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“Power Plants”

Posted on March 2, 2016 - 5:00 am by

One of the most enjoyable things about technology is seeing the new and often unexpected ways in which it’s put to use. An item I recently came across on embedded.com certainly fit the bill for new and unexpected, that’s for sure.

The article described how Swedish researchers “have developed a way to create electronic circuits inside living plants.”

Why, you might ask, would someone want to have circuits in plants? A self-lighting Christmas tree? A wired-for-sound potted fern that sang to itself so that you don’t have to? (This latter reference is to a myth – or is it? – that holds that if you talk or sing to your plants, they’ll grow better.)

Well, here’s why:

“Magnus Berggren, a professor of organic electronics at Linköping University and one of the study’s authors, told The New York Times the technology could, in the future, be used to regulate plant physiology, such as controlling the rate at which flowers bloom or timing their blooms to coincide with appropriate weather conditions or water availability. The result could be the ability to produce more resilient plants without exposing them to chemicals or genetic modification. Other possible applications include harvesting small amounts of electricity from trees or other plants. ‘Today, the most natural way to convert the chemical energy of a tree is to burn it,’ Berggren told the paper, ‘But maybe we could actually gently tap out some of the energy without killing it.’”(Source: EDN)

The approach was prompted by the researchers’ observing that “vascular circuitry” in plants is similar in terms of function to electronic circuits, and found that plants (they experimented with roses) are capable of producing electronic circuits, both analog and digital. Who knew?

The key was finding a way to get conductive polymers into the plants. The way was through something called PEDOT-S, a water-soluble synthetic polymer that used to “wire” the plants through their stems.

“‘Now we can really start talking about power plants,’ [Berggren] added in a statement. ‘We can place sensors in plants and use the energy formed in the chlorophyll, produce green antennas, or produce new materials. Everything occurs naturally, and we use the plants’ own very advanced, unique systems.’”

Power plants, huh?

Technology keeps getting more and more interesting.

Driverless cars: not quite ready for winter weather

Posted on February 24, 2016 - 5:00 am by

This is Upstate New York, so it’s too early to call game over with respect to snowfall. It’s only late February, after all, and we’ve been known to have snow in May. Still, the corner has been turned. But when it comes to handling snow, the corner hasn’t been turned quite yet for self-driving cars. As I learned when I saw an article on Bloomberg a couple of weeks back.

Volvo does some car testing north of the Arctic Circle, where the winter weather can make Syracuse look like Palm Beach. One of the cars Volvo’s testing up there is a self-driving SUV. What they found was that frozen snowflakes were getting to the sensors that were trying to read the road. As a result, the SUVs went snow blind. Volvo engineers solved the problem by placing the vehicle’s radar sensors behind the windshield. The windshield wipers keep things clear, so the sensors can do their thing.

Anyway, it seems like self-driving cars aren’t quite weather for winter weather.

“There’s been a lot of hype in the media and in the public mind’s eye” about the technology for self-driving cars “being nearly solved,” said Ryan Eustice, an associate professor of engineering at the University of Michigan who is working with Ford on snow testing. “But a car that’s able to do nationwide, all-weather driving, under all conditions, that’s still the Holy Grail.” (Source: Bloomberg News)

Ford thinks that they’ve solved one of the driving-in-snow problems: visibility of the lane lines. Using lidar (which does sensing with laser light), they’re scanning roads and creating high-def 3-D maps “that are much more accurate than images from global-positioning satellites, which can be 10 meters (33 feet) off.” What Ford is trying to do is replicate what human drivers do when the line lanes are no longer visible: we drive in the ruts left by the car ahead of us.

Lidar is one of several technologies used to let driverless cars “see”. Cameras and radar are also used. High-speed processors crunch the data to provide 360-degree detection of lanes, traffic, pedestrians, signs, stoplights and anything else in the vehicle’s path. That enables it to decide, in real time, where to go.”

Different types of sensors are used in combinations, capturing data on the same objects in different ways, rather than relying on just one source of information. AI also comes into play.

Winter conditions get in the way of all this. Just as they get in the way of us human drivers. Just like us, a driverless car can become disoriented.

Maybe the best advice for driverless cars will be the same advice that we have to take every winter. There are some times when you just need to stay off the road.

Dissolvable Electronics. (Wow!)

Posted on February 17, 2016 - 6:00 am by

I’m out in San Francisco this week for Photonics West, and, while on the elliptical in my hotel the other day, I caught up on some of my reading.

One of the most interesting articles I came across was from Ars Technica on dissolvable electronics, which someday soon will be used for health monitoring.

“The transient sensors, which can measure pressure, temperature, pH, motion, flow, and potentially specific biomolecules, stand to permanently improve patient care, researchers said. With a wireless, dissolving sensor, doctors could ditch the old versions that require tethering patients to medical equipment and performing invasive surgery to remove, which adds risks of infections and complications to already vulnerable patients.” (Source: Ars Technica)

The initial designs are for use in the brain, but over time there are likely to be many other applications – tissues, other organs.  The electronics – which are incredibly tiny – “contain biodegradable silicon-based piezoresistive sensors, which change their electrical resistance with slight bending, surrounded by more silicon, magnesium, and a dissolvable copolymer, poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA), which is already used in medical devices.”

Dissolvable molybdenum wires are used to transmit data to a “wireless data transmission device that can sit on the outside of the body, just on top of the skin.”

Based on the coatings used, the implants will last a couple of post-surgical days, or longer as needed. While they’re in use, they’ll be monitored to determine whether they’re causing any inflammation.

So far, the research has been confined to rat brains, so the researchers will now be moving up the food chain (animal version) to larger animals, then on to clinical trials before these are widely introduced. Researchers are hoping that human testing will be conducted within the next three to four years.

With so many flashy consumer gadgets out there, it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the many really profound uses that emerging technology is put to. Many of these are in the medical arena. I do my bit to stay in good health, which is why I was on that elliptical to begin with. But you never know when you or someone in your family will be able to benefit from the tremendous medical breakthroughs coming, courtesy of exciting new technology.

See you at Photonics West

Posted on February 10, 2016 - 5:00 am by

We’ve been regulars at Photonics West for a number of years now, which is being held February 16-18 at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. This year will be no exception.

It’s not just that we like to have a getaway from the typical Syracuse winter. A break from snow and cold is always welcome, even when it means foggy and cool, which is what we’re likely to get next week in San Francisco. But this winter’s been a pretty easy one so far, and we’d look forward to Photonics West anyway.

For those unfamiliar with it, the show bills itself as the place to “see the latest research, innovations, products, and services driving today’s technology trends.” Those trends cover many of the types of applications Critical Link’s products are embedded in.

This year, we’ll be showcasing our just-announced infrared-enhanced CCD camera, the MityCCD-H11501. This camera features the latest sensor technology from Hamamatsu, and is designed for scientific imaging applications. We’ll also be displaying our MityCAM sCMOS-based cameras, which combine sensors from Fairchild Imaging and CMOSIS with our Cyclone V SoC-based System on Module.

If you’re going to be at Photonics West, stop by Booth 630 to say hello and take a look at all our CCD and CMOS-based cameras. If you’re interested in customization options or would just like to set up a specific time to meet, you can email us at info@criticallink.com. That also goes for those of you staying home and enjoying the remainder of winter, wherever you are!

“Enabling Technologies for Industry 4.0”

Posted on February 3, 2016 - 5:00 am by

With so much focus on the consumer aspects of the Internet of Things – smart thermostats, smart fridges, smart doorbells – it’s always good to see something about what’s happening in an industrial setting. It’s only fair, especially given that, well before there was an IoT, the networked device concept was already in play with machine-to-machine technologies.  So I was very happy to run across a post on TI’s site, “Smart factories of the future – Enabling technologies for Industry 4.0,” by Ahmed Bahai.

Why Industry 4.0?

Industry 4.0, in which factories will become smart enough to optimize production so that there can be cost-effective customization, represents the fourth Industrial Revolution. (In case you weren’t paying attention in history class, the first Industrial Revolution, and the factory system, came about thanks to harnessing water power and the introduction of the steam engine. In the second Industrial Revolution, electricity replaced other power sources. Then came Industry 3.0, the digital revolution, in which information technology and electronics began automating production.  Bringing us to Industry 4.0.

The technologies that are enabling Industry 4.0 including embedded sensors, network connectivity, data analytics, and software platforms. In his post, Bahai chooses to focus on just “the key attributes of the Industrial Internet from the semiconductor viewpoint, in particular the role of analog and embedded processing as key enabling technologies for the new wave of intelligent manufacturing,” starting with embedded sensors.

Bahai notes the sensors in manufacturing are nothing new, and that embedded sensors won’t be replacing “rugged industrial sensors,” but will complement them.  He writes:

“Integration of magnetics, ultrasonic and optical sensors on a chip or in the package can facilitate diagnosis and prognosis of sub-systems with incremental cost and no major impact on the infrastructure. Predictive maintenance using data collected by distributed networked sensors is an instance of increased efficiency in smart factories of the future.”

He then discusses embedded processors:

“Local processing of data is critical for real-time and low power embedded sensor modules… Embedded processors for industrial sensors are highly differentiated by their integrated low power interfaces, intelligent power management and integrated clock references. Also, a combination of hardware and software security features is critical for secure communication as well as IP and tamper protection.”

Bahai points out that networking,  i.e., “ubiquitous connectivity is an essential enabler of Industrial Internet, and goes on to say “an embedded low power MCU with connectivity and intelligent power management can operate on a coin cell for 10 years.” The final area he discusses is isolation technology, writing that “transferring high data rate information and wideband signaling for measurement and control across isolation barriers is increasingly important in many industrial systems.”

As Bahai says, we’re “at the dawn of the so called ‘Industrial 4.0’,” which means you have plenty of time to go over to the TI site and check out his full post. (The post is quite informative as well as being quite brief, so you’ll definitely have time for it!)

The three embedded market trends you should be considering

Posted on January 27, 2016 - 5:00 am by

Last week, we posted an article on the ARM Connected Community site. This is an interesting and useful information-sharing forum for anyone working with – or just plain interested in – ARM. There are a number of “subdivisions” dedicated to specific areas, from ARM processors to SOC to wearables.

Our post wasn’t ARM-specific, but was rather our take on the trends we’re seeing in the embedded market (including ARM, of course). Anyway, I thought you’d be interested in what we had to say, so we’re running the article here, as well.

EmbeddedMarketTrendsWe at Critical Link have worked on some pretty complex applications for nearly 20 years, and so we’re exposed in real time to trends in the embedded market. Our work creating System-on-Modules (SoMs), custom baseboards, and complete ground-up solutions for various markets has helped illuminate three key trends we think are transforming the embedded computing market.

First is the increasing demand for an engaging user interface. Traditionally, the higher end the application, the less focus on the UI. Blue, green, or amber screen, seven segment or text display, command line or simple menu picks – all were fine. But now that everyone has gotten used to what’s possible with cellular telephone interfaces and apps, customers are demanding an improved user experience in other applications.

Whether they’re building something new from scratch or refreshing an existing product with a sexier display, embedded developers are paying a lot of attention to the interface. They are looking at options for integrating a color LCD display and Ethernet or WiFi capability. So although a product itself may not require an ARM core, the final architecture will require an ARM-based solution that runs embedded Linux because it enables the desired UI improvements and connectivity.

A second important trend for embedded designers is the combination of rising technology complexity and the rate of integration. At Critical Link, our products have focused on combining FPGAs with either DSPs or ARM technologies. Traditionally these have been discrete solutions with the device connectivity at the board level. But with the new System on Chip (SoC) architectures where the FPGA and ARM are contained in the same die, companies often don’t have the experience to get these two technologies to work together efficiently and effectively. The software team doesn’t always understand the FPGA, and the hardware developers struggle with software in the ARM. Neither can do without the other, and as a result talented engineers who are proficient in both disciplines are in high demand. (Given that many of our customers don’t have those resources available, our approach has been to provide examples and a full setup to help customers get over their learning curve.)

In conjunction with this comes the third key trend: We continue to see companies narrowing focus to their true core competencies. They see value in leveraging off-the-shelf boards and focus on their unique expertise and developing the domain specific performance that distinguishes the product from competitors. In fact, we’ve seen a drastic shift away from the belief that making it all in house saves money. To do more with a smaller engineering team, companies who would never consider working with off-the-shelf hardware are now recognizing it as a key piece of their get-to-market strategy, and ultimately faster ROI.

Even after 20 years, we continue to be on the lookout for what’s next, but for now these are some of the trends we’re seeing unfold in real time, each of which are likely to continue driving innovation in the embedded market.

The Growth of the Internet of Things

Posted on January 20, 2016 - 5:00 am by

You hear a lot – make that an awful lot – about the Internet of Things (IoT) these days. Whatever can be connected to the ‘net will be connected to the ‘net – if it isn’t already. No industry or application area seems immune to it. Healthcare. Childcare. Pet care. The stoves we cook on, the pans we cook in. The cars we drive in or – coming soon, you believe the hype – the cars we’re passively sitting in while the cars drive us. Actually, now that I think of it, we won’t be sitting passively in those cars. We’ll be on an IoT device, doing something else. Maybe even shopping for a new car.

From both a professional and personal point of view, I find this all very exciting – even though I do have a number of what I consider common-sense reservations about privacy and security (which I do believe will be resolved over time).

Forbes, in a recent article by Louis Columbus, had an excellent roundup of IoT forecasts and market size estimates. Here’s the direct link.*

A few things standout.

One is Cisco’s prediction that the global market for IoT will have a value of $14.4T by 2022. You read that right: $14.4 TRILLION. This is, of course, a colossal number, but I do need to emphasize that Cisco is talking about what they call Value at Stake:

“…the combination of increased revenues and lower costs that is created or will migrate among companies and industries from 2013 to 2022. • The five main factors that fuel IoE Value at Stake are: 1) asset utilization (reduced costs) of $2.5 trillion; 2) employee productivity (greater labor efficiencies) of $2.5 trillion; 3) supply chain and logistics (eliminating waste) of $2.7 trillion; 4) customer experience (addition of more customers) of $3.7 trillion; and 5) innovation (reducing time to market) of $3.0 trillion.” (Source: Cisco)

(Just want to point out that IoE is not a typo. The Internet of Everything (IoE) is a term that’s now being used by Cisco and others, and is starting to catch hold.)

Whether you look at it by money spent on the IoT/IoE, or the value of money spent/money-time saved, much of the value of is in the Industrial Internet of Things, machine to machine technology that’s used to optimize operations, track inventory, take care of maintenance, etc. City government (public safety, traffic control), transportation (logistics, smart trains, etc.), and healthcare (patient monitoring, virtual medicine, wellness) are other areas that are going to be big. These are the industries with the application areas where Critical Link technology tends to be involved.

Here’s a prediction I’m making on the IoT/IoE: in five years, we won’t be referring to it by a separate name anymore. When we say “computing” or “information technology”, this is what we’ll be talking about.

—————————————————————————————————————————————

Warning: it may not take you there, as Forbes’ links sometimes resolve to the general site URL. The article is worth looking at, and has a number of interesting infographics in it. To find it, you may need to google “Roundup Of Internet of Things Forecasts And Market Estimates, 2015” and click on that link.

 

CES 2016 – in case you missed it

Posted on January 13, 2016 - 5:00 am by

As most “tech watchers” are no doubt aware, early January always means the Consumer Electronics Show, held each year in Las Vegas. Critical Link doesn’t tend to get involved on the consumer-side, but I’m still enough of a tech watcher, and tech device/tech toy fan, that I enjoy reading up on what happens at CES. Plus there’s always core technology there that’s of interest.

This year, one of the sources I relied on for CES news was William Wong, who writes over on Electronic Design. This post is a quick summary of what he had to say about the show.

One thing he found of interest is Cima NanoTech’s SANTE technology. SANTE stands for “self-assembling nanoparticle technology”), and is a “conductive coating that forms a random mesh-like network.” I found this intriguing enough that I went over to the company’s site to read about it. SANTE technology is designed “for applications such as large projected capacitive touch screens, transparent antennas, transparent heaters and EMI shielding.”

As Wong reports:

“Capacitive touch is faster and easily handles multitouch supporting dozens of simultaneous contact points, compared to one or two for infrared touchscreens currently used for large displays. The nano particles wind up in a random pattern eliminating the Moire effect that is often seen on more regular touch systems.”(Source: Electronic Design)

The displays that it will support will be able to handle displays as large as 85 inches – and can scale beyond that. Wow! This is pretty cool stuff.

Wong also took a look at Marvell’s 1000Baset-T1 Ethernet for cars, which is smaller and cheaper than regular Ethernet on CAT5 or CAT6. Remember when a T1 line was a big deal, connecting an entire company to the Internet? Now, in the near term, there may be one in your car?

The DragonFly 2020 from Nano Dimensions is a 3D PCB printer.

“The DragonFly uses an additive approach that builds up each layer. The dielectric ink contains a collection of two tiny particles that contain the two encapsulated parts of an epoxy. The printer deposits the ink, breaks the encapsulation, and allows the epoxy to harden. This forms the circuit board, while the silver ink provides the conductive surfaces and via’s. It does not need holes because of the way the way the PCB is created.” (Source: Electronic Design)

D3 printing is likely the future of PCB prototyping and of highly custom solutions. As Wong notes, there are:

“…many challenges to overcome because the characteristics of the silver ink are different from copper that would be used in conventional PCB production. Having the same characteristics is important because the prototype needs to replicate the final product. One way this is done is by increasing the vertical (Z) height when using the silver ink.”

On the more consumer-oriented end of things, Wong observed that there was an awful lot of floor space dedicated to virtual reality, augmented reality, and drones. (He estimated that there were upwards of 1,000 different drones on display at the show, from micro-drones on up to a drone, which looks like a little helicopter) that can actually carry a person. Although I can see where in search and rescue situations, this sort of drone would be valuable, it’s still a scary thought. Lots of things that can go wrong here.) Wong also saw a lot of hoverboards, some telepresence robots, and some hybrid fuel cells, one of which caught his interest as it uses salt water and metallic magnesium.

Kind of makes me wish I’d been there. Maybe next year. It would be a hectic but fun way to usher in 2017.

What’s coming in 2016. (One man’s view, anyway.)

Posted on January 6, 2016 - 4:30 am by

One of the pleasures of the new year is reading the predictions of others on what’s going to happen in that new year. Thus, I was happy to see that Rick Merritt on EE Times had gotten his crystal ball out of storage and was making some predictions for the electronics industry.

I wasn’t so glad to see that his first prediction was that 2016 would see some major layoffs, largely as a result of all the M&A activity during 2015. He specifically calls out Avago/Broadcom, but there will be others. And not just in our particular electronics arena. EMC has been all over the tech news the last couple of weeks about their upcoming layoffs in anticipation of the company becoming part of Dell. Overall, Rick believes that the industry is settling “into its golden years of single-digit growth.” He doesn’t see any “next big thing” driving explosive growth on the horizon.  Virtual and augmented reality he views as over-hyped.

That brings him to the Internet of Things (IoT), which he also sees as over-hyped.

IoT is not the next big thing. It is 27 new things and a bunch of old things we used to call embedded, all blended together into a marketing smoothie that’s easy to talk about and hard to take to the bank.

He’s got a point, and there are an awful lot of silly, useless things out there parading around under the IoT banner. But the IoT could have been more positively framed if he’d expressed it the way that Critical Link sees things: in a couple of years, what we’re now talking about as the IoT will no longer be considered something “different.” When we talk about the IoT in the future we’ll just be calling it “computing.” Anything that can be embedded and connected will be.

Rick is also somewhat down on big data mining. Some of the luster will be wearing off and “the volume will get turned up on the calls for privacy and security.”

As I worked my through it, I have to admit that Rick’s list was turning into a complete downer, which is at odds with how we view the world from our little corner of it. But Rick ends his forecast on a higher note:

Engineers will make several key advances in the 10nm node, 3-D chip stacks and systems-in-package. Such core capabilities will result in a string of really great chips including Apple’s next A-series SoC, Nvidia’s Pascal graphics processor and an Intel/Altera accelerator for servers.

Despite the costs and challenges, engineers will continue to turn the crank meaningfully toward Moore’s Law. But that’s another easy prediction.

At Critical, we’re optimistic about 2016. We predict that we’ll be doing interesting work that uses the latest technology, and that we’ll be working on big important applications, not silly, useless ones.  Which reminds me of the ads GE’s running. I especially like the one where the new GE hire talks about the apps he’ll be working on, as opposed to his friend at Zazzy whose app puts fruit hats on animals.

I think it’s safe to say that, thanks to our customers who work on those big important applications, there are no Zazzy apps in our future.

Happy 2016 to you all!

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