university of tokyo Archive

  • CubeSat XI-V: Japan gets tweeting satellite

    CubeSat XI-V: Japan gets tweeting satellite

    Posted on May 10, 2010 | No Comments
    As if the Akiba Pulse Box (the Twitter heart beat posting device) or the Bowlingual (the iPhone Twitter app for dogs) weren't enough: Japan now boasts the world's first tweeting satellite, the CubeSat XI-V. Developed by the Nakasuka Lab at the University of Tokyo, the pico satellite (four inches) is currently orbiting Earth and keeps posting [JP] various data to its followers on Twitter.

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  • Video: No-touch, mid-air 3D input interface for mobile devices

    Video: No-touch, mid-air 3D input interface for mobile devices

    Posted on April 26, 2010 | No Comments
    A lot of sophisticated, portable gadgets nowadays have a touchscreen, but what if you could operate those gadgets with your fingers - without touching the display or any part of the device itself? A research team led by Masatoshi Ishikawa, a professor at the University of Tokyo, has developed a way to operate mobile devices by moving your fingers in mid-air.

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  • New technology heats up cell phones when callers get agitated

    New technology heats up cell phones when callers get agitated

    Posted on March 11, 2010 | No Comments
    I can't think of too many use cases for this, but they did it: A team of researchers from the University of Tokyo (Japan's MIT if you will) has developed a technology that makes it possible to "physically" convey emotions from cell phone to cell phone. The key elements of the technology are a sensor and a Peltier device that's attached to the back of the phones. Read the rest on CrunchGear.

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  • Indoor Personal Mobility Robot (video)

    Indoor Personal Mobility Robot (video)

    Posted on January 13, 2010 | No Comments
    It's always good to hear that some robot makers are focusing on the development of machines that actually have the potential of helping people in their everyday life. And the so-called Indoor Personal Mobility Robot, which is particularly geared towards the elderly, is certainly one good example. The main idea behind the robot is to make life easier for people who have trouble moving indoors. It's designed so that you can actually sit in it and, much like a Segway, "drive" around in your house by moving your upper body. Face your body forward, for example, and the robot will move accordingly, and the best thing is that even people who aren't able to use their hands can use it (you can turn around by moving your waist).

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  • Digital Contents Expo Tokyo: “Morphing Bumpy 3D Display for embodied CG art” (2 videos)

    Digital Contents Expo Tokyo: “Morphing Bumpy 3D Display for embodied CG art” (2 videos)

    Posted on October 28, 2009 | No Comments
    One of the most spectacular booths at the Digital Contents Expo in Tokyo (which ended Sunday) was the one of the Yoichiro Kawaguchi lab at the University of Tokyo. Their so-called "world's first spherical bumpy display" can be touched by viewers to feel the surface moving and morphing.

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  • Hey, Google: Check out this ultra-fast book scanner

    Hey, Google: Check out this ultra-fast book scanner

    Posted on October 14, 2009 | No Comments
    Wikipedia says Google is using a special camera that's able to scan books at a rate of 1,000 pages per hour, which doesn't sound bad at all (I am talking about Google Books of course, the company's online collection of digitized books ). But now a team at the elite University of Tokyo has announced the development of a device that can scan a 1,000-page book in four minutes.

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  • Japanese researchers use nanotechnology to fight fake money

    Japanese researchers use nanotechnology to fight fake money

    Posted on September 10, 2009 | No Comments
    A group of researchers from Tokyo-based Dai Nippon Printing (DNP) and the University of Tokyo has developed a new technology [JP] that makes it harder for criminals to counterfeit paper money or other valuables made of paper, i.e. coupons or vouchers. It can also be used to make credit cards more secure, too.

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  • Touchable Holography: New projector lets you “touch” 3D objects with your hands (video)

    Touchable Holography: New projector lets you “touch” 3D objects with your hands (video)

    Posted on August 6, 2009 | No Comments
    Here's some more info on a Sci-Fi dream come true: As if looking at floating images in free space produced by mid-air displays isn't cool enough, a research team from the University of Tokyo now makes it possible to even touch (kind of) those images with a newly developed projector system. The so-called Touch Holography is essentially made of three parts: Provision Interactive Technologies' Holo display, two Wii remote controls to track your hands in front of the display and a tactile display that uses ultrasound to provide tactile sensation onto your hand.

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  • Video: Two robots playing baseball (kind of)

    Video: Two robots playing baseball (kind of)

    Posted on July 24, 2009 | No Comments
    Baseball is a national sports in Japan and so it was just a matter of time for this baseball- and robot-crazy country to invent (industrial) robots that are able to play baseball. The 2-robot team can't run around and doesn't look human, but both machines are able to throw and bat the ball in quite an impressive way.

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