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The hidden hardware helping AI's heat problem: PCHEs

Across AI infrastructure, thermal constraints now connect semiconductor design with power and cooling systems. More compact, lighter, and efficient than conventional shell-and-tube models, printed circuit heat exchangers save floor space, reduce energy costs, and improve overall efficiency in dense, hyperscale environments.
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Nearly 1,000 parts: Industrial enclosure range expanded

Altech Corp. has expanded its industrial enclosure lineup to 10 unique series with nearly 1,000 parts! Designed for control, junction, and terminal applications, these plastic and aluminum housings offer up to IP69 protection. They mount directly to walls or panels, resisting chemicals, corrosion, flames, impacts, and severe outdoor conditions without sacrificing aesthetics.
Find your perfect enclosure today.

Cool Tools: MetraSCAN BLACK2 -- Next-gen shop-floor 3D inspection

You'll gain some superhero powers when you brandish FARO CREAFORM's new MetraSCAN BLACK2, a next-gen portable metrology-grade optical 3D scanner engineered to deliver total inspection flexibility on the shop floor. This unit boasts a 3-in-1 architecture that combines C-Track scanning, stand-alone scanning, and probing in a single metrology-grade system.
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Compact, touchless position sensors: Wear-free operation in tight spaces

Novotechnik's TFD-4000 Series of touchless linear position sensors delivers wear-free measurement in tight spaces. Featuring ranges up to 50 mm, IP67 protection, 12-bit resolution, and analog outputs, these reliable sensors operate from -40 C to 125 C across diverse industrial, mobile, and medical applications such as short-stroke linear valve positioning, solenoid valves, off-highway brake actuation, and more.
Learn more.

World's first 10-m safety laser scanner: See farther, protect more

Datasensing, Datalogic's Sensor & Safety and Machine Vision business unit, has launched the SLS10 Safety Laser Scanner, the world's first 10-meter safety laser scanner. Delivering a 275-degree scanning angle, 240-m² of coverage, and an 84-msec response time, the SLS10 protects larger workspaces with fewer devices. It features best-in-class angular resolution for precise AGV navigation, SIL-2/PLd compliance, dust immunity, and the new ONEGUI platform for simplified configuration.
Learn more and see it in action.

Accelerate AI-driven machine vision systems

BitFlow has announced full production of its Claxon CXP-12 frame grabbers, designed for NVIDIA GPU-accelerated machine vision. Across five models, the CoaXPress 2.0 lineup delivers up to 50 Gbps -- five times 10 GigE Vision -- eliminating data bottlenecks. The full CXP-12 specification ensures deterministic, high-bandwidth streaming to unleash modern AI inference models.
Learn more.

Millimeter-wave imaging inspection in real time

With its new quality and inspection R&S IMAGER millimeter-wave scanner, Rohde & Schwarz aims to simplify the industrial inspection of packaged products. The system sees through common packaging materials at production speed without using X-rays, protecting both products and operators. The high-contrast 3D images are used as digital twins and can be automatically integrated into AI-powered fault-detection systems. Sees through plastics, cardboard, and composites. Applications include food and beverage, pharmaceuticals, logistics.
Learn more.

What are single-loop process controllers?

PLCs are powerful, but complex control isn't always necessary. For standalone processes requiring single-variable monitoring -- like temperature, pressure, or flow -- a single-loop controller is ideal. See how single-loop controllers can streamline your next project.
Read the AutomationDirect tech tip.

Great Resources: Flexible circuit design guide

Tech-Etch uses advanced techniques to manufacture flex and rigid-flex circuits to exacting customer specs. Special processes include selective plating a single circuit with two different finishes, contoured circuits with variable metal thickness, semi-additive and subtractive techniques, open window or cantilevered contact leads, plus SMT for component assembly. Tech-Etch specializes in flexible circuits for medical, telecommunications, aerospace, semiconductor, and other high-reliability electronic applications.
Learn about flex circuits and get the guide (no registration required).

EMI Investigations: New immunity development system

Saelig Company announces the Langer E1 Immunity Development System for EMI investigations. This compact, affordable kit simulates burst and ESD interference to pinpoint layout weak spots down to IC pins. By eliminating "black box" guesswork early in development, engineers can efficiently identify coupling mechanisms, test measures, and resolve immunity issues before compliance failure.
Learn more and see it in action.

Battery packs for unmanned aerial vehicles

Re:Build Manufacturing has launched U.S.-assembled, NDAA-compliant lithium-ion battery packs for commercial, public safety, and defense UAV applications. Available in Core, Power, and Performance series, the packs use non-FEOC cells and are produced at Re:Build's advanced facility in New Kensington, PA. Re:Build also offers custom pack and battery management system development.
Learn more.

Easy-to-use precision measurement system

Optical Gaging Products has announced the StarLite S1, a compact, semi-automatic 3-axis video measurement system. It combines fully automatic video measurements with manual stage motion and features an IntelliCentric-S optical system for high-resolution images. Powered by Measure-X software, this system delivers fast, repeatable, high-accuracy results, making it ideal for both shop-floor and quality-control applications.
Learn more.

Why a soccer kick bends the ball path: SOLIDWORKS simulation

With SOLIDWORKS Flow Simulation, you can virtually test a ball's flight path and see the science behind its amazing trajectory. Visualize anything you want to test, including the physics that make a ball curve and dip, to optimize performance and reduce physical testing. See the SOLIDWORKS Flow Simulation study setup and learn about the Magnus effect where a spinning object moving through a fluid curves away from its straight path. [Credit: Screenshot courtesy of SOLIDWORKS]
View the video.

Lightning-fast in-line verification, high-performance barcode reading

The Omron VHV5 Barcode Reader now combines high-performance barcode reading and calibrated ISO verification in one device. Replacing offline sample checks, it delivers 100% inline verification at production speeds up to 1,200 parts per minute. With flexible lighting, the VHV5 easily inspects labels and Direct Part Marks, even on challenging curved or irregular surfaces.
Learn more.

How to choose the right industrial Ethernet switch

Antaira Technologies breaks down 10 mission-critical capabilities separating industrial-grade switches from commercial compromises. Even if you aren't in IT engineering, you will find valuable networking knowledge in this guide to protect vital infrastructure.
Read the full article.

Artificial Intelligence being used to crack the language of cancer and Alzheimer's

Powerful algorithms used by Netflix, Amazon, and Facebook can "predict" the biological language of cancer and neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's, scientists have found.

Big data produced during decades of research was fed into a computer language model to see if artificial intelligence (AI) can make more advanced discoveries than humans.

Academics based at St John's College, University of Cambridge in the UK, found the machine-learning technology could decipher the "biological language" of cancer, Alzheimer's, and other neurodegenerative diseases.

Their ground-breaking study was published in the scientific journal PNAS in April and could be used in the future to "correct the grammatical mistakes inside cells that cause disease."

Professor Tuomas Knowles, lead author of the paper and a Fellow at St John's College, said, "Bringing machine-learning technology into research into neurodegenerative diseases and cancer is an absolute game-changer. Ultimately, the aim will be to use artificial intelligence to develop targeted drugs to dramatically ease symptoms or to prevent dementia happening at all."

Every time Netflix recommends a series to watch or Facebook suggests someone to befriend, the platforms are using powerful machine-learning algorithms to make highly educated guesses about what people will do next. Voice assistants like Alexa and Siri can even recognize individual people and instantly "talk" back to you.

Dr. Kadi Liis Saar, first author of the paper and a Research Fellow at St John's College, used similar machine-learning technology to train a large-scale language model to look at what happens when something goes wrong with proteins inside the body to cause disease.

She said, "The human body is home to thousands and thousands of proteins, and scientists don't yet know the function of many of them. We asked a neural network-based language model to learn the language of proteins.

"We specifically asked the program to learn the language of shapeshifting biomolecular condensates -- droplets of proteins found in cells -- that scientists really need to understand to crack the language of biological function and malfunction that cause cancer and neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's. We found it could learn, without being explicitly told, what scientists have already discovered about the language of proteins over decades of research."

Proteins are large, complex molecules that play many critical roles in the body. They do most of the work in cells and are required for the structure, function, and regulation of the body's tissues and organs -- antibodies, for example, are a protein that function to protect the body.

Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Huntington's diseases are three of the most common neurodegenerative diseases, but scientists believe there are several hundred.

Fluorescence microscopy image of protein condensates forming inside living cells. [Credit: Weitz lab, Harvard University]

 

 

In Alzheimer's disease, which affects 50 million people worldwide, proteins go rogue, form clumps, and kill healthy nerve cells. A healthy brain has a quality control system that effectively disposes of these potentially dangerous masses of proteins, known as aggregates.

Scientists now think that some disordered proteins also form liquid-like droplets of proteins called condensates that don't have a membrane and merge freely with each other. Unlike protein aggregates that are irreversible, protein condensates can form and reform and are often compared to blobs of shapeshifting wax in lava lamps.

Professor Knowles said, "Protein condensates have recently attracted a lot of attention in the scientific world because they control key events in the cell such as gene expression (how our DNA is converted into proteins) and protein synthesis (how the cells make proteins).

"Any defects connected with these protein droplets can lead to diseases such as cancer. This is why bringing natural language processing technology into research into the molecular origins of protein malfunction is vital if we want to be able to correct the grammatical mistakes inside cells that cause disease."

"We fed the algorithm all of the data held on the known proteins so it could learn and predict the language of proteins in the same way these models learn about human language and how WhatsApp knows how to suggest words for you to use," said Dr. Saar. "Then we were able ask it about the specific grammar that leads only some proteins to form condensates inside cells. It is a very challenging problem, and unlocking it will help us learn the rules of the language of disease."

The machine-learning technology is developing at a rapid pace due to the growing availability of data, increased computing power, and technical advances that have created more powerful algorithms.

Further use of machine learning could transform future cancer and neurodegenerative disease research. Discoveries could be made beyond what scientists currently already know and speculate about diseases -- and potentially even beyond what the human brain can understand without the help of machine learning.

"Machine learning can be free of the limitations of what researchers think are the targets for scientific exploration," said Dr. Saar, "and it will mean new connections will be found that we have not even conceived of yet. It is really very exciting, indeed."

The network developed has been made freely available to researchers around the world to enable advances to be worked on by more scientists.

Source: St John's College, Cambridge

Published May 2021

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