All the breakthrough technologies generally set a stage for the innovations to emerge as something spectacular for the society. Hence, let us go through similar milestones and we bet each technology on the list will be worth following in the coming years.
PASSIVE WiFi and LiFi
So this year a few students from the University of Washington along with some researchers discovered a new way of working with Wi-Fi – calling it the Passive Wi-Fi. This is really an amazing technology breakthrough that will enable smartphones and the laptops to talk with the existing wireless networks with lesser energy usage than it has been doing now.
Right now what happens is that your phone & router keeps pinging the data back & forth to locate each other. Passive Wi-Fi definitely makes less usage of the energy required by at least 10,000 times providing the benefit of an extensive battery life boost.
Yet another breakthrough technology Li-Fi is basically having Wi-Fi through the light bulbs. You can expect to see and hear more about this technology as it increases the network speed by up to 100x time!
4D PRINTING TECHNOLOGY
With the growing trends and possibilities, the world is gradually adopting the 3D printing technology, but this hasn’t stopped the scientists from going one step further. And it is in this year, 2016, that we have seen the appearance of 4D printing technology adhering to the same principles as of 3D printing.
And it’s not wrong to say that 4D printing is just an improvement on what 3D printing is. 4D printing is the future!
HYPERLOOP ONE
Elon Musk is the technological intellect of our era and when he says that he desires to change the transportation setup, he literally means it. Musk is undertaking a mass transportation with its Hyperloop One. This is basically a tube-based train-like system covering large distances at super incredible speeds. 2016 was the demonstration period.
It hits around 115 miles / hour in just a split second, yes, in just 1.1 seconds. For a better understanding, it will transport passengers from San Francisco to Los Angeles at 800 miles/hour. This is a turning period, a revolution in the history of mass transit. And Hyperloop One is going to be a big change in our lives.
ALPHAGO SHOWCASING BETTER (ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE) AI
You probably must have heard about it during mid-2016. Google’s AlphaGo robot beats the best human GO player. This improved the artificial intelligence far more than anyone could have anticipated. AlphaGo’s achievement returns us closer towards a true artificial intelligence.
Beating “Go”, world’s greatest human player of a complex strategy board game, was considered as impossible but AlphaGo defeated the impossible to make it potential.
HDMI ALT MODE
Significant technological discoveries envision us about what our world will be in a few years down the line. However, smaller things too, make immediate effects on our lives. Like, the all new HDMI Alt Mode which has specifications that control both the HDMI and USB Type – C standards. One cable just rules it all!
And in simpler terms, HDMI Alt Mode allows you to connect any device with a USB Type-C port to any other device with an HDMI port. Just with a single cable, you will be able to connect your smartphone to your television. And for this, no adapter or any special hardware is required. HDMI Alt Mode is foreseen to become a consumer reality by the year 2017.
LITHIUM BATTERIES
There is no other technology in the world that affects our modern consumer more than a poor or worthy battery life. It is the most important element that one looks for, be it for a laptop, a smartphone or any other smart appliances. Your high-tech device is just a piece of brick without sufficient batteries. 2016 has seen mostly lithium-ion batteries that require a liquid anode for power.
However, there’s a new variation on the horizon. A distinct lithium-metal battery which is compact, faster and doubles the potential of current lithium-ion batteries is the newer spin-off.
Basically, in the physical same there are two lithium-metal batteries lasting twice as long. This is definitely one future technology that everyone’s looking forward to.
TESLA AUTOPILOT
Elon Musk, the electronic vehicle maker, and an electronics genius made a software update into its 60,000 sensor-laden cars turning the autonomous driving into a sturdy reality. This concept came into existence because of the fatal and increasing car crashes caused by human error.
This software update was officially named as “Tesla Version 7.0” and nicknamed as Autopilot. In fact, it did provide the drivers with something similar to what the airline pilots make use of in flights.
This car could manage on its own the speed, change lanes, and park for itself. Features like automatic parallel parking were previously on offer by other car companies including BMW and Mercedes. But the self-steering system, suddenly overnight, through a software update, became a giant leap towards full autonomy.
The self-driving cars may not be able to become fully legal in most countries, but their potential for cutting pollution, saving lives, boosting economies, and also improving the quality of life for the elderly people has directed towards the rapid deployment of other key technologies.
IMMUNE CELL ENGINEERING
This is commendably a life-saving breakthrough technology. Genetically engineered immune cells are now being produced to save the lives of all cancer patients. That may just be a start and Killer-T cells are programmed to wipe cancer out. Not only cancer but also multiple sclerosis and HIV could be treated by the engineering of the immune system.
The company, Cellectis, has arranged for the use gene editing to create a highly engineered yet simpler ‘universal’ stock of the T-cells made from the blood of the people who donate. New DNA’s would still be added, and gene editing will delete the T-cell receptor to sniff out foreign-looking molecules.
CONVERSATIONAL INTERFACES – POWERFUL SPEECH TECHNOLOGY
You might have noticed that some of the people ignore using the touch screens on their Apple, Samsung, Xiaomi devices in the favor of something that’s much more efficient & intuitive – their voice. Yes, voice interfaces have always been a dream of technologists for many decades. But in the recent years, thanks to some of the impressive advances in the machine learning, voice controls have now become a lot more practical.
This has its own limitations of not being able to recognize aptly yet the advantages take over the negatives.
TEACHING ROBOTS
The progress that has been happening over a couple of years in the robotics field has accelerated dramatically that each type of machine doesn’t have to be programmed individually. This is why it matters to grow increasingly.
Robots that learn to take responsibilities, deal with duties, and send out that same knowledge to the cloud for other robots to pick up that information is the main concept of teaching robots.
Projects like these are only possible because most of the research robots use the same conventional framework known as ROS for programming. When one of the machines learn to give a task, it can pass on the data to others. These machines can also upload feedback that in turn, refine all the guidance. given to subsequent machines. All the recognition and grasping happens in just five to ten megabytes.
