NASA’s Dawn spacecraft used a high-efficiency ion thruster to visit Ceres and Vesta in the asteroid belt. This electric method of propulsion is now being manufactured for small satellites by Orbion Space Technology. (Image: NASA) Much like groceries, satellites have a shelf life. In low-Earth orbit,

New research from Duke University details a system dubbed SonicSense that allows robots to interact with their surroundings in ways previously limited to humans. “Robots today mostly rely on vision to interpret the world,” explained Lead Author Jiaxun Liu, first-year Ph.D. student in the laboratory

Ed Brown Tech Briefs: Howd you get started with this idea? Professor Habib Rahman: It started from a project with our Connected System Institute, where we worked on a motor to make its digital twin to see if we could control the motors remotely. I have been working on rehab robotics for long time. M

Roberto Baldwin In a world where nearly every device talks to every other device, its no surprise that vehicles talk to one another and to the cloud. While mapping software has utilized networked devices to help you find the quickest route to your destination, vehicle communications is more than jus

Arm CEO Rene Haas holds the new Arm Agentic AI CPU during his live-streamed keynote for the “Arm is Everywhere” event. (Image: Arm) This episode of the Aerospace & Defense Technology podcast features highlights from Arm CEO Rene Haas’ keynote at the recent live‑streamed Arm is Everywhere event 

(Image: Adobe Stock) On this episode of the Aerospace & Defense Technology podcast, we continue our Season 14 focus on military embedded computing and networking, featuring keynote remarks from the 2026 AUSA Global Force Symposium and an interview with Jeff Baldwin, Director of Engineering at Se

Delphi Powertrain Systems, Troy, MichiganMost automotive fuel systems use a Fuel Delivery Module (FDM) with components to filter and pump gasoline at a specified pressure and flow rate from the fuel tank to the engine. The FDM uses a reservoir assembly to maintain a fuel supply at the pump inlet and

Metallized Carbon Corporation, Ossining, New YorkModern mechanical carbon materials are being used in a wide variety of applications, including aircraft gear boxes, air turbine motor starters, and main shaft seals for both aircraft turbine engines and aircraft auxiliary power units (APUs). These sel

Pulsar FusionBletchley, United Kingdomwww.pulsarfusion.com Sunbird first plasma with krypton. (Image: Pulsar Fusion) Today’s spacecraft rely primarily on two very different propulsion systems, each with fundamental limitations. Chemical rockets generate extremely high thrust, essential for launch an

Proponents of laser beam welding (LBW) and electron beam (EBW) welding each pronounce the singular praises of their favored technology, but often the best solution for a customer is to use both technologies together. Both processes are well suited to joining components with complex geometries, and c

Multiply Labs is building high-fidelity robotic digital twins with NVIDIA Isaac Sim. (Image: Multiply Labs) Robotic biomanufacturing company Multiply Labs recently announced a landmark milestone in its mission to scale production of cell and gene therapies. The company is now leveraging NVIDIA’s ope

The Industrial Internet of Things is predicated on large-scale, distributed sensor/control networks that can run unattended for months to years with very low power consumption. The characteristic behavior of this type of network entails very short bursts of message traffic over short distances using

Internet of Things (IoT) applications — whether for city infrastructures, factories, or wearable devices — use large arrays of sensors collecting data for transmission over the Internet to a central, cloud-based computing resource. Analytics software running on the cloud computers reduces the huge v

Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controllers are used in most automatic process control applications in industry today to regulate flow, temperature, pressure, level, and many other industrial process variables. They date back to 1939, when the Taylor and Foxboro instrument companies introduce

PickNik’s MoveIt Pro, developed in part with funding and help from NASA, automates robotic arm demonstrations in the lobbies of two Amazon Web Services learning centers. (Image: PickNik Inc.) Being an astronaut isn’t always glamorous. Crewmembers on the space station spend about a third of their tim

William Marshall, Styron, Midland, MIGlass and transparent plastics, especially acrylic resins, have long been used in the lighting industry for various aesthetic and functional purposes. As the industry has evolved, light-emitting diode (LED) lighting has moved from niche applications to more mains

Georgia Tech Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA The photoresponsive hydrogel soft lens developed by researchers in Coulter BME Professor Shu Jia’s lab. (Image: Georgia Tech) A team of biomedical engineers at Georgia Tech has unveiled a breakthrough in adaptive optics: a bio-mimetic, light-powered

Low-Cost Printable Electronics Fabrication The need for low-cost and environmentally friendly processes for fabricating printable electronics and biosensor chips is rapidly growing. NASA has developed a unique approach for an atmospheric pressure plasma-based process for fabricating printable electr

As contemporary electronics embrace light weight, increasing efficiency, and high speed, each link of the manufacturing process also conforms to this philosophy, including printed circuit board (PCB) assembly. Soldering has played an essential role in determining the success of electronic products,

Billy Hurley, Digital Editorial Manager“Our lithium-air battery design represents a revolution in the battery community,” said Amin Salehi-Khojin, assistant professor of mechanical and industrial engineering at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Salehi-Khojin and fellow researchers at UIC and Ar