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Tech Briefs - Tech Briefs
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How Much Do You Know About Transducers?
Often employed at the boundaries of automation, measurement, and control systems, transducers convert energy from one form to another.
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Preparing Robots to Crawl on the Moon
The future of moon exploration may be rolling around a non-descript office on the CU Boulder campus. Here, a robot about as wide as a large pizza scoots forward on three wheels. It uses an arm with a claw at one end to pick up a plastic block from the floor, then set it back down.
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Performance Materials: An Underlying Solution for Complex Electrification Design Requirements
EV and hybrid applications design engineers must address the voltage, current, sealing, vibration, chemical compatibility, and temperature challenges associated with manufacturing all types of EV and hybrid vehicles. This means choosing protective products that can work within increasingly complex designs, as well as withstand the harsh environments inherent to vehicle operation. In addition to protecting and sealing critical components, product designers need to understand that electronic devices have the potential to emit electromagnetic radiation in the architecture of the vehicle and therefore also need to consider electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding products to protect critical electronic components and systems from EMI.
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3D-Printing Method Makes Two Materials from One Resin
Tech Briefs: What got you started on the project?Isabel Arias Ponce: Within the field of additive manufacturing, one of the main hurdles, especially with light-based techniques, is that it's very difficult to fabricate features that are not well-supported but are overhanging or free floating. To fabricate those structures, people typically add what’s called support material, which is usually made of the same material as the final. Since it's all the same chemistry, after fabrication, the support material must be manually removed, usually with mechanical force. That can not only end up damaging the final parts, but it also adds a lot of time-consuming manual steps.
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Medical Crash Cart Goes Robotic
Medical crash carts — stocked with medications, syringes, gauze, and IV fluids — are essential tools in emergency rooms, where seconds matter, space is tight, and confusion can cost lives. However, despite their importance, crash carts vary widely in layout between hospitals and departments. In high-stress situations, this inconsistency can lead to delays as providers search for supplies or open the wrong drawers. That’s why a team of Cornell researchers set out to reimagine the traditional crash cart, transforming it into a robot designed to support, not disrupt, emergency care teams during critical, time-sensitive procedures.