Power Walking with Energy Floors

Power walking isn’t just a health craze - it could produce electrifying results!

Energy Floors, a Netherlands-based company, wants to be a player in the sustainable energy market. They don’t just talk the talk, they walk the walk … literally. Their products, the Sustainable Energy Floor and Sustainable Dance Floor, convert footsteps into electricity. As a person steps on an Energy Floor tile, the tile flexes about 10 mm. That movement is converted into electricity -  15 Watts on average, and up to 25 Watts peak. The tiles are modular; connect 40 tiles together and the network can generate up to 1 kW. They wouldn’t give me details on the generator, except to say that it’s not piezoelectric. Based on the diagram below, it looks like a rack-and-pinion that drives a small permanent magnet generator.

In addition to the tiles, the system includes a controller module that directs the flow of electricity. The 12V output can light LEDs (as in the Sustainable Dance Floor or a lighted walkway), power an external low-voltage device, or charge a battery.

Blocks that light up when activated entice people to step on them. Put a few at each shopping mall and you have a playground that lets kids burn off their excess energy and turn it into electricity. Set them up in front of the stage at a Phish concert and you might generate enough electricity to power the amps during one of Trey Anastasio’s guitar solos. (Okay - maybe that one is a little ambitious.)

 

But it’s not just a high-tech toy. Energy Floors recently partnered with the Russian Railway Research Institute, which hopes to put Energy Floors on railroad platforms and high-traffic walkways. 

They’ll also investigate the use of this technology to harvest energy from the movement of cars and trains. Frankly, I think piezoelectric transducers might be better for those applications. They’re less efficient than electromagnetic generators, but they might be more durable under heavy vehicular traffic.

In keeping with the company’s sustainable focus, the floor tiles are made from recyclable materials. They have a 30 year expected lifetime. 

Laurence Kemball-Cook delivers a TED talk on this concept:

Sustainable energy is a multifaceted industry. Solar, wind, and hydroelectric are the big players, but small energy-harvesting products have their place as well. A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Energy Floors could make that step more productive.

Energy Categories

Biomass

BIOMASs

Coal

COAL

Hydropower

HYDROPOWER

Natural Gas

NATURAL GAS

Nuclear

NUCLEAR

Oil

OIL

Solar

SOLAR

Wind

WIND

Alternative Fuels

Alternative fuels are derived from resources other than petroleum. Some are produced domestically, reducing our dependence on imported oil, and some are derived from renewable sources. Often, they produce less pollution than gasoline or diesel.

To promote alternative fuels, the Federal government offers tax incentives to consumers purchasing qualifying alternative fuel vehicles.

• 
  Ethanol is produced domestically from corn and other crops and produces less greenhouse gas emissions than conventional fuels.
• 
  Biodiesel is derived from vegetable oils and animal fats. It usually produces less air pollutants than petroleum-based diesel.
• 
  Natural gas is a fossil fuel that generates less air pollutants and greenhouse gases.
• 
  Propane, also called liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), is a domestically abundant fossil fuel that generates less harmful air pollutants and greenhouse gases.
• 
  Hydrogen can be produced domestically from fossil fuels (such as coal), nuclear power, or renewable resources, such as hydropower. Fuel cell vehicles powered by pure hydrogen emit no harmful air pollutants.

Overview of Human Area Networking Technology

What is RedTacton?

RedTacton is a new Human Area Networking technology that uses the surface of the human body as a safe, high speed network transmission path!!

RedTacton is a break-through technology that, for the first time, enables reliable high-speed HAN. In the past, Bluetooth, infrared communications (IrDA), radio frequency ID systems (RFID), and other technologies have been proposed to solve the "last meter" connectivity problem. However, they each have various fundamental technical limitations that constrain their usage, such as the precipitous fall-off in transmission speed in multi-user environments producing network congestion.

1. RedTacton uses the minute electric field emitted on the surface of the human body. Technically, it is completely distinct from wireless and infrared. 
2. A transmission path is formed at the moment a part of the human body comes in contact with a RedTacton transceiver. Physically separating ends the contact and thus ends communication.
3. Using RedTacton, communication starts when terminals carried by the user or embedded in devices are linked in various combinations according to the user's natural, physical movements.
4. Communication is possible using any body surfaces, such as the hands, fingers, arms, feet, face, legs or torso. RedTacton works through shoes and clothing as well.

Basic Principle

RedTacton takes a different technical approach. Instead of relying on electromagnetic waves or light waves to carry data, RedTacton uses weak electric fields on the surface of the body as a transmission medium. 
1. The RedTacton transmitter induces a weak electric field on the surface of the body.
2. The RedTacton receiver senses changes in the weak electric field on the surface of the body caused by the transmitter.
3. RedTacton relies upon the principle that the optical properties of an electro-optic crystal can vary according to the changes of a weak electric field.
4. RedTacton detects changes in the optical properties of an electro-optic crystal using a laser and converts the result to an electrical signal in an optical receiver circuit.

The three major functional features of RedTacton are highlighted below.

1. A communications path can be created with a simple touch, automatically initiating the flow of data between a body-centric electronic device and a computer that is embedded in the environment. For example, two people equipped with RedTacton devices could exchange data just by shaking hands. A wide range of natural human actions -- grasping, sitting down, walking, or standing in a particular place -- can be used to trigger RedTacton to start a networked process

2. Using a RedTacton electro-optic sensor, two-way communication is supported between any two points on the body at a throughput of up to 10 Mbps. Communication is not just confined to the surface of the body, but can travel through the user's clothing to a RedTacton device in a pocket or through shoes to communicate with a RedTacton device embedded in the floor. Unlike wireless technologies, the transmission speed does not deteriorate even in the presence of large crowds of people all communicating at the same time in meeting rooms, auditoriums or stores. Because the body surface is the transmission path, increasing the number of connected users directly increases the available number of individual communication channels. 
3. RedTacton can utilize a wide range of materials as a transmission medium, as long as the material is conductive and dielectric, which includes water and other liquids, various metals, certain plastics, glass, etc. Using ordinary structures such as tables and walls that are familiar and readily available, one  could easily construct a seamless communication environment at very low cost using RedTacton. (Note that constraints are imposed by the length and environment of the propagating conductor, and by the thickness of the dielectric.) 

Mechanism of communication with RedTacton

The transmitter sends data by inducing fluctuations in the minute electric field on the surface of the human body. Data is received using a photonic electric field sensor that combines an electro-optic crystal and a laser light to detect fluctuations in the minute electric field.

The naturally occurring electric field induced on the surface of the human body  dissipates into the earth. Therefore, this electric field is exceptionally faint and unstable. 

The photonic electric field sensor developed by NTT enables weak electric fields to be measured by detecting changes in the optical properties of an electro-optic crystal with a laser beam.

Features

RedTacton has three main functional features. 

(1) Touch: Touching, gripping, sitting, walking, stepping and other human movements can be the triggers for unlocking or locking, starting or stopping equipment, or obtaining data.
(2) Broadband & Interactive: Bandwidth does not deteriorate even with duplex operations and simultaneous access by many users! Duplex, interactive communication is possible at a maximum speed of 10Mbps. Because the transmission path is on the surface of the body, transmission speed does not deteriorate in congested areas where many people are communicating at the same time.
(3) Any media: In addition to the human body, various conductors and dielectrics can be used as transmission media. Conductors and dielectrics may also be used in combination.

Free Space Optics (FSO) communication

Free Space Optics (FSO) communications, also called Free Space Photonics (FSP) or Optical Wireless, refers to the transmission of modulated visible or infrared (IR) beams through the atmosphere to obtain optical communications. Like fiber, Free Space Optics (FSO) uses lasers to transmit data, but instead of enclosing the data stream in a glass fiber, it is transmitted through the air. Free Space Optics (FSO) works on the same basic principle as Infrared television remote controls, wireless keyboards or wireless Palm devices.

Free Space Optics (FSO) transmits invisible, eye-safe light beams from one "telescope" to another using low power infrared laser in the teraHertz spectrum. The beams of light in Free Space Optics (FSO) systems are transmitted by laser light focused on highly sensitive photon detector receivers. These receivers are telescopic lenses able to collect the photon stream and transmit digital data containing a mix of Internet messages, video images, radio signals or computer files. Commercially available systems offer capacities in the range of 100 Mbps to 2.5 Gbps, and demonstration systems report data rates as high as 160 Gbps.

                            Free Space Optics (FSO) systems can function over distances of several kilometers. As long as there is a clear line of sight between the source and the destination, and enough transmitter power, Free Space Optics (FSO) communication is possible.

Bionic eye prototype unveiled by Victorian scientists and designers

PHOTO: A rear view of the bionic eye prototype developed by Australian researchers and industrial designers.(Monash University)

RELATED STORY: Australian team hails bionic eye success

MAP: Monash University 3800

A team of Australian industrial designers and scientists have unveiled their prototype for the world's first bionic eye.

It is hoped the device, which involves a microchip implanted in the skull and a digital camera attached to a pair of glasses, will allow recipients to see the outlines of their surroundings.

If successful, the bionic eye has the potential to help over 85 per cent of those people classified as legally blind.

With trials beginning next year, Monash University's Professor Mark Armstrong says the bionic eye should give recipients a degree of extra mobility.

"There's a camera at the front and the camera is actually very similar to an iPhone camera, so it takes live action for colour," he told PM.

AUDIO: Latest prototype for bionic eye unveiled (PM)

"And then that imagery is then distilled via a very sophisticated processor down to, let's say, a distilled signal.

"That signal is then transmitted wirelessly from what's called a coil, which is mounted at the back of the head and inside the brain there is an implant which consists of a series of little ceramic tiles and in each tile are microscopic electrodes which actually are embedded in the visual cortex of the brain."

Professor Armstrong says is it is hoped the technology will help those who completely blind, enabling them to navigate their way around.

"What we believe the recipient will see is a sort of a low resolution dot image, but enough... [to] see, for example, the edge of a table or the silhouette of a loved one or a step into the gutter or something like that," he said.

"So the wonderful thing, if our interpretation of this is correct - because we don't know until the first human trial - [is] it'll of course enable people that are blind to be reconnected with their world in a way.

How does the bionic eye work?

A digital camera (1) embedded in the glasses will capture images.

An eye movement sensor inside the glasses (2) will direct the camera as you turn your head.

Digital processors (3) will modify the images captured by the camera.

A wireless transmitter will then present the image that you are "looking at" to a chip that has been implanted at the back of the brain (4).

The chip will then directly stimulate the visual cortex of the brain with electrical signals using an array of micro-sized electrodes.

The brain will learn to interpret these signals as sight.

Source: Monash University

"There's a number of different settings ... so you could set it to floor mapping for example and it creates a silhouette around objects on the floor so that you can see where you're going."

A challenge the designers have had to overcome is ensuring the product was lightweight, adjustable and enabled users to feel good about themselves.

"We want to make it comfortable and light weight and adjustable so that different sized heads and shapes will still manage it well and have those sort of nice aspects," Professor Armstrong said.

"We don't want a Heath Robinson wire springs affair on somebody's head.

"It needs to look sophisticated and appropriate, probably less like a prosthetic and more like a cool Bluetooth device."

The first implant is scheduled to go ahead next year which is expected to be followed by clinical trials, research and user feedback to the team.

The development of a bionic eye was one of the key aspirations out of the 2020 summit that was held in 2008.

Professor Armstrong says it is "amazing" that a prototype for the technology has already been achieved.

"To be honest when I heard about that 2020 conference and all of the people there, I thought it was a little bit of a hot air fest if you know what I mean," he said.

"But I've been proven completely wrong.

"Some of the initiatives from that, this is a major one for sure, have been brought to fruition and it's wonderful for Australia and equally wonderful for Monash University."