You probably love Toshiba’s latest announcement, the Super Charge ion Battery and think it could explode or catch fire, after the events that took place lately with batteries. Well, Toshiba has announced and recorded a video ( watch after the jump ) of an externally short circuited battery and you can see that it won’t explode, neither catch fire.
For making the battery more safe, they have used lithium titanate, that has a high flash point and a high heat resistance separator. Toshiba stated that the risks of combustion or burst …

Sega Toys teams up with NeuroSky to take gaming to a next level, by working on what they call “mind-controlled tech toys”. In the development process they are going to use the ThinkGear bio-sensor technology built by NeuroSky, that eliminates the need for contact gels, by using dry active sensor and maintain a small form factor.They haven’t said anything about what those toys are going to be, any release dates or pricing, but we aren’t expecting them very soon and sure not in 2008. Currently i am thinking what …

Nowadays solar cells made a lot of fuss and a lot of scientists try to develop them better and better. And now a team from Japan has come to success by creating a flexible cell, thin as a sheet of paper, that’s also low priced, using traditional printing techniques. Regular solar cells are using silicone, that was expensive and couldn’t allow making cells thin, but the researchers from Fujimori Kogyo and Toin University in Yokohama eliminated the use of silicone. The solar cells developed by them are inexpensive and …

More than two years ago there was a rumor about the Super Li-ion batteries, that would charge very fast and lasts for many recharges. Now, finally Toshiba announced the release of those Super Charge ion Batteries, also called SCiB, that will unfortunately be only used for industrial use firsly, mostly for hybrid cars. The SCiB can recharge up to 90% in just 5 minutes or less and can be recharged more than 5,000 times, which means a lifetime of more than 10 years. We shall see the battery in use …

BMW has found that the Internet Protocol could easily replace and have much better performances than the current standards used for in-car networks. They are planning to connect all gear through Internet Protocol to reduce costs and increase performance, by reducing specialized components. Especially with the new IPv6 that will definitely make a create difference, but still the IPv4 is also good.
iDrive might improve in-car technology a lot and it could use a multimedia server or allow you to surf the internet through it.
Via Autoblog

After Lexus made a system that tracks the driver, now they show us, on the 2008 LX570, another monitoring system. This system will help you avoid any other vehicles, trees or walls which reduce your visibility. It also has a side mounted camera which gives you a better view below your passenger. The system is capable of doing this things due to an 180-degrees side-to-side view which gives you the impression that you are standing in front of the car.
via Engadget

Google announced yesterday that they are going to develop energy from solar, wind and geothermal power and stop using electricity produced of coal, to reduce the costs and also protect the environment.
They are planning to invest tens of millions in the technologies and they have already started to put solar panels on their buildings roofs. Their datacenters use a lot of electricity, so they need to make this investment to reduce the costs. It will probably take some time, but at the end they will help the world by making …

It’s been known that Maglev is an excellent technology for wind energy and now it became reality with the Super Powered Magnetic Wind Turbine. The Maglev doesn’t need ball bearings, the blades of the wind turbine being suspended above the machine’s base. Also, it doesn’t use electromagnets, but permanent magnets so it doesn’t need electricity, being another plus.It’s maintenance costs are also reduced due to the neodyum magnets that eliminate the energy loss through friction, also increasing the generator’s lifetime.
The Maglev wind turbines have a lot of advantages, over the …

Today, Toyota announced they’ve finished development of a driving simulator that will use to test the drivers characteristics and improve the safety, by reducing accidents. They use advanced technologies, with video, acceleration simulator that allows them to perform driving tests, too risky for the real world. Also, they can simulate literally any driving conditions, being probably the most realistic driving simulator in the world.
The dome has 7.1 meter in diameter, with a 360 degree video screen, tilting device, vibrations and other technologies that copy the real driving experiences. The …

A new technology has been implemented in the UK to light the roads. Astucia SolarLite LEDs store the solar energy on daytime and during night they emit light to increase visibility. Officials say that they have reduced accidents by 70 percent since used, by improving the driver’s visibility from 90 to 900 meters and his reaction time from only 3.2 seconds to almost 30 seconds, while driving at 60mph.
After their success in UK and considering they have a lifetime of 8 to 10 years, they might be also be used …

If you want something tremendous to melt plastic you could try out Hercules 400 Laser. It could do all sort of other things like lightening firework or burn cardboard. The laser has a power of 400mW and it sends a ray that can be seen at very big distances. So if you want to play, than we recommend the Hercule 400 Laser, but you could do that only if you would happen to have $3,000.

A new power generator has been announced today by Millenium Cell and Horzon Fuel Cell Technologies. The product incorporates a water activated cartridge system, that can produce 400-watts from pure water. The first alpha version of the power generator has been unveiled at the CEATEC ( Combined Exhibition for Advanced Technologies ) in Japan, this year and now they are preparing the beta version to present it at the Las Vegas CES ( Consumer Electronics Show ), in January 2008.This seems to be the first portable power generator, that deserves …

Exmocare created a wristwatch that can find out about the wearers emotions. The watch monitors the variation of your hart rate and galvanic skin response. It sends an infrared ray to your skin to measure your blood volume pulse. By measuring the infrared beam, the watch calculates your blood volume pulse. The wristwatch could also send an report to another person through SMS, email or IM. It could be used to monitor people that have chronic illness. Exmocare said that this watch would be released at the start …

At the LA auto show VW unveiled a new console: the Space Up! blue, which features a 7 inch touchscreen display. Could this be a result of the collaboration between VW and Apple? We don’t know yet, but we think that they gave us an example of how things could go on between the driver and the car in the near future. The touchscreen uses proximity sensors so the user could navigate through the system with only a gesture near the console. The Space Up! controls almost all functions of …

Wouldn’t you love cheap solar energy wherever you are and incredibly flexible ? Well, this could be made possible with the Nanosolar Powersheet. The greatest fact at this technology is that you can put the sheets on your roof, windows and anywhere you want and generate cheap solar energy for all your needs.
Until now, the silicon and glass panels were generating energy at $3 per watt, which is very high, but the Nanosolar Powersheets could generate the energy at a rate of 10 times less, at 30 cents a watt, …