11 cheap gifts guaranteed to impress science geeks Science comes up with a lot of awesome stuff, and you don't need a Ph.D, a secret lab, or government funding to get your hands on some of the coolest discoveries. We've got a list of 11 mostly affordable gifts that are guaranteed to blow your mind, whether or not you're a science geek. Click on any image to see it enlarged. 1. Aerogel Also known as frozen smoke, Aerogel is the world's lowest density solid, clocking in at 96% air. Aerogel isn't just neat, it's useful. Price: $35 2. Inside these sealed glass balls live shrimp, algae, and bacteria, all swimming around in filtered seawater. EcoSpheres came out of research looking at ways to develop self-contained ecosystems for long duration space travel. Price: $80 3. NASA has been trying to figure out how to get a sample of rock back from Mars for a while now. Every once in a while, a meteorite smashes into Mars hard enough to eject some rocks out into orbit around the sun. Price: $70+ 4. Price: $150 5. Price: $110 6. Price: $80 7. Price: $15 8.
Knut: Stay Connected by Amperic Knut can be used to: Monitor the temperature of your home, aquarium, wine collection, home brewing operation all at the same timeMonitor the humidity in your basement or cigar collectionTell if someone has opened your liquor cabinet or refrigerator doorMeasure how much vibration a package experiences during shippingInsure you water your plantsThousand more uses that we haven't imagined yet - but you will Knut is controlled by an app installed on your computer or mobile device. This app will give you direct access to: Alerts GraphingData collection This app will be available for most computers (PC, Mac) and mobile devices (iPhone, Android). Setup Up Is Simple You can set up Knut using the Knut Interface app or a web page stored in Knut. How It WorksKnut spends the majority of the time asleep. The Knut Interface app periodically checks this email address and stores this data on the computer/mobile device. We plan to offer more sensors based on your suggestions.
Grove - Moisture Sensor - Wiki This Moisture Sensor can be used to detect the moisture of soil or judge if there is water around the sensor, let the plants in your garden reach out for human help. They can be very easy to use, just insert it into the soil and then read it. With the help of this sensor, it will be realizable to make the plant remind you : hey, i am thirsty now, please give me some water. Note:This sensor isn't hardened against contamination or exposure of the control circuitry to water and may be prone to electrolytic corrosion across the probes, so it is not advisable to be left in place or used outdoors. Features Soil moisture sensor based on soil resistivity measurement Easy to use 2.0cmX6.0cm grove module Specification Specification Platforms Supported Arduino Raspberry Pi TI LaunchPad Application Ideas Botanical gardening Moisture sensoring Getting Started Grove - Help Following documents help in getting the user started with Grove. With Arduino The hardware installation as shown below: With TI LaunchPad
Ninja Blocks SEN0148 Digital Temperature & humidity sensor (With Stainless Steel Probe) - ABRA Electronics Inc. Loading... Please wait... Advanced Search | Search Tips Categories New Products Our Newsletter SEN0148 Digital Temperature & humidity sensor (With Stainless Steel Probe) Price: Brand: DFRobot Weight: Quantity: Product Description This is an anti-rust, robust and precise SHT1x sensor, which can master enterprise-class and industrial-level applications. It can be applied in various fields: telepoint base stations, electronic control cabinet, production site, storehouse, machine rooms, greenhouses, animal farming, medicine stock and etc. Metallic package enables it to deal with the very dusty or other severe circumstance. the wall-hanging style makes it easy to install. The metallic mesh covering the sensor adopts method of infiltering copper during sintering to enhance the temperature resistance, pressure resistance, and wearing resistance of it. The 2-wire serial interface and internal voltage regulation allows for easy and fast system integration. Specification: Connection Shipping List Currency Converter
Thingternet My Nest article got me thinking about smart metering. In my head, smart metering is all about energy efficient homes constantly connected to utility companies, controlling all my appliances to minimise my energy use. The reality is a bit different A few hundred thousand UK homes have had smart meters installed so far. The full roll-out will start in 2014 and should be complete by 2019. Benefits to us are that smart meters should eliminate the massive variations that seem to exist in bills based on estimated usage. In theory, making energy meters into addressable, networked devices should be the start of a huge market. I think they’re making a mistake. Filed under Energy One of the hottest new items in the Thingternet is the Nest, a $249 home thermostat designed by Tony Fadell, co-creator of the first iPod. Nest is a very clever piece of kit. Nest have taken a ubiquitous device that is at best invisible and at worst incomprehensible, and turned it into an object of desire. - it’s small.
Waspmote - Wireless Sensor Networks 802.15.4 ZigBee Mote - Open Source Sensor Device New Generation! More than 120 sensors available 16 radios technologies available Open Source SDK & API Features Ultra low power (7µA) 120+ sensors integrated on 10 Sensor Boards 16 radio technologies: Long range: 4G / 3G / GPRS / GPRS+GPS / LoRaWAN / LoRa / Sigfox / 868 MHz / 900 MHz Medium range: ZigBee / 802.15.4 / DigiMesh / WiFi Short range: RFID/NFC / Bluetooth 2.1 / BLE Over the Air Programming (OTA) Encryption libraries (AES, RSA, MD5, SHA, Hash) Certified encapsulated line (Plug & Sense!) Industrial Protocolos: RS-232, RS-485, Modbus, CAN Bus, 4-20mA
Tutorials | Flutter Wireless Primer #001: What's an Arduino Skill level: [Beginner] Arduino is an electronics prototyping platform, which is a fancy way of saying "Arduino makes it easy for regular people to build electronics". Lets say you have some project, where you want to flip a switch and have an LED turn on. The entire electrical circuit is just a battery pack wired to a switch, then a resistor, then the LED, then the wires go back to the battery. Flip that switch and the LED turns on! But what if you only want the LED to turn on when certain conditions are met? You need a temperature sensor, but where would you add it to the circuit? That can be tricky to do with just electronics, but it's easy to do with software, and that's where Arduino comes in. [Arduino code editor, showing an entire program for blinking an LED.] With a computer in your circuit, turning the light on at a certain temperature is easy. [Diagram showing a resistor and LED wired to the popular Arduino UNO.]
MOSFET MOSFET showing gate (G), body (B), source (S) and drain (D) terminals. The gate is separated from the body by an insulating layer (white) Two power MOSFETs in the surface-mount package D2PAK. A cross section through an nMOSFET when the gate voltage VGS is below the threshold for making a conductive channel; there is little or no conduction between the terminals drain and source; the switch is off. Simulation result for formation of inversion channel (electron density) and attainment of threshold voltage (IV) in a nanowire MOSFET. The 'metal' in the name MOSFET is now often a misnomer because the previously metal gate material is now often a layer of polysilicon (polycrystalline silicon). Likewise, the 'oxide' in the name can be a misnomer, as different dielectric materials are used with the aim of obtaining strong channels with smaller applied voltages. An insulated-gate field-effect transistor or IGFET is a related term almost synonymous with MOSFET. Composition[edit] [edit] where with