Carbon Trust has given a £1 million boost to four UK fuel cell pioneers. According to the Trust, their cutting-edge technology could be used under the bonnet of mass-produced hydrogen-powered cars as early as 2017. “Major manufacturers have already built hydrogen-powered fuel cell cars, but the real challenge is to bring down the costs and, in the global race to do this, UK technologies are now in pole position,” says Carbon Trust. To fuel this push by UK industry and having identified an opportunity to combine innovative technology from Runcorn-based ACAL Energy and Sheffield-based ITM Power, Carbon Trust is providing £500 thousand of funding to the companies to develop a new hybrid high-power, low-cost fuel cell design.Carbon Trust is also backing a project based at Imperial College London (Imperial) and University College London (UCL) with £500 thousand to develop a fuel cell that could offer significant cost savings by using existing high-volume manufacturing techniques employed in the production of printed circuit boards.The funding comes from the Carbon Trust’s Polymer Fuel Cells Challenge (PFCC) which was launched in 2009 to support the Department for Energy and Climate Change’s objectives to develop lower cost fuel cells and coincides with the recent launch of the Government’s UKH2Mobility project to ensure the UK is well positioned for the commercial roll-out of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. “The UK’s home-grown automotive industry hasn’t been the runaway success story many would have hoped for, but British technology is in pole position to be under the bonnet of a next generation of mass-produced hydrogen-powered cars. After a lot of hype, fuel cell technology is now a great growth opportunity for the UK,” explains Dr Ben Graziano, Technology Commercialisation Manager at Carbon Trust. “The funding that we have received from the Department for Energy and Climate Change has enabled us to support the development of some truly world-class British technologies that could slash the costs of fuel cells and transform how we all get about; by 2017 British fuel cell technologies could be powering your car.” "It is excellent news that automotive OEMs are committed to the launch of hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles in 2015 timescales, and that the UK will be among the early adopters. However it is clear that continuous efforts to reduce cost will be necessary to ensure that H2FC vehicles are affordable for mass markets. This funding from the Carbon Trust PFCC is perfectly targeted to ensure that British innovation can be at the forefront of the process to get the economics of the technology right," says Amanda Lyne, VP of Strategic Business Development and Marketing, ACAL Energy Ltd. Carbon Trust’s Polymer Fuel Cells Challenge aims to speed the UK towards world-beating fuel cell solutions that can grab a significant share of a market that the Carbon Trust has estimated to be worth $26bn in 2020. Carbon Trust, which has already supported ACAL Energy and ITM Power in de-risking their unique technologies, saw an opportunity to combine these innovations to demonstrate a fuel cell that could be far cheaper to manufacture, more efficient, produce the required power and be compact enough to fit under the bonnet of tomorrow’s cars. ACAL Energy brings a revolutionary new design of fuel cell inspired by the human lung and bloodstream that is highly durable, virtually platinum-free and also significantly cheaper to produce. ITM Power brings a unique membrane technology (which has been evaluated by several global companies), proven to produce world-beating power density (widely recognised as the single most important factor in reducing fuel cell costs), which could be in fuel cell cars by as early as 2017. ITM’s current order book for delivery in the current financial year is £0.5 million. The company has recruited seven staff in the last 12 months and is currently seeking to recruit ten more. ACAL Energy has raised £6.1 million of investment since March 2010 and its staff is set to increase from 25 at that time to 35 by April 2012.The Imperial and UCL project is developing a fuel cell stack that could offer significant cost savings by using existing high-volume manufacturing techniques employed in the production of printed circuit boards. By simplifying the design and manufacture, this could reduce the costs of a fuel cell stack by more than 20%. Imperial Innovations and UCL Business are collaborating with the project to assist commercialisation of the technology. Source: Renewable Energy Magazine
Fuel cell technology could be under your car bonnet by 2017
Indian-origin engineer develops technology to double Wi-Fi speed
New York: An Indian-origin engineer has developed a novel technology that doubles Wi-Fi speeds with a single antenna -- an achievement with potential to transform the telecommunications field in future. Columbia University's Harish Krishnaswamy, an electrical engineering graduate from the Indian Institute of Technology -Madras, has for the first time integrated a non-reciprocal circulator and a full-duplex radio on a nanoscale silicon chip to create the breakthrough system. "This technology could revolutionise the field of telecommunications," said Krishnaswamy, director of the Columbia High-Speed and Mm-wave IC (CoSMIC) Lab. "Our circulator is the first to be put on a silicon chip, and we get literally orders of magnitude better performance than prior work," he noted. Last year, Columbia researchers invented a technology -- full-duplex radio integrated circuits (ICs) -- that can be implemented in nanoscale CMOS to enable simultaneous transmission and reception at the same frequency in a wireless radio. That system
required two antennas. "Full-duplex communications, where the transmitter and the receiver operate at the same time and at the same frequency, has become a critical research area and now we've shown that WiFi capacity can be doubled on a nanoscale silicon chip with a single antenna. This has enormous implications for devices like smartphones and tablets," Krishnaswamy explained. "Being able to put the circulator on the same chip as the rest of the radio has the potential to significantly reduce the size of the system, enhance its performance, and introduce new functionalities critical to full duplex," added co-researcher Jin Zhou. Krishnaswamy's team had to "break" Lorentz Reciprocity - a fundamental physical characteristic of most electronic structures that requires electromagnetic waves travel in the same manner in forward and reverse directions - to develop the technology. "It is rare for a single piece of research, or even a research group, to bridge fundamental theoretical contributions with implementations of practical relevance. It is extremely rewarding to supervise graduate students who were able to do that," said the Indian-origin engineer who has earlier won many accolades for his research efforts. The research was published in the journal Nature Communications and the paper was presented at the "2016 IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference" in San Francisco, California, recently. Source: ummid.com
required two antennas. "Full-duplex communications, where the transmitter and the receiver operate at the same time and at the same frequency, has become a critical research area and now we've shown that WiFi capacity can be doubled on a nanoscale silicon chip with a single antenna. This has enormous implications for devices like smartphones and tablets," Krishnaswamy explained. "Being able to put the circulator on the same chip as the rest of the radio has the potential to significantly reduce the size of the system, enhance its performance, and introduce new functionalities critical to full duplex," added co-researcher Jin Zhou. Krishnaswamy's team had to "break" Lorentz Reciprocity - a fundamental physical characteristic of most electronic structures that requires electromagnetic waves travel in the same manner in forward and reverse directions - to develop the technology. "It is rare for a single piece of research, or even a research group, to bridge fundamental theoretical contributions with implementations of practical relevance. It is extremely rewarding to supervise graduate students who were able to do that," said the Indian-origin engineer who has earlier won many accolades for his research efforts. The research was published in the journal Nature Communications and the paper was presented at the "2016 IEEE International Solid-State Circuits Conference" in San Francisco, California, recently. Source: ummid.com
In your face projection mapping delivers virtual make-up
Japanese artist, director and producer Nobumichi Asai has unveiled Omote, his latest project that uses projection mapping techniques to create stunning illusions on a model’s face. In his recently released video the model moves her head while projected graphics constantly transform how she appears; creating masks and cyber influenced visuals. He was inspired by the Japanese Noh mask.
Laser scanning was used to create a mesh that followed the contours of the model’s face and it’s rumoured that Asai is now looking to create a system the covers the whole body. Asai has built up a large
portfolio of work that includes a number of projection mapping projects, usually featuring huge backdrops including buildings, a dockyard and a large stage show for Subaru. Source: InAVate, Image-Courtesy: https://33.media.tumblr.com
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