Smart Cities

Do you face a serious case of city traffic woes every morning, with an added dose of exhaust fumes? Innovators have now worked out a smart and eco-friendly solution — an alternative mode of urban transportation. Introducing Smacircle S1, a carbon fiber e-bike that is lightweight, foldable, packable and can be easily carried in a backpack.

Those of us living in cities often find it a relief to get out into the countryside or spend a day on the beach when the hot summer temperatures hit. Cities are subjected to something called the urban heat island effect – where temperatures are higher than the surrounding countryside due to a combination of factors. These include the use of dark building materials for roads and roofs, lack of vegetation, tall buildings blocking cooling winds and air pollution.

In a bold move which signals their commitment to both reducing the impact of climate change on our environment and meeting customer demand, Volvo announced that all cars manufactured from 2019 will have an electric motor – with the range to choose from including hybrid cars, mild hybrid cars and fully electric cars.

Even if you’ve never been to London, most people know what one of their iconic Black Cabs look like. Along with red London Buses, Buckingham Palace and Big Ben, they’re one of the most recognizable symbols of this city. Now though, it’s time for them to have a makeover.

As we move towards creating a more sustainable future, the automotive industry is already taking steps to reduce its impact on the environment, including the development of electric cars such as those made by Tesla. TU/ecomotive, partnering with Eindhoven University in the Netherlands, have taken things one step further by creating the world’s first biodegradable car.

As you sit in your garden on a summer’s day, you may well enjoy the gentle humming of honey bees diligently collecting pollen in the background. Would you miss that sound if it was no longer there, or think about the consequences? Whilst many of us are now aware that a wide variety of bee species are in decline, we don’t often think about the implications of their potential extinction.

Many of us can now control our household devices remotely, turning our central heating on or off on our way to work, or programming lights to come on when we are away from home. Now, engineers at Cornell University are looking to extend this type of technology by creating intelligent infrastructure which can monitor underground pipework.

A smart home contains amongst other things, a high definition television, DVD player, mobile phone, washing machine, home security, home theater, entertainment, thermostat regulation and every other electrical machine you can imagine.

The ill-effects of climate change are a horrific dream which will soon become a reality in our near future. In fact, some of these consequences are already being witnessed. One of the root causes of our changing climate is man and his whims. It has been predicted by researchers that sea levels are rising at an exponential rate, with the major contributing factor leaning towards global warming.

The future of humankind is dependent on the ability to overcome one of the greatest challenges it is currently facing: sustainability. Whilst the challenge is clear, the path to a successful sustainable food system is not. One question is to what degree technological development can influence the food production chain.

The power and destruction wreaked by hurricanes, cyclones and typhoons the world over is well known, but did you know that the floods caused by these massive weather systems are the number one cause of death by natural disaster in the world? Their scale even outstrips earthquakes and volcanoes due in part, to their ability to affect a huge area.

Disaster management is usually based on protection and restoration. Protection is achieved by providing spare resources in advance, while restoration aims at finding network resources by reusing failed network components, in order to convey lost traffic. In parallel, standby systems are used in an emergency, like in the case of earthquakes. A transportable terrestrial station of a satellite communication system is such an example.