators that converted bits into sound or light. At industrial level the conversion of bits into printouts and into commands operating a lathe or other tools was the reason for their adoption. Actually, it is this conversion of bit/data …

The advance in smart material technologies includes the capability of self replication. Studies in this area started in the last decade and exploited the results of Nature: using DNA strings with attached molecules of materials scientists demonstrated the possibility of replication (see the image). Of course the replication instructions to …

In the last ten years there have been several researches focussing on the creation of a sensory system for robots that could be as effective as the one of animals. Animals have a variety of sensorial capabilities, varying in different species. Most species (probably all) have touch sensors embedded in …

I have a digital reflex camera and it is a bulky one. It gets even bulkier when I decide to use a telephoto lens. The reasons are related to the physics of optics. The “bulkiness” of the lens depends on the size of the sensor you have and on the …

Several dictionaries do not list the word “blacker” because black is supposed to be an “absolute” state, you cannot get something that is more black than black. A week ago I reported on the use of Vantablack by BMW to paint their X6 model and showcase it at the Frankfurt …

2. Powder Bed Fusion – Laser fusion Power Bed Fusion based on Laser – SLS Selective Laser Sintering and SLM Selective Laser Melting,,  was invented over 20 years ago by EOS, a German company still on the leading edge in additive manufacturing tools. It is based on the use of …

Back in 2014 I wrote a post commenting on the announcement of the use of carbon nanotube to paint an object in real “black”. Black is the color absorbing all light (visible) wavelengths, but in reality what we usually call black is something that is absorbing quite a bit of …

  9. Self-healing concrete If you place a bunch of stones one over the other it won’t take long to discover that the structure is weak and will collapse at a moment notice. This is no news, our ancestors were familiar with the problem and as far as 8,500 years …