We all know that it's important to sit up straight, and to not stay seated for too long. With that in mind, researchers at Germany's Fraunhofer Institutes for Industrial Engineering and for Silicate Research have developed an LED-equipped stool that coaches people in their sitting.
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Vertigo is a very common condition, but it can be difficult to assess and to treat. It was with this in mind that a German consortium developed the headphone-based EQUIVert biofeedback system. It is claimed to be able to make the condition easier to understand, and to cure.
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To help keep German cucumber farms viable, the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology (IPK) is developing a simple, lightweight, and intelligent two-armed robot to automate harvesting of the vegetable.
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Last year, we first heard about Fraunhofer's DEDAVE unmanned submersible. Then this July, we got word of an initiative aimed at locating sunken flight models of a famous Canadian jet fighter. Now, the two have come together – a DEDAVE has located a couple of of the models.
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While it may be worthwhile programming robots to paint many identical objects, the painting of smaller-run items is still done manually. That could be about to change, however. Scientists are developing a system which will allow robots to figure out how to paint individual objects.
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Audi has teamed up with the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering to explore how people will spend their time in autonomous cars, and how manufacturers can best tailor their cabins for work, rest or play.
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As many of us know from personal experience, accessing a smartphone's touchscreen can be difficult when your hands are full. That's why scientists have developed a hands-free system that lets you control a phone via facial gestures – and those gestures are detected in your ear.
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If you want to incorporate protruding features into a sheet of glass, the typical way of doing so involves using molds. Those molds are costly to manufacture, however. That's why the Fraunhofer Institute has developed a laser-based alternative technique that promises to be cheaper and faster.
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Consumer-grade 3D scanners tend to only handle small items, or scan with a low resolution. Now Fraunhofer has unveiled its new 3D scanner that uses infrared rays to capture objects and people in more detail, snapping up to 36 three-dimensional images per second.
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With an average range of only 100 mi (161 km) per charge, all-electric vehicles still can't compete with more conventional cars. To level the playing field a bit, Fraunhofer is working on a new battery design that could increase an electric car's range to 1,000 km (621 mi).
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