Tuning in: Silvery wires of a liquid-metal alloy, encased in a polymer, form an antenna that still works after being twisted.
Credit: Nate DeGraff/NC State
New publications, experiments and breakthroughs in information technology--and what they mean.
Adaptable Antenna
Injecting liquid metal into polymer molds produces efficient antennas that can twist and stretch
Source: "Reversibly Deformable and Mechanically Tunable Fluidic Antennas"
Michael D. Dickey et al.
Advanced Functional Materials 19: 3632-3637
Results: Engineers at North Carolina State University created a flexible yet efficient antenna using a liquid metal, a gallium-indium alloy. The antenna is as efficient as a standard copper antenna, transmitting over a broad frequency range at about 90 percent efficiency. It remains functional even when it is twisted, folded, or stretched to 40 percent beyond its normal length.
To read the entire article you must log in:
Most of our content — all daily news, blogs, and videos — is free. Magazine stories are paid. To read this story, you must have a subscription or you must use a reading credit. Registration to Technology Review is free and entitles registrants to three free reading credits.
Manufacturing in the United States is in trouble. That's bad news not just for the country's economy but for the future of innovation.
This document is part of the “How-To Guide for Most Common Measurements” centralized resource portal. This tutorial provides a detailed guide for measurement and device considerations to take temperature measurements using thermocouples. Get an introduction to thermocouples, which are inexpensive sensing devices widely used with PC-based data acquisition systems. Also review some specific thermocouple examples and learn how thermocouples work and ways to integrate them into a data acquisition measurement system.
View full PDF >
Listen to story > 
Our list of the 50 most innovative companies, including the following:
On Twitter
Become a Fan on Facebook
Subscribe to the Feed