University Electronics

The proposed shifter uses a half-mode substrate-integrated waveguide, with phase shifted in a via-pad-slot structure where a through via is attached to a pad surrounded by an annular slot. “The phase shifter does not need clean room facilities for fabrication,” said lead researcher Dr Yi Wang, and “the liquid-metal enabled phase shifting elements have a passive nature, unlike active semiconductor-based ...

The University of Nottingham has creates a business unit for the industrialisation of electrical motors and drive systems, claiming that it is the first UK institution to create an independent business unit for the industrialisation of electrical motors and drive systems. Nottingham Drive Specialist Services (NDSS) will provide “bespoke development, manufacturing and testing of electrical motors and drives to support ...

The Translational Research Hub (TRH), designed to foster collaboration between industry and scientists, has officially opened at Cardif University. It is the home of the Institute for Compound Semiconductors (ICS) and Cardiff Catalysis Institute (CCI), and was funded by UK and Welsh governments – including £17.3m through UKRPIF, £12m from Welsh Government, £13.1m in European funding administered by WEFO and ...

Researches at the University of Bristol have created an artificial fingertip that produces signals that appear to mimic human touch nerve signal. “We found our 3D-printed tactile fingertip can produce artificial nerve signals that look like recordings from real, tactile neurons,” according to Bristol’s professor of robotics Nathan Lepora. “Human tactile nerves transmit signals from various mechanoreceptors, which can signal ...

The University of Surrey has created a flexible and stretchy supercapacitor “that can be easily integrated into footwear, clothing, and accessories”, it said. Building one involves transferring aligned carbon nanotube arrays from a silicon wafer over to a PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane) layer in which they are partly embedded. Polyaniline is then polymerised onto the surface of the nanotubes. In capacitors made from ...

The University of Southampton is storing data onto glass at a density that would squeeze 500Tbyte onto a substrate the size of a CD. Data is written as miniature shapes through the bulk of silica glass using the three spatial dimensions. The shapes have two separate optical characteristics – adding two more dimensions – making this so-called five-dimensional (‘5d’) data storage. ...

University of Surrey researchers have been inventing ways to get electronic activity into every page of plain paper books, and have come up with two forms of ‘magic bookmark’ as they have dubbed them. Developed at Surrey’s Advanced Technology Institute and its Digital World Research Centre, the idea is that the bookmark communiates with a phone app via a bluetooth link. One of the ...

Anglia Components has broken ranks with other distributors targeting the UK’s start-ups and entrepreneurs and has launched a dedicated division, Anglia Unicorn, to put academic start-ups in touch with financial seeders and both in touch with skilled engineers who can make the vision a reality. Named after the mythical creature which eludes capture, a Unicorn company is a start-up that ...

Tower Semiconductor has officially announced an optical automotive lidar integrated circuit made using its PH18 silicon photonics platform. PH18 uses silicon and silicon nitride waveguides to create and link optical building blocks including couplers, interferometers, radiators, modulators and photodetectors. Its low-loss silicon nitride waveguides are capable of handling the optical powers necessary for lidars. The IC was designed by researchers from the ...

Coventry University has built an 53 workstation electrical and electronic engineering laboratory in its Beatrice Shilling Building, named after the British electrical and mechanical engineer. Educational test equipment distributor of SJ Electronics supplied the instruments, all from Tektronix’ range. Intended for for first and second year students, each station has: TBS2074B 70MHz digital storage oscilloscope AFG1022 25MHz arbitrary waveform generator ...