Top TechTop Tech #45: Touchscreen Biometric Scanners, Crowdsourced Camera Monitoring, Faster Depth Camera
Promising products and interesting innovations
By Paul Worthington
Today’s Top Tech:
• Touchscreens turn into biometric scanners
• Zensors crowdsource live camera monitoring
• Faster depth camera
Faster depth camera
Researchers at Northwestern and Columbia University developed a 3D camera that is inexpensive, produces high-quality images, and works in all environments – including outdoors.
Modeled after the human eye, the new depth camera only scans parts of the scenes that have changed. “If you send the same signal to your eye over and over, the neurons will actually stop firing,” the researchers say. “The neurons only fire if there is a change in your visual stimulus. We realized this principle could be really useful for a 3D scanning system.”
The Motion Contrast 3D Scanning system captures depth information, not just a stereoscopic view. The work was supported by the Office of Naval Research and the US Department of Energy.
Zensors crowdsource live camera monitoring
A smartphone app can monitor a designated area — using multiple cameras, crowdsourced workers and artificial intelligence — detect changes in what’s being monitored, and automatically notify users.
Developed by researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Rochester, Zensors are a cheap, accessible way to add sensors to the environment. “Simply ask Zensors a question about your home or business,” the developers say, such as “How many glasses need refilled?” All you need is an unused smartphone or Wi-Fi camera, like a Drop am. In seconds, you can create a live sensor feed. You create alerts, by email or text. Using our API, developers can build rich and responsive applications.”
The full research paper is here.
Touchscreens turn into biometric scanners
Researchers at Yahoo Labs developed a biometric system using a phone’s capacitive touchscreen.
Bodyprint authenticates a user via body parts, Engadget reports here: It can recognize your ear, fist, phalanges… and then “you can program the system to answer calls only when it detects your ear pressed against the phone.”
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