The Pentagon has a laser that can identify people from a distance—by their heartbeat
The Jetson prototype can pick up on a unique cardiac signature from 200 meters away, even through clothes.
Everyone’s heart is different. Like the iris or fingerprint, our unique cardiac signature can be used as a way to tell us apart. Crucially, it can be done from a distance.
An individual’s cardiac signature is unique, though, and unlike faces or gait, it remains constant and cannot be altered or disguised.
Contact infrared sensors are often used to automatically record a patient’s pulse. They work by detecting the changes in reflection of infrared light caused by blood flow. By contrast, the new device, called Jetson, uses a technique known as laser vibrometry to detect the surface movement caused by the heartbeat. This works though typical clothing like a shirt and a jacket (though not thicker clothing such as a winter coat).
Cardiac signatures are already used for security identification. The Canadian company Nymi has developed a wrist-worn pulse sensor as an alternative to fingerprint identification. The technology has been trialed by the Halifax building society in the UK.
One glaring limitation is the need for a database of cardiac signatures, but even without this the system has its uses. For example, an insurgent seen in a group planting an IED could later be positively identified from a cardiac signature, even if the person’s name and face are unknown.
Augmented Reality Changing The Factory Landscape From PTC’s Room With A View
Solving a spatial problem
The goal here is to make the factory a spatial problem. "As humans, we are spatially empowered," Heun explains. "We have superpowers in our brain to understand space. Everyone has that. Every child has that. At the moment that you put the interaction with these factories into that space where they are, you literally could enable children to operate a factory. That is how easy it is."
Heun and his team have prototyped a tool that they are developing with Lego, and allowed children to program it successfully. "I told our chairman that although this is only a small Lego toy, it can also work for a big machine. The interface is the same.
"We expect more and more from our factories, or from the world that we live in. We made everything digital, and now we want to make the real world digital as well, but we don't have the right interface for that.
See the full story here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/markvenables/2019/06/25/augmented-reality-changing-the-factory-landscape-from-ptcs-room-with-a-view/#38b06f5ab40a
Vivo hopes augmented reality will get a second chance in the 5G era, unveils Vivo AR Glass headset
Chinese firm Vivo seems to be confident that consumer augmented reality will take off for real this time, mainly thanks to 5G.
The headset features a dual-screen display, rather than the single option on Google's mostly failed Google Glass project, and 6DoF (six degrees of freedom) to map the wearer's position in the virtual world.
The announcement was made during MWC19 Shanghai - the Far Eastern version of Mobile World Congress that occurs in Barcelona each February/March.
We'll bring you more on the Vivo AR Glass when it gets closer to release.
See the full story here: https://www.pocket-lint.com/ar-vr/news/vivo/148472-vivo-hopes-augmented-reality-will-get-a-second-chance-in-the-5g-era-unveils-vivo-ar-glass-headset
ABSOLUTELY AUGMENTED REALITY | “8 1/2 ANTI-SOCIAL MASKS FOR INSTAGRAM”
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See the full story here: https://www.flaunt.com/content/absolutely-augmented-reality
Apple wins a Patent for a Predictive, Foveated VR Headset
Today the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 63 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today and one of them is titled "Predictive, foveated virtual reality system." The invention is designed to ease eye strain associated with viewing VR imagery like games for long periods of time.
Many conventional virtual reality and augmented reality systems on the market today may suffer from latency problems potentially cause eyestrain, headaches, and/or nausea.
Additionally, the amount of image data required to be captured, generated and/or displayed to the user of a conventional virtual reality system may be so large as to affect the performance of the system (e.g., increased latency) and to increase the cost and/or size of the system.
Apple's granted patent covers methods and systems for a virtual reality (VR) and/or augmented reality (AR) device (e.g., a headset, or head mounted, device) may include a predictive, foveated virtual reality system.
A predictive foveated virtual reality system may also be configured to capture (and render) image data using more than one resolution, such as to possibly reduce overall overhead, cost, workload.
Additionally, a virtual reality system may be configured anticipate a user's movements, such as to look ahead, in order to capture image data, as well as prepare the image data for display, for a predictive, future line of sight, according to some embodiments.
See the full story here: https://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2019/06/apple-wins-a-patent-for-a-predictive-foveated-vr-headset.html
Soundgarden’s Immersive ‘Artists Den’ Experience Premieres This Week
An immersive experience is being launched to recreate Soundgarden's final North American show of the “King Animal” tour. The concert took place on Feb. 17 2013 and is widely regarded as one of the band's best. Lead singer Chris Cornell has since died and his bandmates have described the effort as the world’s first attempt at recreating the live concert experience from both the visual and the audio side. The technology was previously used on Lorde and Childish Gambino holographic tours. “Live From the Artists Den” is a 360-degree real-time mix that will be synced to on-screen footage and further complemented by a light show.
See the full story here: https://variety.com/2019/music/news/soundgarden-immersive-artists-den-experience-premiere-exclusive-preview-1203245118/
Facebook Continues Plans for Independent Oversight Board
Bloomberg reports that Facebook is “still trying to agree on its fundamental structure … [and] basic decisions like how many members it should have, how those members should be picked, and how many posts the board will review, are all still undecided.” A draft charter specifies that the Oversight Board will be comprised of 40 people, appointed from around the world, and that three to five members will review each case. Once a decision is made, the “ruling board members will then write a public explanation, and could even suggest that Facebook tweak its policies.”
One definitive decision is that the board be independent, to quell criticism that Facebook has too much control over content. But not everyone is satisfied. “It’s all well and good for people on the outside to kind of prescribe that, yeah, Facebook needs to cede some of its power to outsiders,” said Stanford University law professor Nate Persily. “But when you start unpacking how to do that, it becomes extremely complicated very fast.”
Persily and a dozen law school students “created their own version of the Facebook Oversight Board,” and, at the end of May, presented findings that suggested the board be much larger than 40 part-timers. “If they’re going to do any reasonable slice of the cases that are going to go through the appeals process, it’s going to have to be much larger or it’s going to have to be full-time,” said Persily.
See the full story here: http://www.etcentric.org/facebook-continues-plans-for-independent-oversight-board/
The patent was originally filed in June 2015 and became public earlier this month. It describes how the company’s drones could be hired to look out for open garage doors, broken windows, graffiti, or even a fire, before alerting the owner of the property.
Using delivery drones for surveillance raises huge privacy concerns for everyone who hasn’t given Amazon permission to view their homes — a problem that Amazon’s patent specifically addresses. The patent describes how geo-fencing technology would be used to ensure that Amazon’s drones don’t capture footage of houses they’re not supposed to. Images could be edited during capture or they processed post-capture. Images could also be limited by “physically constraining a sensor of the UAV,” which suggests a drone’s camera may be physically prevented from looking at any unauthorized houses.
See the full story here: https://www.theverge.com/2019/6/21/18700451/amason-delivery-drone-surveillance-home-security-system-patent-application