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Super Powers!

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MIT can now track a heart rate through a wall with Wi-Fi signals. Parents could watch their baby’s heart rate from another room without using any kind of wearable device or special sleeping pad with a new development out of MIT that uses Wi-Fi signals to track the rise and fall of peoples’ chests.

MIT can now track a heart rate through a wall with Wi-Fi signals

Researchers at the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory transmitted a low-power wireless signal through a wall and measured how long it took the signals to bounce back. Changes in the reflected signals allowed the team to measure movement, or even minute chest movements. Based on a person’s chest rising and falling, the CSAIL group can determine their heart rate with 99 percent accuracy.

The system can track up to four people at a time. “It has traditionally been very difficult to capture such minute motions that occur at the rate of mere millimeters per second,” paper co-author Dina Katabi said in a release. The CSAIL team has been perfecting its Wi-Fi tracking for a while now.

Iron Man

Spiderman. Wolverine. Batman. Darth Vader. Hulk. Invisible Woman. Aquaman. Storm. Thursday Next. A Mad Scientist Designing Organs That Could Give You Superpowers. Michael McAlpine’s 3-D printed bionic ear enables superhuman hearing, but you’re on your own for a cape.

A Mad Scientist Designing Organs That Could Give You Superpowers

Photo: Frank Wojciechowski Acquiring a superpower usually requires a bite from a radioactive insect, an uncomfortable dose of cosmic radiation, or the discovery of extraterrestrial parentage, but scientist Michael McAlpine hopes to make the process as simple as purchasing aspirin at the pharmacy. So far, he’s invented a “tattoo” for teeth that can detect cavities—not exactly the stuff of Hollywood blockbusters—although his latest project, a 3-D printed bionic ear that enables superhuman hearing, could be. McAlpine earned his Ph.D. in chemistry at Harvard and now is an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton, where he leads a nine-person research group. “I was corrupted to being more of an engineer than a scientist,” says McAlpine. His first papers in 2003 focused on putting silicon nanowires on flexible substrates.

Why the ear? Onewheel Is One Wheel Away From Being a Hoverboard. Photos by Onewheel Usually, when you see something that catches your eye at CES, your first instinct is to pick it up and try it out.

Onewheel Is One Wheel Away From Being a Hoverboard

Our team spotted the Onewheel in the hallway heading out of Showstoppers, but none of us were brave enough to jump on it in our sleep-and-food-deprived states. (Besides, the unit we spotted in the hallway was out of juice, so we have a backup excuse.) The 25-pound Onewheel isn’t just the unicycle version of a skateboard. It’s also electrically powered, and it purportedly balances itself with the help of an onboard gyroscope and motion sensors. According to Onewheel, the board reaches a top speed of 12mph. Photo by Onewheel Alas, this Kickstarter project is only a real thing in prototype form at the moment. Minions.