A tiny, portable radar device could allow visually impaired people, or unmanned moving devices to detect objects in real time. Radar technology has been used for decades in aviation, defense and speed-camera technology. Now, a team at KAUST, in collaboration with scientists at the VTT Technical Research Center of Finland, have created a compact, low-cost…
NASA’s Cassini Reveals Surprises with Titan’s Lakes
On its final flyby of Saturn’s largest moon in 2017, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft gathered radardata revealing that the small liquid lakes in Titan’s northern hemisphere are surprisingly deep, perched atop hills and filled with methane. The new findings, published April 15 in Nature Astronomy, are the first confirmation of just how deep some of Titan’s lakes…
Starship Technologies Surpasses 50,000 Deliveries with Autonomous Robots
In April 2018, Starship Technologies started transporting groceries to residents in Milton Keynes, U.K., from a co-op food store. A year later, the company has announced it has made more than 50,000 commercial deliveries with its autonomous robots. In total, the robo-deliverers have travelled more than 200,000 miles in more than 100 cities worldwide. Lex…
Drones Gather Intel on Supercell Thunderstorms
Supercell thunderstorms are terrifying natural marvels that carry high risks of lethality and devastation. To improve prediction and reduce “false alarm” tornado warnings, researchers are planning an investigation centered on radar and unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) called the Targeted Observation by Radars and UAS of Supercells (TORUS). The study will gather intel on the supercell’s…
Volkswagen Tests Level 4 Automated Vehicles in Hamburg, Germany
Among the urban traffic in Hamburg, Germany, will be a fleet of five e-Golf automated test vehicles from Volkswagen Group Research. According to the company, it will be “the first time Volkswagen has begun to test automated driving to Level 4 at real driving conditions in a major German city.” Hamburg is currently undergoing a…
Low-Bandwidth Radar Technology Provides Improved Detection of Objects
Radar technologies were originally designed to identify and track airborne military targets. Today they’re more often used to detect motor vehicles, weather formations and geological terrain. Until now, scientists have believed that radar accuracy and resolution are related to the range of frequencies or radio bandwidth used by the devices. But a new Tel Aviv…
Merged Satellite, Ground Data May Forecast Volcanic Eruptions
On Nov. 13, 1985, the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in the Andes – about 80 miles west of Bogota, Colombia – erupted, sending a pyroclastic flow down its mountainside. The heat melted the snow at an elevation of more than 17,000 feet, and volcanic ash muddied the resulting water – called lahar – that rushed…
Virtual Tests for Autonomous Driving Systems
Sensors in autonomous vehicles have to be extremely reliable, since in the future motorists will no longer constantly monitor traffic while underway. In the past these sensors were subjected to arduous road tests. The new ATRIUM testing device from Fraunhofer Institute for High Frequency Physics and Radar Techniques FHR now makes it possible to move…
A Decade of Exploring Alaska’s Mountain Glaciers
In Alaska, 5 percent of the land is covered by glaciers that are losing a lot of ice and contributing to sea level rise. To monitor these changes, a small team of NASA-funded researchers has been flying scientific instruments on a bright red, single-engine plane since spring 2009. Flying low over some of the most…
Raytheon Developing New Version of Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar for U-2 Aircraft
Raytheon (NYSE: RTN) is developing a new version of the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar that flies on the U-2 Dragon Lady aircraft under a $320 million undefinitized contract from the U.S. Air Force. Equipped with an active electronically scanned array antenna, ASARS-2B doubles the surveillance range while maintaining the mapping and imagery resolution of the current ASARS-2A system. ASARS-2B completed flight test…