Wearable devices like smartwatches and smart glasses have gradually become a regular part of daily life, but there’s still an ongoing annoyance with many of them: battery life. While devices like smartwatches can do a few days per charge, larger devices like smart glasses have a history of shoddy battery life that makes them impractical for many people.
Now, though, new technology could help make wearables last for longer and make them lighter weight. A team from the Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute has developed a new method for creating the functional wires which form the basis of smart wearables.
The newly developed wires are made from carbon nanotubes, a material which is 100 times stronger than steel but can conduct electricity as well as copper. The tubes are created from atoms connected into hexagonal rings, making them both strong and flexible.
However, it is hard to work with carbon nanotube material because it has a tendency to bunch up and tangle. The researchers managed to address this by adding acid and other additives to the material and then kneading it similar to the way you make bread.
The result is carbon nanotube wires which were tested out in textile supercapacitors, of the sort used in smart clothing.
The tubes had excellent energy storage meaning they can help wearables operate in a more efficient way, which would reduce weight and lets the devices last for longer. Another research group found that they could add sensors using these wires to clothing, which could detect harmful gases — making them ideal for use in fields like firefighting.
“This is the world’s first achievement of dispersing functionalized CNTs in organic solvents for solution spinning. It will drive the development of lightweight and long-lasting wearable electronic devices,” said lead researcher Han Joong Tark. “Through continuous research, this technology could replace copper wires in future mobility fields, such as electric vehicles and drones, greatly improving both lightweight design and energy efficiency.”
The research is published in the journal ACS Nano.
The OnePlus Buds Clip are a new pair of open-ear earbuds built around a simple convenience. They join Sony’s LinkBuds Clip in the growing ear-cuff category, but either OnePlus bud can go on either ear.
Sensors recognize how the earbuds are being worn and route the audio channels accordingly. There’s no label to check before putting them on, and the feature also works when only one bud is used.
We buy fitness bands and activity trackers to keep tabs on our exercise, but it is easy to forget to start tracking or switch modes when moving between different activities. For Fitbit and Pixel Watch users, that could soon become a lot less annoying, as Google is rolling out a major upgrade to automatic activity tracking that can recognize more than 100 types of exercise, up from just 10 before.
Google first showed off the improved tracking earlier this month alongside the Fitbit Edge. It is now coming to Fitbit Air and the Pixel Watch 3, 4, and 5, and Google claims the added context behind the system makes workout detection nearly twice as accurate while cutting missed activities by more than half. Fitbit Edge will support it too.