Story 1: Artificial Intelligence used to create the ‘world’s fastest shoes’
Source: PC Magazine Story by Stephanie Mlot
Link: https://www.pcmag.com/news/shift-robotics-used-ai-to-create-the-worlds-fastest-shoes
See video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r0TPD5NUQ0
- An outfit based in Pittsburgh called Shift Robotics recently unveiled what it claims are the “world’s fastest shoes,” which they call Moonwalkers.
- Okay, “shoes” is a misnomer. They’re really roller-skate like devices you strap on to your shoes that enable you to “walk at the speed of a run.”
- Moonwalkers use a combination of artificial intelligence and machine learning to help the user walk swiftly.
- As their amazing video shows, to walk faster, you just walk faster. To slow down, walk slower. To stop, you just stop walking. It’s that simple!
- A brushless DC motor distributes power across eight plastic wheels, which react to the natural movement of each ankle to transition between Shift (go) and Lock (stop) modes.
- A front hinge on the Moonwalkers skate-like body allows the foot to naturally bend at the toes, preserving mobility and balance, while an electronic multi-layer brake protection system allows you to use stairs, elevators, and mass transit access without fear of falling.
- The Shift Robotics team claims you can learn to use the Moonwalkers after about 10 steps.
- If you want a pair you’ll have to wait until March 2023, and the price will be $1,099.
- My take on this – this is not just a gimmick toy – imagine how it could help, for example, people with walking challenges!
- Or factory or loading dock workers who need to move quickly from area to another.
- Or postal deliver folks walking neighborhoods
- Or nurses, etc. in hospitals needing to move quickly on “foot”
- Endless real-world possibilities!
Story 2: Egg whites could help remove microplastics from seawater
Source: Engadget.com Story by J. Fingas
Link: https://www.engadget.com/egg-whites-remove-microplastics-from-water-163248018.html
- Microplastics are tiny fragments less than 5 millimeters that cause pollution in our lakes, rivers, and oceans
- Princeton University researchers have discovered egg whites can be used to create a lightweight, porous aerogel that can remove microplastics and salt from seawater.
- When you freeze-dry and superheat the egg whites (up to 1,652 degrees Fahrenheit) in an oxygen-free environment, their pure protein system produces a mix of carbon fiber strands and graphene sheets that can remove 99 percent of tiny plastics from water, and 98 percent of the salt.
- As the article points out:
- As you might imagine, a readily available organic material like this has its benefits. It’s cheap to make and needs only gravity to work. It won’t consume energy or excess water. Activated carbon is cheap, but it’s not nearly as effective as the egg white gel. And while eggs from the grocery store prompted the breakthrough, you can use other proteins that won’t cut into the population’s food supply.
- The Princeton team stresses that before their egg whites-based aerogel is ready for widespread use they need to refine the manufacturing process to make mass production possible.
- But, if they succeed, it would make it potentially easy to remove microplastics and purify ocean water.
- A key question not addressed in the article – how you would deploy the egg-white based filter solution on a massive scale to address huge ocean areas?
- The article ends by noting: There are other purposes, for that matter. The gel might also be useful for energy storage and insulation, so don’t be surprised if you one day find egg-like proteins in your walls.
Story 3: Physical therapy patients will soon be able to use smartphones to watch 3D immersive exercise videos
Source: Intel Newsroom
Link: Helping Shape the Future of Healthcare with Technology (intel.com)
- When I’ve been a physical therapy patient, I come home with print outs showing how to do the prescribed exercises, and sometimes I get links to simple demonstration videos online. And I try my best to remember the moves and positions I was taught.
- The Providence Health & Services team here in Portland realized patients need a much better solution – so, right now, they’re working to create immersive 3D videos that physical therapy patients can watch on their smartphones.
- The remarkable videos allow you to use touch screen controls to move around the demonstrator, so you can see the correct way to execute an exercise from any angle.
- The new physical therapy exercise videos are being produced on a small stage at Providence Office Park in Portland where 20 Intel depth-sensing cameras capture 360-degree action in what is called “volumetric capture.”
- About Intel RealSense Depth Camera D435:
- The Intel RealSense depth camera D435 is a stereo solution, offering quality depth for a variety of applications. It’s wide field of view is perfect for applications such as robotics or augmented and virtual reality, where seeing as much of the scene as possible is vitally important. With a range up to 10m, this small form factor camera can be integrated into any solution with ease and comes complete with our Intel RealSense SDK 2.0 and cross-platform support.
- The digital footage from each camera is sent to a computer powered by an Intel Xeon processor that converts billions of pixels into a 3D immersive virtual environment that can be manipulated by the viewer to see from nearly any angle.
- An added benefit is the videos can be shared among patients at the healthcare system’s 51 hospitals.
- Providence built the original studio in 2021, using funding from the Intel Pandemic Response Technology Initiative.
- New funding this year from Intel is supporting the Providence team’s current work with the Gronstedt Group, who are experts in augmented and virtual reality to create the innovative smartphone app.
- By automating patient learning with immersive 3D smartphone-based video experiences, Providence expects to lower costs, deliver better caregiver experiences, and improved patient health outcomes.
Story 4: Tiny microscope can spot breast cancer cells forming
Source: The Guardian
- Researchers at the Imperial College London have developed an endo-microscope that is less than 1mm in diameter – that’s about the width of 25 human hairs.
- Time out: Definition of endo-microscope:
- Endo means internal, within. An endo-microscope is microscope version of an endoscope, which is an illuminated usually fiber-optic flexible or rigid tubular instrument for visualizing the interior of a hollow organ or part (such as the bladder or esophagus) for diagnostic or therapeutic purposes that typically has one or more channels to enable passage of instruments (such as forceps or scissors)
- The tiny microscope is attached to a very small and flexible tube designed to be inserted into the body making it possible to be maneuvered through small spaces during surgery.
- The microscope can produce high resolution images from inside the target tissue to be examined and/or treated.
- The hope is it could be used to speed up breast cancer treatment by helping surgeons identify cancerous cells as small as a hundredth of a millimeter in size at a much faster rate than traditional methods.
- It would help reduce the need for follow-up operations to remove cancerous cells that previously evaded detection.
- And the new microscope would also help with breast-conserving surgery, where the surgeon removes the cancer while leaving as much normal breast tissue as possible.