Engineering

Self-driving software will become a key differentiator for highly automated vehicles but the technology is not quite ready yet. Credit: Shutterstock The recent crash of a Tesla car in the United States, in which two people died, has reignited debate about the capabilities and safety of today's "self-driving" technologies. Tesla...

The drone-delivery service in Christiansburg, Va.—the first in the country to deliver goods directly to residences on demand—gave researchers a unique opportunity to study how people feel about the technology when they've actually experienced it in their own community. Credit: Virginia Tech The week of Thanksgiving last year, a postcard...

Side view of a swimming biobot developed at IBEC, consisting of a muscle cell-laden hydrogel and a spring-like skeleton. These biobots can self-train, showing surprising speed and strength. Credit: IBEC A team of researchers working at Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology has developed a skeletal-muscle-based, biohybrid soft robot that...

University at Buffalo tech can identify machines by their unique 'hot end,' could aid intellectual property, security. Credit: University at Buffalo 3D printing is transforming everything from fashion and health care to transportation and toys. But this rapidly evolving technology, also known as additive manufacturing, can threaten national security and...

NAU mechanical engineer Michael Shafer and graduate student Diego Higueras-Ruiz conducting a visual inspection of their new compliant robotic arm actuated with cavatappi artificial muscles. Credit: Northern Arizona University In the field of robotics, researchers are continually looking for the fastest, strongest, most efficient and lowest-cost ways to actuate, or...

This inflatable shelter is out of thick plastic sheets and can pop up or fold flat. Credit: Benjamin Gorissen/David Melancon/Harvard SEAS In 2016, an inflatable arch wreaked havoc at the Tour de France bicycle race when it deflated and collapsed on a cyclist, throwing him from his bike and delaying...

Credit: Pavel Odinev / Skoltech Skoltech scientists in collaboration with researchers from the University of Arizona and the Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed an approach that allows power grids to return to stability fast after demand response perturbation. Their research at the crossroads of demand response, smart grids, and...

The TOPCoRE solar cell achieved 26 percent efficiency, a new world record for both-sides-contacted solar cells. Credit: Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft A team of researchers led by Dr. Armin Richter of the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE achieved a record conversion efficiency of 26.0 percent for both-sides contacted silicon solar cells....

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Current national strategies for bridge maintenance favor replacement over maintenance. A fairly simple depreciation formula is used, resulting in overly conservative assessments of a bridge's long-term health. In a study published in the American Society of Civil Engineers' Journal of Performance of Constructed Facilities, researchers from...

Currently, Paulino and the team are in the prototyping phase, printing structures using a Stereolithography 3D printer with liquid photopolymers as a base. Credit: Candler Hobbs, Georgia Tech A mollusk and shrimp are two unlikely marine animals that are playing a very important role in engineering. The bodies of both...

The cheetah's aerodynamic drag tail allows it to demonstrate tremendous precision and maneuverability at high speeds. Can we translate this performance to a tail for a robot? Credit: University of Cape Town From lizards to kangaroos, many animals with tails possess an agility that allows them to turn or self-right...

Credit: MandriaPix/Shutterstock Throughout the past year of working from home, I have gone for numerous morning, lunchtime and evening walks around my neighborhood in the Eastern parts of Lund in Sweden. My neighborhood has three dams for storing stormwater in the event of extreme rain. These help slow the water...

Credit: UniSA’s Future Industries Institute Researchers at UniSA have developed a cost-effective technique that could deliver safe drinking water to millions of vulnerable people using cheap, sustainable materials and sunlight. Less than 3 percent of the world's water is fresh, and due to the pressures of climate change, pollution, and...

Dr Filip Biljecki showcasing the urban digital twin used in the study. Urban farming has picked up in scale and sophistication globally in recent years. Several innovative urban farming approaches have been introduced in Singapore, such as rooftop farming, optimisation of land use, the introduction of more greenery into the...

By counting pedestrians in the Kendall Square area of Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIT Associate Professor Andres Sevtsuk has produced a new model of pedestrian flows on street networks that can be used for city planning. Credit: Christine Daniloff, MIT A key portion of MIT's campus overlaps with Kendall Square, the bustling...

Synthetic bat ear designed by Rolf Mueller and his team. Credit: Virginia Tech Inspired by the workings of a bat's ear, Rolf Mueller, a professor of mechanical engineering at Virginia Tech, has created bio-inspired technology that determines the location of a sound's origin. Mueller's development works from a simpler and...

MAX phases material (an example shown in electron micrograph) are some of the most high-temperature corrosion and oxidation-resistant materials to date. Credit: Dr. Miladin Radovic/Texas A&M Engineering Will it be possible to design materials that are unfazed by extreme temperatures in the near future? In a study published in the...

Credit: Clive Stapleton/Shutterstock British politicians, national and local, tend to like investing in roads. The Treasury believes that the Department for Transport's approach to economic analysis is sound, and so is willing to award substantial funds. The department is happy to accept them, as are the civil engineering contractors that...

The wearable transmitter is designed to compress its top layer in a double arch pattern, shown here, to respond to movement without compromising signal transmission. Credit: Huanyu Cheng, Penn State Current research on flexible electronics is paving the way for wireless sensors that can be worn on the body and...

Purdue University researchers Eckhard Groll (left) and Leon Brendel stand next to a fridge experiment they designed to work in different orientations - even upside down. Credit: Purdue University/Jared Pike For astronauts to go on long missions to the moon or Mars, they need a refrigerator. But today's fridges aren't...