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08.07
Engineering News Roundup
Compiled
By IEEE-USA Staff
The following items highlight
new and notable developments in electrical
engineering and computer or information
technology emerging from the federal government
in recent months.
Origami Electronics?
By weaving black carbon
nanotubes into paper, engineers have created
printable, flexible batteries that are more
resilient than many existing batteries, yet can
be cut, folded and worked just like paper. The
rechargeable material could find uses in a range
of devices, from portable electronics to
automobiles.
Researchers from NSF's
Nanoscience and Engineering Center for Directed
Assembly of Nanostructures at Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., reported
the new technology in the 13 Aug. 2007,
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
In addition to withstanding a temperature range
extending from minus 70 degrees Celsius to
nearly 150 degrees above zero, the new batteries
are capable of providing both the constant
output of a standard battery and the sudden
energy bursts of supercapacitors. Because almost
any liquid salt can serve as the electrolyte,
the researchers demonstrated that substances
found in sweat, blood and urine can help power
the battery, making the system ideal for medical
applications.
Additional information is
available in the RPI press release:
http://news.rpi.edu/update.do?artcenterkey=2280
U.S. Backs New International
Standard For Open Documents (OOXML)
The Commerce Department’s
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
has voted for conditional approval of a proposed
international standard for open documents. The
candidate standard, ISO/IEC DIS 29500, Office
Open XML File Formats, sometimes abbreviated
as “Office Open XML” or OOXML, is being
fast-tracked by ISO/IEC (the International
Organization for Standardization and
International Electrotechnical Commission).
The OOXML describes its purpose
in the following way: “OpenXML was designed from
the start to be capable of faithfully
representing the pre-existing corpus of
word-processing documents, presentations, and
spreadsheets that are encoded in binary formats
defined by Microsoft Corporation.”
XML stands for Extensible Markup
Language. XML allows the sharing and
manipulation of data across different computer
platforms. XML is now incorporated in many
standards, including ISO/IEC 26300:2006:
Information technology — Open Document Format
for Office Applications (OpenDocument) v1.0,
which is often abbreviated as ODF.
“NIST believes that ODF and
OOXML can co-exist as international standards,”
says NIST Director William Jeffrey. “NIST fully
supports technology-neutral solutions and will
support the standard once our technical concerns
are addressed.”
“As was the case with ODF, the final approved
text of DIS 29500 will be the result of
negotiations on technical and other issues
submitted by ISO/IEC National Bodies during the
present ISO/IEC fast track ballot,” Jeffrey
said.
Comments Sought On New
Network Security Publications
The National Institute of
Standards and Technology (NIST) has released
three draft Special Publications (SP) documents
for public comment.
Revision 1, Wireless Network
Security: IEEE 802.11a/b/g, and Bluetooth
(SP 800-48) provides an overview of wireless
networking technologies and gives detailed
information on two commonly used standards: the
Institute of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers (IEEE) 802.11a/b/g and IEEE 802.15.1,
better known as Bluetooth. The publication seeks
to assist organizations in reducing the risks
associated with these forms of wireless
networking. It updates the original SP 800-48,
which was released in November 2002. SP 800-48
Revision 1 complements but does not replace, SP
800-97, Establishing Wireless Robust Security
Networks: A Guide to IEEE 802.11i. People
seeking information on IEEE 802.11i should
consult SP 800-97. Comments on this draft are
due by 14 Sept. 2007, to
800-48comments@nist.gov (put “Comments SP
800-48” in the subject line).
Guide to Storage Encryption
Technologies for End User Devices (SP
800-111) is intended to assist organizations in
understanding storage encryption technologies
for end user devices, such as laptops, PDAs,
smart phones and removable media, and in
planning, implementing, and maintaining storage
encryption solutions. The publication also
provides recommendations for cryptographic key
management and authentication used for storage
encryption. Comments on this draft are due by 7
Sept. 2007, to
800-111comments@nist.gov (put “Comments SP
800-111” in the subject line).
Guide to SSL VPNs (SP
800-113) is intended to assist organizations in
understanding Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Virtual
Private Network (VPN) technologies. The
publication also makes recommendations for
designing, implementing, configuring, securing,
monitoring and maintaining SSL VPN solutions. SP
800-113 provides a phased approach to SSL VPN
planning and implementation that can help in
achieving successful SSL VPN deployments.
Comments on this draft are due by 21 Sept. 2007,
to
800-113comments@nist.gov (put “Comments SP
800-113” in the subject line).
The draft publications are available for
downloading at
http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/drafts.html.
Winners Named In NASA
Personal Air Vehicle Competition
NASA has awarded $250,000 to
participants of the Personal Air Vehicle
competition, one of the seven NASA Centennial
Challenges. The competition promotes the use of
self-operated, personal aircraft for fast, safe,
efficient, affordable, environmentally-friendly,
and comfortable on-demand transportation as a
future solution to America's mobility needs.
Four teams competed for overall
best performance and prizes for noise reduction,
handling, efficiency, short takeoff, and top
speed. The contest took place 4-12 Aug. at
Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport in
Sonoma, Calif. At no cost to NASA, the
Comparative Aircraft Flight Efficiency
Foundation, known as the CAFE Foundation,
administers the challenge. The foundation is a
nonprofit group of flight test engineers in
Santa Rosa, Calif.
The award recipients are:
-
Vantage Prize, $100,000:
Vance Turner of Rescue, Calif., owner of a
short-wing Pipistrel piloted by Michael
Coates
-
Noise Prize, $50,000: Dave
and Diane Anders of Visalia, Calif., owners
and pilots of a RV-4 aircraft
-
Handling Qualities Prize,
$25,000: John Rehn of Santa Rosa, Calif.,
owner of a Cessna 172, piloted by Jeff
Stocks
-
CAFE Efficiency Prize,
$25,000: Vance Turner
-
Short Runway Prize, $25,000:
Vance Turner
-
Top Speed, First Prize,
$15,000: Dave and Diane Anders
-
Top Speed, Second Prize,
$10,000: Vance Turner
The challenge will continue
annually for four more years. This year's
competition establishes baselines for more
difficult standards next year, when the total
prize money will increase to $300,000. The total
prize money provided by NASA for all five years
is $2 million.
Centennial Challenges is an
element of NASA's Innovative Partnerships
Program. The challenges promote technical
innovation through prize competitions to support
NASA's plan to return to the moon and journey to
Mars. For more information about the Innovative
Partnerships Program and Centennial Challenges,
visit:
www.ipp.nasa.gov/cc
NASA Software Helps Maintain
Space Station’s Orientation
NASA has added a new computer
program to help monitor the four gyroscopes that
keep the International Space Station properly
oriented without the use of rocket fuel. During
a spacewalk on Monday, two astronauts from the
space shuttle Endeavour removed and replaced a
gyroscope that failed in late 2006.
Computer scientists at NASA's
Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.,
designed the new software for the space station.
The Inductive Monitoring System will be added to
a group of existing tools to identify and track
problems related to the gyroscopes.
"If the system does something
unexpected, the software alerts ground
controllers that something is different, an
anomaly, and that allows them to analyze the
situation and take preventive measures as
necessary," said David Iverson, the computer
scientist at Ames who spearheaded the five
year-effort to develop the software.
During its development,
researchers used the software to analyze several
months of normal space station gyroscope data
collected by the International Space Station
Mission Control Center at NASA's Johnson Space
Center, Houston. In these tests, problems with
the gyroscopes were noticed long before the
previous system flagged glitches. NASA started
using the software earlier this year.
The software program also has
been used in F-18 fighter planes and by the
space shuttle's leading edge impact detection
system, as well as for electric power plant and
water quality monitoring.
For more information about the
International Space Station, visit:
www.nasa.gov/station
DARPA Demonstrates Autonomous
Airborne Refueling
In August, the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA) completed its
Autonomous Airborne Refueling Demonstration
program, showing that unmanned aircraft can
autonomously perform in-flight refueling under
operational conditions.
These recent flights built on the first-ever
fully autonomous refueling, conducted under
controlled test conditions last year. Since
then, the Autonomous Airborne Refueling
Demonstration (AARD) has completed 10 additional
flights.
The Autonomous Airborne
Refueling Demonstration used precise inertial,
GPS, and video measurements, combined with
advanced guidance and control methods, to plug a
refueling probe into the center of a 32-inch
basket trailed behind a tanker. Flights were
conducted at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.,
with a NASA Dryden Flight Research Center
F/A-18, configured to operate as an unmanned
test bed, refueling from a 707-300 tanker.
The exceptional performance
ultimately achieved by the program was made
possible by two major enhancements to the AARD
system. Improved video processing eliminated
troublesome dropouts, allowing the system to
conduct four times as many plug attempts per
flight, while advanced control algorithms proved
capable of anticipating much of the overall
drogue motion. These algorithms were actually
able to precisely match the drogue motion —
something pilots are specifically taught to
avoid. In one case, the system followed the
drogue through a full three-foot cycle in the
two seconds before making contact, never
deviating more than four inches from the exact
centerline of the drogue, all while traveling at
250 miles per hour, 18,000 feet above the
Tehachapi Mountains.
Project Seeks To Drive Solar
Cell Efficiency To Over 50 Percent
In late July, the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
initiated a three-year effort with the newly
formed DuPont-University of Delaware Very High
Efficiency Solar Cell (VHESC) Consortium to
drive the efficiency of a new class of solar
cell modules to over 50 percent and develop a
pilot-scale process technologies to produce them
at a cost of less than $1,000 per square meter,
which is the current price for today’s
commercially available solar cells.
The solar cell to be developed
by the VHESC team uses a novel lateral optical
concentrating system that splits solar light
into three different energy bins of high,
medium, and low, and directs them onto cells of
various light sensitive materials to cover the
solar spectrum. In addition, the VHESC solar
cell includes a wide acceptance angle optical
system that captures large amounts of light and
eliminates the need for complicated tracking
devices.
DARPA and the U.S. military are
pursuing solar cell technology due to the
considerable logistical burden of supplying
batteries to the soldier in the field and the
fundamental mission limitations that are imposed
if resupply is not possible. A three-day soldier
battery load may weigh as much as 20 pounds.
Resupply of primary batteries is currently the
third largest logistics pipeline burden for the
military, behind only fuel and water. The DARPA
VHESC program aims to dramatically reduce the
battery logistics pipeline and provide the
soldier with more power at reduced weight, thus
improving mobility, survivability and the
availability of advanced electronic technologies
on the battlefield.
New Technology Reported For
Brain Imaging
Brain imaging is becoming an
increasingly important tool in many research
areas, including sleep, addiction and other
behaviors, and in diseases such as autism,
Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson's disease. But
the large scanners currently in use make brain
imaging difficult in many situations — for
example, with patients in intensive care units,
research subjects performing complex tasks, or
for infants and young children who need
sedation.
A research team led by Dr.
Joseph Culver of the Washington University
School of Medicine set out to develop a more
advanced optical imaging system with improved
image quality. In the online edition of
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
on 6 July 2007, they reported the development of
a high-performance, high-density diffuse optical
tomography (DOT) system.
Diffuse optical imaging (DOI) is
a mobile system that uses a small, flexible
imaging cap. In contrast to positron emission
tomography (PET), which uses ionizing radiation,
DOI uses safe, infrared light for imaging. DOI
detects blood dynamics in a manner similar to
functional MRI (fMRI), which primarily measures
levels of one form of hemoglobin, the molecule
that carries oxygen in our blood. DOI can
measure levels of hemoglobin both when it is
carrying oxygen and when it isn’t, enabling
researchers to form a more complete picture of
blood activity in the brain. Despite these
advantages, however, DOI has been limited by its
low resolution, lack of ability to measure area
volumes and the complexity of the equipment.
Their work was supported in part
by National Institutes of Health’s National
Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
and National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and
Bioengineering (NIBIB).
Comments may
be submitted to todaysengineer@ieee.org.
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