Smart windows

If you're on a sightseeing tour in a bus, you really don't want to be looking away from the passing attractions to Google them on your smartphone. The AR Interactive Vehicle Display is intended to help, by showing relevant information on the vehicle's window glass.

Windows are pretty basic necessities for letting in light and heat, but you don’t always want both at once. Now engineers at North Carolina State University have developed a new material that allows windows to easily switch between three modes.

There are already "smart" windows that can be electronically switched between either letting sunlight through or blocking it. A new multi-layered one, however, can be set to several energy-saving light filtration modes.

A large percentage of a building’s energy usage is consumed by heating and cooling, but a new dynamic shading system could help. Inspired by the skin of krill, the system uses cells of blooming pigment that can block light on demand.

Researchers at Oxford have developed a new smart window coating that can be tuned on the fly to emit or reflect heat from the Sun in different amounts, reducing the energy costs of heating and cooling by up to a third.

Opening a window may help ventilate a room, but it also lets in a lot of outdoor noise such as that of traffic. A new window could help, as it's said to bring in more fresh air than a conventional open window, while still keeping out unwanted sounds.

While double-glazed windows do help save energy, scientists have tweaked the concept to make it even more effective. Instead of leaving an air gap between the two panes of glass, the researchers have inserted a heat-absorbing, light-blocking liquid.

In summer months sunlight comes with an unwanted side order of heat. Now, researchers have developed windows that can change color automatically when heated by sunlight, to keep buildings cool – and to top it off, they’re solar panels as well.

Earlier in the year, LG Display showed its vision for the aircraft cabin of the future, which included transparent OLED partitions. Now the company has installed the technology in subway train windows.

Goggles, glasses and windshield can fog up if there’s a difference in temperature or humidity. Researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a new anti-fog coating that warms up the surface without needing electricity.

As stuffy offices get even more stuffy in a hot summer, aircon units will very likely be switched on. But aircons use a lot of power. Engineers have created a see-through coating for windows that's reported to reflect up to 70 percent of heat coming in from the sun.

Aerogels are among the best thermal insulators, but their cloudy appearance doesn't work for windows, one of the worst offenders for letting heat escape a building. Now, researchers at Colorado University Boulder have found a way to make them transparent, recycling a beer by-product in the process.