Information Technology

Metal detectors currently used for screening aircraft passengers could soon be supplanted by novel millimetre-wave cameras, able to detect even non-metallic concealed objects. The new system, named after a Brazilian bat, is based on technology developed for ESA spacecraft. Tadar is being demonstrated at this week’s Inter Airport Europe Exhibition in Munich.

Conventional metal detectors, such as those used to check passengers at airports, are limited in that they can on

Currently, the density of transistors that electronic devices now allow is such that the integration of complete digital systems in a single integrated circuit is now possible. With the aim of reducing the period of design and development and enabling the tackling of these kinds of designs possible, these are made up of a base of modules or cores. Given their complexity, these modules often include one or more processors, whereby, in these cases, multi-processor systems are possible.

Many vision systems require text recognition captured at very high speed: vehicle registration identification devices, scanners, etc. Current technology enables the use of complex image pre-processing systems to enhance reading characteristics. This PhD thesis puts forward two binarisation algorithms that are suitable for high-precision applications in optical character reading (OCR). The binarisation of a digital image involves the conversion of the digital image into a black and white one in su

Oil companies could soon harness the power of distant supercomputers to tackle problems such as where to place equipment and how to clean up oil spills.

For decades, the industry has used computers to maximize profit and minimize environmental impact, explained Tahsin Kurc, assistant professor of biomedical informatics at Ohio State University.

Typically, companies take seismic measurements of an oil reservoir and simulate drilling scenarios on a local computer. Now

The average user may not notice, but the Global Positioning System (GPS) is more reliable today than it was several years ago.

Widely used by the military, first responders, surveyors and even consumers, GPS is a navigation and positioning system consisting of ground-based monitors and a constellation of satellites that rely on atomic clocks. A statistical method, developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and tested and implemented with the help of

Increasing the spread of broadband connectivity throughout Europe is central to the growth of the knowledge economy. Yet broadband technology is hardly new. So what is holding back wider implementation and investment? This is the issue at the core of the IST project NOBEL.

At the core of the Internet is a large network of optical fibres. The challenge for NOBEL is to make that network work much more efficiently, in connecting together all the growing millions of broadband use