Amelia's Weekly Fish Fry

The Currency of Data: Liquid Instruments’ Innovative Take on Software Defined Instrumentation

Software defined instrumentation takes center stage in this week’s Fish Fry podcast! Ben Nizette and I chat about how Liquid Instruments is changing the face of test and measurement. We examine each of their hardware platforms and investigate why this kind of flexible, modular, reconfigurable, and shareable instrumentation is the way of the future. Also this week, I check out the first commercially viable flexible plastic microprocessor chips developed by a team of researchers at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and British flexible electronics manufacturer PragmatIC Semiconductor.

 

The Road Forward for IoT: Cellular, LoRa, and WiFi - Oh My!

The Internet of things is not a concept, it is a network, the true technology enabled network of all networks” - Edewede Oriwoh

In this week’s Fish Fry podcast, Marc Pegulu from Semtech and I chat about the future of IoT, the pros and cons of the various networks we need to support our Internet of things ecosystem, and where LoRa and LoRaWAN fit in the grand scheme of IoT. I also examine how an off-the-shelf IoT wearable device is able to detect COVID-19 infection before symptoms appear for the first time. 

 

Sowing the Seeds of Change: How Sustainability and Extending Product Life Cycles Can Help Ease Our Supply Chain Woes

We are sowing the seeds of innovation in this week’s Fish Fry podcast! Peggy Carrieres from Avnet and I investigate the global supply chain challenges facing our engineering community today. We take a closer look at the role sustainability will play in the future of electronic design and how Avnet’s visual libraries called "Avail" can help you navigate a variety of supply chain and design chain issues. Also this week, I highlight a group of researchers from the University of Florida who have grown plants in lunar soil for the first time! I examine how this research could not only help develop food sources for future astronauts living and operating on the Moon and on Mars, but also how it could help us overcome stressful conditions in food-scarce areas here on Earth. 

Let’s Just Fly There! How the Center for Autonomous Vehicles in Air Transportation Engineering is Charting a Course for Flying Taxis

I have often said that the lure of flying is the lure of beauty. - Amelia Earhart 

In this week’s podcast, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Professor Naira Hovakimyan joins me to discuss how the development of the new Center for Autonomous Vehicles in Air Transportation Engineering (AVIATE) at UIUC will help charter a course for flying taxis! We investigate Hovakimyan’s L1 adaptive flight control system and the role it will play in the development of this kind of autonomous aircraft. We also chat about the different technologies developed by team members at UIUC in association with this project and how various universities and companies including Georgia Tech, MIT, Boeing, Kitty Hawk and Google Wing are coming together to make flying taxis a reality. Keeping with our high flying theme this week, I also check out the details of a new air utility vehicle called the Speeder 2 unveiled by Mayman Aerospace at the recent Draper Venture Network CEO Summit in California.

Let’s Get Spaced Out! New Space-Qualified FRAM and the Discovery of New Black Holes

In this week’s podcast, we are headed to space! First, I investigate how a team of researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill discovered a hidden treasure trove of black holes in dwarf galaxies and how their research could help unlock the mysteries surrounding a supermassive black hole in our own galaxy. Keeping with our space theme, Helmut Puchner (Infineon VP and Fellow of Aerospace and Defense) also joins me to discuss a new space-qualified serial interface FRAM. We chat about why this technology is more energy-efficient than other devices used for space applications and the advantages this particular serial interface FRAM brings to the table versus other memory devices.

 

AI to Save the Day: Athinia Uses Artificial Intelligence and Big Data to Help Solve Semiconductor Challenges

Can big data and artificial intelligence help solve the problems plaguing the semiconductor industry? That is exactly the topic of this week’s Fish Fry podcast! Athinia CEO Laura Matz joins me to discuss how Athinia is using AI and big data to solve critical semiconductor challenges. We discuss collaboration across the semiconductor industry, how Athinia is creating new insights in material optimization, and why military-grade requirements for data security are integral to Althinia’s cloud infrastructure and operations.

Opening the Door for Manufacturing Innovation: PulseForge Develops a New Form of Thermal Processing

What if we could revolutionize manufacturing and save energy at the same time? My guest is PulseForge CEO Stan Farnsworth and we are digging into the details of PulseForge’s new digital thermal processing. Stan and I investigate how this kind of thermal processing differs from traditional thermal processing and how it can vastly reduce the amount of energy used in manufacturing. We also take a closer look at each of PulseForge’s application areas, including curing and sintering, soldering and debonding, and why Stan believes that rethinking manufacturing is crucial to future electronic design innovation. 

 

Shaving Hairs and New Electronics: UChicago’s Nanocrystal Breakthrough

Are you ready for some exciting nanocrystal technology? I certainly hope so! In this week’s Fish Fry podcast, Igor Coropceanu joins me to discuss how he and a team of fellow researchers at the University of Chicago discovered a new way to make nanocrystals function together electronically. We explore why this breakthrough in nanocrystal technology could lead to future devices with new abilities, what applications this would be a perfect fit for, and why this study reflects a step forward in new material research as well.

Reimagining Moore’s Law - One Glass Chip at a Time

Let’s talk about chips! In this week’s Fish Fry podcast, Dr. Eyal Cohen (Co-founder and CEO of Cognifiber) joins me to unpack the photonic computing revolution. We investigate the details of Cognifiber's glass-based chips, proprietary fibers, and embedded waveguides, and why the advancement of this kind of technology could revolutionize the world of edge computing. Also this week, I take a closer look at a new nanocellulose paper semiconductor developed by a team of researchers at Osaka University.

 

 

Consolidation and Collaboration: MCUs and The Future of the Automotive Industry

Motors big and small take center stage in this week’s Fish Fry podcast! Marcello Williams Silva (Infineon) joins us to discuss trends in automotive designs. We investigate how consolidation is changing the automotive landscape, the role that parallel processing units will play in future automotive and eMobility designs, and the critical design elements we should consider when it comes to our automotive designs. Keeping with our motorized theme this week, I also check out the first DNA-based motors that combine computational power with the ability to burn fuel and move in an intentional direction.