Where Science Meets Fiction
Devices converting movement into power.
In the Human Performance Laboratory at Waseda University in Tokyo, researchers fitting subjects with MEMS accelerometers before a standard walking protocol generate a waveform that tells an interesting story. The sensor bonded to the mastoid bone, the hard protrusion directly behind the ear, records a clean oscillating signal at approximately 1.8 hertz whenever the subject…
Canary Wharf station in London handles around 100,000 passengers on a busy weekday. Many of them use the staircases – the long inclined runs connecting the underground platforms to street level. Each person descending pushes several hundred newtons of force into a step, holds it for a fraction of a second, transfers their weight forward,…