Silver pen writes circuits on any material

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

University of Illinois engineers have developed a silver-inked rollerball pen capable of writing electrical circuits and interconnects on paper, wood and other surfaces. The pen is writing whole new chapters in low-cost, flexible and disposable electronics. 
Led by Jennifer Lewis, the Hans Thurnauer professor of materials science and engineering, and Jennifer

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Mentor backs new multicore QorIQ chip with embedded Linux

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Mentor Graphics is to support Freescale's Advanced Multi-Processing (AMP) Series of QorIQ multicore processors (below) with its Embedded Linux platform, open source tools and services, to deliver a unified workflow for Freescale customers.
Freescale customers who are developing Linux-based applications using the AMP Series processors are expected to realize

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Kontron launches Core i7 VME card with four levels of ruggedisation

Hyperthreading Intel Core i7 6U VME single-board computer launches at Paris Air Show
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk


Showing there's still plenty of life in VME, Kontron has launched a 6U VME single-board computer (SBC) VM6050 with an Intel Core i7 processor at the Paris Air Show today.The VM6050 combines extremely high x86 computing and graphics performance with flexible and modular

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Freescale Drives Embedded Multicore with New QorIQ Family

AMP series built on 28nm with new multithreaded 64-bit core
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Freescale Semiconductor's next generation of QorIQ embedded multicore devices uses a new, multithreaded 64bit Power Architecture core, 28nm process technology, up to 24 virtual cores, new acceleration engines and sophisticated power management to deliver new levels of performance and power efficiency

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Apacer rolls out SSDs for mobile industrial apps

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

As portable devices become all the rage, compactness and thin profile have gone mainstream, so Apacer is introducing two industrial SSDs (solid state disks) targeting industrial tablet PCs and rugged mobile devices. The new offerings include the 2.5-inch SAFD 25M3 and the 1.8-inch SAFD 18S3, both of which are storage solutions boasting thin profile as well

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Green Hills teams with Clarinox on wireless-enabled embedded systems

Agreement includes Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and RFID Protocols
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Green Hills Software has teamed up with Australian provider of embedded wireless solutions Clarinox Technologies to promote both companies’ joint offerings. The Clarinox application suites and drivers for short-range wireless protocols – including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and RFID – will be integrated with Green

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Mobile phones to drive USB3.0 SuperSpeed shipments

Mobile phones are a key driver but mobile PC dominates this year
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

The primary story for USB in 2010 was the emergence of the SuperSpeed standard and 2011 should be a much bigger year for the technology, especially in mobile PCs, says market researcher In-Stat. This is driven by the first chipsets from AMD that integrate SuperSpeed into the core logic chipset

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Kontron aims to quickly connect machines to the Cloud with Atom-based M2M dev kit.

Plug & play M2M for quick entry into the Cloud-based 'Internet of Everything' market

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk



Kontron has launched a machine-to-machine (M2M) Smart Services Developer Kit based around Intel's Atom processor, the first time the chip has been used in a more deeply embedded system.The Computer-on-Module (COM)-based kit provides simple 'plug & play' capability enabling

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Protecting embedded wireless devices from attack without encryption

Using an encrypted 'jamming' signal
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

For embedded devices that are too small or power sensitive to use encryption, providing protection from hacking is difficult. But researchers at MIT and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst (UMass) have developed a new system for preventing such attacks. The system would use a second transmitter to jam unauthorized

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TI launches $7 dual core M3 microcontroller

Concerto 32-bit microcontrollers based on C28x and ARM Cortex-M3 cores

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk




Texas Instruments has developed a family of microcontrollers with TI’s C28x core and control peripherals with an ARM Cortex-M3 core and connectivity in a clearly partitioned architecture that supports real-time control in a single, cost-efficient device. Software libraries for the key

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World's first production-ready Bluetooth 4.0 low energy heart-rate monitor

Belt will work with any Bluetooth version 4.0 smartphone or gadget
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk




Wireless sports & fitness monitoring developer and manufacturer Dayton Industrial has developed a heart rate chest belt that is ready to go into volume production using a Bluetooth 4.0 chip from Nordic Semiconductor.Nordic believes this will spur the development of brand new Bluetooth low

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Broadcom develops 1GHz full band cable tuner for fast channel changes

40nm DOCSIS3.0 tuner with full 1GHz bandwidth 
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Broadcom has developed a tuner for cable TV systems that spans the whole 1GHz bandwidth, replacing multiple tuners and providing a fast channel change regardless of the frequency.
It has integrated the industry's first 1GHz Full-Band Capture digital tuning technology into three new 40nm hybrid IP cable set-top box

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IBM develops 10GHz graphene devices for wireless

Wafer scale integrated circuits running up to 10GHz

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

IBM researchers have developed the first integrated circuit fabricated from wafer-size graphene, and demonstrated a broadband frequency mixer operating at frequencies up to 10GHz.Designed for wireless communications, the graphene-based analogue integrated circuit could improve today's wireless devices and

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Intel teaches machines to build their own device drivers

Intel teaches machines to build own device drivers • The Register

TERMITE takes synthesis to the device driver, reducing errors and simplifying ports to new operating systems

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General Dynamics to Develop Open Architecture Back-End RF Processor for US Air Force

Finally, a plug-and-play DSP By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

The US Air Force has awarded General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems a $7.8m contract to develop an Open System Architecture (OSA) common back-end digital processor for the entire family of Air Force radio frequency (RF) electronic devices, to include radars, SIGINT sensors, electronic-warfare and communication systems.
Under

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GE launches miniature rugged automatic video tracker

Module the size of a processor tracks images in video
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

GE Intelligent Platforms has developed a miniature rugged automatic video tracker that is easily integrated using standard or custom format carrier cards, saving time, effort and cost and minimizing program risk. The ADEPT3000 has been optimized to perform real-time detection and tracking across the full

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Peregrine launches digitally tunable capacitors

Silicon-on-sapphire tunable capacitors for integrating into RF systems 
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk
Peregrine Semiconductor has developed a family of 5bit, 32-state digitally controlled variable capacitor to provide a monolithically integrated impedance tuning for RF applications. The PE64904 and PE64905 DuNE Digitally Tunable Capacitors (DTCs) enable wide-band tunable networks,

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RIM subsidiary uses Cortus 32bit core for hardware encryption

Tiny APS3 Processor Licensed by Certicom
By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Certicom, a wholly owned subsidiary of Blackberry maker Research In Motion (RIM) and an industry leader in Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) security is to use the APS3 CPU from French chip designer Cortus in its hardware security technology.
“The Cortus APS3 was a good fit for our design." said Dan O'Loughlin Director

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Renesas launches SuperH microcontroller for embedded HD OpenVG graphics

Enables Open VG1.1 2D Graphics Display and WVGA Full-Colour Display

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Renesas Electronics and its subsidiary, Renesas Mobile have launched a new 32bit microcontroller (MCU), the SH7734, with improved graphics and network functionality for automotive, industrial and consumer applications that include an LCD panel. The SH7734 MCU features an Open VG compliant

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SiS continues to push Android into the home on MIPS

SiS Selects MIPS’ Newest Multicore Processor for Next Generation Internet TVBy Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Taiwan’s Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS) has licensed the new superscalar multiprocessing MIPS32 1074Kf Coherent Processing System (CPS) for next generation designs based on the Android operating system.
“Android is fundamentally changing the embedded world, enabling the industry to

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Point-to-point radio to boom as mobile backhaul

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Rapidly increasing mobile data use by consumers and businesses will fuel growth in wireless point-to-point radios says a recently released Strategy Analytics GaAs and Compound Semiconductor Technologies Service (GaAs) Data Model. The report, “Wireless Point-to-Point Radio Component Demand,” forecasts that wireless point-to-point radios, used to backhaul mobile

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Qualcomm teams with Wilocity for move into 60GHz WiFi

Atheros subsidiary launches tri-band chipset

By Nick Flaherty www.flaherty.co.uk

Qualcomm Atheros has teamed up with Wilocity, a leading developer of 60 GHz multi-gigabit wireless chipsets for the mobile computing, consumer electronics and peripheral markets, to launch the industry's first tri-band Wi-Fi chipset that integrates the multi-gigabit performance of in-room 60 GHz band with seamless

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