Touch screens - What do you know..?

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Touch screens nowadays are becoming so common that every gadget in the world is going touch screen. Every person in his day to day life will interact with something which is touch screen. But have you ever wondered what these touch screens are made of..? How do they work..? What's the technology behind it.?

Many people don't know about these. After you finish reading this, you will be amazed by the technology and think of it as a miracle..!

I don't think defining 'touch screen' is necessary as you know what it means. you can easily write,navigate,open windows etc with touch screen. But think of this, ' within fraction of second your touch is your touch is translated into control commands that a computer understands'..! but how..??

To know that, lets look at different type of touch screens.

1. Capacitive touch screens : Its a wafer thin electrode made of ITO ( indium tin oxide) coated below glass. In such screens, an electrical field is generated on the surface of the screen. That field is disrupted by the user's touch, and electrodes on the edges of the screen measure changes in the current and can thus define the location of the disruption.
2. Resistive touch screens : Its composed of many layers. The most important are the two electrically conductive layer separated by a small distance. When you touch on it, the two metallic layers become connected at that point.This results in the change in the current and computer locates the point of contact.
   
3. Acoustic pulse recognition : It makes you of piezoelectric transducers. They "hear" sound waves caused by the user's touch. Sensors in the edges of the screen measure the amount of time it takes for the pulse to reach the edge, and can then calculate the location of the touch.

There are many other type of touch screens too like surface acoustic wave, optical imaging, self capacitance etc. Please feel free to explore the web...:)

The mobile touch screens what we use everyday uses 'Capacitive touch screens' as they are light and inexpensive. But there is a problem....!! The material used in the manufacture of these screens i.e, ITO (indium tin oxide) is very rare. There are only few deposit of indium anywhere in the world. So thinking of the future, scientists are looking for an alternative for ITO.

Now the updated news in the touch screens technology is that the researchers at Fraunhofer have come up with an alternative to ITO which is as efficient as ITO also cheaper ..!!

Its main components are carbon nanotubes and low-cost polymers. This new electrode foil is composed of two layers. One is the carrier, a thin foil made of inexpensive polyethylenterephthalate PET used for making plastic bottles. Then a mixture of carbon-nanotubes and electrically conducting polymers is added that is applied to the PET as a solution and forms a thin film when it dries.

So now you know about a technology and tell others and make yourself look intelligent..:) So see you when something significant happens in the world of science n technology...:)

Racetrack Memory - what is it..??!!

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You may be having the most advanced configuration for your computer but still, I bet sometimes you wish computer to be faster and efficient...:) Well, you may have to wait for another 5 to 7 years.... 'Racetrack memory' is on its way....!!

With Racetrack Memory,

• you can have your computer booted up instantly...!!
  
• Also you can access your HDD at 100,000 times faster than now..!! ( its lightning speed...:) )
  
• Moreover it's 300 times more energy efficient..!!

What more do you want..???
So now you may be thinking ... what is it...???

Stuart Parkin of IBM’s Almaden Research Center came up with a concept of spintroncs-based memory in which the parts dont move instead the information moves. Prof. Mathias Kläui of Switzerland’s EPFL ( École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne ) developed the concept and came up with the Racetrack memory.

Like a videocassette, Racetrack Memory would store data magnetically. Instead of on a moving tape, however, it would be stored on a tiny unmoving nickel-iron nanowire. The bits of information, which are stored in the wire using the spin of electrons rather than an electronic charge, would be moved around at several hundred meters per second, using a spin polarized current. Adjacent bits would be delineated from one another via domain walls with magnetic vortices.
Just to get you an idea of how much faster this could be..., according to EPFL, accessing these nanowires is like reading an entire VHS tape in less than a second..!! They are planning to embed millions or even billions of such nanowires on the chip...!! ( got the idea..?...:) )

But before it hits the consumer market, there are lots of difficulties to be overcome. Such as...
Microscopic imperfections in the crystal structure of the wires, which led to the magnetic domains becoming “stuck,” and it results in a performance equal to current HDDs'.

Lets hope it hits the market soon and days of booting up our computers instantly are not far...:)

Turning trees into street lights...!

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This is one discovery, when properly developed and employed, is going to change the whole world.
This will provide one revolutionary solution for controlling pollution and also to save a significant amount of power...!! Its another magic of nano technology...:)

Now a days there is a very large increase in cutting down trees for some construction or road widening purposes. This decrease in no. of trees is as everybody knows, is very dangerous. Trees provide us oxygen to live and we are killing them. How foolish are we...??!!! don't you think...?

This motivated Post-doctor Yen-Hsun Su of Research Center for Applied Science (RCAS), Academia Sinica, Taiwan, to think of this revolutionary idea and also making it a reality...!!

This brilliant discovery is using gold nanoparticles to induce luminescence in leaves...!!!

How is it possible.....??

well, Yen-Hsun Su implanted gold nanoparticles into Bacopa caroliniana plants and found that, when exposed to high wavelength ultraviolet light, the gold nanoparticles can produce a blue-violet fluorescence that triggers a red emission of the surrounding chlorophyll.

Assistant Prof. Shih-Hui Chang of Institute of Electro-Optical Science and Engineering, upon learning the discovery said,"Light emitting diode (LED) has replaced traditional light source in many display panels and street lights on the road. A lot of light emitting diode, especially white light emitting diode, uses phosphor powder to stimulate light of different wavelengths. However, phosphor powder is highly toxic and its price is expensive. As a result, Dr. Yen-Hsun Wu had the idea to discover a method which is less toxic to replace phosphor powder which can harm human bodies and cause environmental pollution"


In an interview with the 'Chemistry World' Yen-Hsun Su stated "In the future, bio-LED could be used to make roadside trees luminescent at night. This will save energy and absorb CO2 as the bio-LED luminescence will cause the chloroplast to conduct photosynthesis,"

The invention needs to be developed a lot. But anyway, I think its a billion dollar idea...! Lets hope the days of us seeing the roadside trees illuminating, are not far...:)

Do you know what's going on behind the closed doors of 'Nokia research center'...???

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New discoveries, inventions, gadgets with some pretty cool n amazing features are introduced to the world everyday. have ever wondered what researchers and scientists working on right now which would amaze us i the future..?? Well.. if you are then, here is a little window of "Nokia Research Center" giving you a peek into the future...!!!

Know more about "Nokia Research Center" HERE...

Read below to see into the future.....:)
1. Nanowire sensing
What is it...???
In one word its an 'artificial nose'.

How does it work..??
By placing a nanowire on top of a chip, they can train it to recognize different substances which are placed close to the sensing surface.You may ask how can it act as nose, well.., the current passing through the nanowire in influenced by the its surrounding objects.Current reacts , when you place a different object.

Future applications...??
In the future, this kind of technology could be used to monitor environments and measure a variety of things including air pollution, food-based contaminants or bio-chemical processes.
Go for the video....:)



2. Stretchable electronic skin

What is it...??
The title suggests it all.... As you know the circuit board currently are solid.Researchers are working on a technology that will make them flexible like a skin.

How do the make it..??
By using evaporated gold as a conductor, they have created an electronic touchpad which can be stretched like a rubber band, but still respond to touch and pressure.They are testing it to stretch by up to 20 per cent of its original length without any drop in performance.y

Why do we need such thing in future..??
Just think of the possibilities o what could it offer in future...its mind blowing..! Think like this.. it could enable a unique range of wearable devices or even enable technology to feasibly become part of our clothing.This can change the whole way of interacting with technology and gadgets..!!
Watch below.....


3. Electrotactile experience

This third one is the most realistic. Because this is being shown off on a nokia n900. researchers are trying to make the touchscreens to give back more realistic feedbacks so that it can take the way of interacting with touchscreens to a whole new level.
Part of the team’s research is looking at ways to try and replicate textures, potentially offering users new experiences when it comes to interacting with a touchscreen.



So... did you like the future....?????

Drug delivery by magnetic nano particles...!!!

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If the drug we take to cure any illness reaches the affected part of the body efficiently, then that particular drug will have its optimum effect towards curing the illness.This is kind of common sense..... The main drawbacks of current drug delivery methods are

• many drugs’ potencies and therapeutic effects are limited or otherwise reduced because of the partial degradation that occurs before they reach a desired target in the body.
• Once ingested, time-release medications deliver treatment continuously, rather than providing relief of symptoms and protection from adverse events solely when necessary

Now the researchers from Lund University in Sweden have made a successful attempt in the drug delivery method. Which can be revolutionary if properly developed.They have developed magnetic nanoparticles that can be directed to metallic implants such as artificial knee joints, hip joints and stents in the coronary arteries.

A stent is a tiny tube placed into an artery, blood vessel, or other duct (such as one that carries urine) to hold the structure open.As usual this method is too has problems.depending on the type of stent inserted, the cells of the artery wall can grow and again obstruct the artery or a blood clot can develop in the stent.

To deal with such problems what researchers have now figured out is as below...
The nanoparticles were coated with a drug used to treat blood clots.(The particles could also carry other drugs, e.g. drugs to stop the cell growth that makes an artery become narrower.) When the stent is placed in a magnetic field, the magnetic force becomes sufficiently strong to attract the magnetic nanoparticles.Thus these magnetic nanoparticles carrying drugs will be directed exactly to the affected part of the body and hence cure the problem that is to be cured.

Associate Professor Maria Kempe, her brother and colleague Dr Henrik Kempe and members of staff at Skåne University Hospital have shown that the principle works in animal experiments.They were even successful in dissolving a blood clot in a stent in the heart of an animal.

"They could also carry antibiotics to treat an infection developed after insertion of an implant. We have developed polymer materials that can be loaded with antibiotics -- these could produce interesting results in this context," says Maria Kempe."It takes many years to develop a treatment method that can be used on patients. But the good initial results make us hopeful,"

Again one problem with this method is...For the method to work the patient therefore has to have an implant containing a magnetic metal.

Smugglig drugs within the body...!!!

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Can you believe if I say, according to a study cancer patients are increasing at a rate of 10000 patients per year...?? Its true.... also according to WHO cancer rates could increase by 50% to 15million by 2020...!!

Let me just tell you what cancer is. Cancer is a type of disease in which cells show uncontrolled growth ,intrusion on and destruction of adjacent tissues and sometimes they pouches (yellow) to the surfaces of cells.

spread to other locations in
the body via lymph or blood.Cancer is caused due to the abnormalities in the genetic material of the transformed cells.In other words, its like everybody has cancerous cells in their body.They start to show malignant properties mentioned above when they are triggered and this triggering process is caused due to carcinogens such as tobacco smoke,radiation,chemicals etc.


Vastly used cancer treatment used nowadays is chemotherapy (which is is the treatment of a disease by chemicals by killing cancerous cells) and Immune-cell therapy.Unfortunately it has a major drawback, it has a major drawback, it causes side effects such as constipation,delirium,fatigue,nausea and vomiting,insomnia etc are very common.A heart,kidney or liver damage is also a real possibility in chemotherapy.

Now let me tell you a good news as well.... researchers from MIT have found a way to overcome the drawbacks in chemotherapy....!!!!!! The new way is to deliver the necessary drugs by smuggling them on the backs of the cells sent in to fight the tumor.In this way drugs can accurately hit the cancerous cells only, greatly reducing the risk of a side effect.

In immune cell therapy, doctors remove a type of immune cells called T cells from the patient, engineer them to target the tumor, and inject them back into the patient. Those T cells then hunt down and destroy tumor cells.What researchers are trying to do is, they have designed drug-carrying pouches made of fatty membranes that can be attached to sulfur-containing molecules normally found on the T-cell surface, in order to avoid the nasty side effects.
In the Nature Medicine study, the researchers injected T cells, each carrying about 100 pouches loaded with the interleukins IL-15 and IL-21, into mice with lung and bone marrow tumors. Once the cells reached the tumors, the pouches gradually degraded and released the drug over a weeklong period. The drug molecules attached themselves to receptors on the surface of the same cells that carried them, stimulating them to grow and divide.

Within 16 days, all of the tumors in the mice treated with T cells carrying the drugs disappeared. Those mice survived until the end of the 100-day experiment, while mice that received no treatment died within 25 days, and mice that received either T cells alone or T cells with injections of interleukins died within 75 days.

The above experiment clearly demonstrate the efficiency of this new method. Darrell Irvine is the senior author of a paper describing the technique in the Aug. 15 issue of Nature Medicine. So lets hope this puts an end to the cancer and to the suffering of those patients who go through a hell of miseries because of the side effects.