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What are Onshape Custom Features?

Certified Onshape Professional Too Tall Toby explains how to supercharge your workflow using community-created tools. In this insightful tutorial, he dives into the world of FeatureScript -- the powerful coding language behind Onshape. Learn where to find new scripts and how to use them. Save time. Learn new skills, shortcuts, and maybe even better ways to do things. Incorporate Custom Features into your everyday work. Very useful.
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What can you do with touchless magnetic angle sensors?

Novotechnik has put together an informative video highlighting real-world applications for their RFC, RFE, and RSA Series touchless magnetic angle sensors. You may be surprised at the variety of off-highway, marine, material handling, and industrial uses. You'll learn how they work (using a Hall effect microprocessor to detect position) and their key advantages, including eliminated wear and tear on these non-mechanical components. We love when manufacturers provide such useful examples.
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What can the new Autodesk Inventor AI Assistant do for you?

Autodesk Assistant brings industry-specific context to help execute tasks and orchestrate actions across your 3D models -- not just answer questions. Designed to understand your workflows, Assistant appears as a dockable panel alongside your Inventor workspace and includes the ability to perform complex tasks or gather information from your designs without writing a single line of code. Find out what this new AI "colleague" can do for you.
Watch this informative Autodesk video.

Useful! Snap-together LED enclosure lighting

Seifert StripLite SL 4000 Series LED enclosure lighting provides bright illumination to 700 lumens. On/off switch and motion sensor models are available. Easily daisy chain up to 16 light strips. Magnetic or clip mounting. See video/info on website or contact Bristol Instruments for more information.
Learn about snap-together lighting.

Next-gen multi-touch panels

Beckhoff's Next line of multi-touch control panels and panel PCs is engineered for demanding human-machine interface and control tasks. These panels offer convenient operation with advanced multi-touch technology, a high-quality look and feel, anti-glare and anti-ghosting effects, and a wide choice of formats (from 7 to 23.8 in.) and options. A main draw is the line's attractive pricing.
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Most powerful handheld 3D laser scanner on the market

Creaform, a business of AMETEK, has launched HandySCAN 3D|EVO Series, the most powerful handheld 3D laser scanning solution on the market. This innovative series features a built-in touchscreen display and an integrated high-res 12-MP photo camera, incorporating augmented reality (AR) and advanced on-scanner visualization. Users can streamline repetitive inspections and enhance quality control processes using the new auto-alignment feature. Powered by 46 blue laser lines with accuracy of 0.020 mm. The Creaform Metrology Suite includes four application software modules: Scan-to-CAD, Inspection, Automation, and Dynamic Tracking. So many more features.
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Continental develops first sensor to measure heat in EV motors

Global automotive supplier Continental has developed a new sensor technology that measures the temperature inside permanently excited synchronous motors in electric vehicles directly on the rotor for the first time.
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LEDs with highest output power available

The new OCI-460 SWIR LED series from EPIGAP OSA Photonics features markedly improved output power compared to the company's previous OCI-480 package and all competitive SMD SWIR LED devices. For example, model OCI-460 ID1550-XS operates at 1,550 nm and features drive current up to 1.5A to deliver approximately 13% higher output efficiency over EPIGAP's OCI-480 package. This impressive advancement features 96% higher output power compared to any other SWIR SMD LED currently on the market. Ideal for use in sensing, machine vision, and more.
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AI and collaboration in SOLIDWORKS

Discover AURA, the new AI assistant built into SOLID-WORKS, in this informative video from TriMech Group. What can AURA do for you? It can streamline workflows and make collaborating on and tracking projects even easier, for starters. Other top features of SOLIDWORKS Design 2026 are also covered. Some good tips here.
View the TriMech Group video.

Solutions for weighing and force measurement

Automation-Direct now offers Sensy 2172L series single point, 5510 series shear beam, and 2782 series tension/compression load cells that deliver flexible solutions for weighing and force measurement. They are ideal for applications ranging from small packaging scales to rugged industrial tanks and conveyor systems. Built from aircraft-grade aluminum or stainless steel, these models feature built-in overload protection, accuracies down to 0.03% of full scale, protection ratings up to IP67, and capacities up to 2,000 kg.
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Top Product: Future-proof enclosure cooling

Seifert's new SLIMLINE NEO ushers in next-generation industrial cooling with natural refrigerant R290 (GWP 0.02) and high-efficiency inverter technology. It cuts energy costs with EER up to 3.6, reduces refrigerant charge by 75%, and extends electronics life. A fully redesigned, lighter, smaller enclosure delivers lower vibration, better component protection, and easier handling. Available in two elegant surfaces: stainless steel and mild steel, powder coated.
Learn more.

Coin cell supercapacitors: High capacity, quick release

Coin cell supercapa-citors are compact, high-capacity energy storage devices that rapidly charge and discharge and endure far more cycles than rechargeable batteries. They're ideal for high switching loads such as real-time clock and battery back-up power, battery-swap ride-through, and LED or audible alarms. SCHURTER's latest versions support up to 5.5 V and 100 to 1,500 mF.
Learn more.

Tech Tip: Mastering sheet metal bend calculations in Onshape

Mastering bend calculations in sheet metal design is a key skill that can impact the accuracy and manufactur-ability of your designs significantly. Explore the various options available to become a pro in this Onshape Tech Tip: K Factor, bend allowance, and bend deduction, with guidance on when each should be used. You will probably learn something even if you don't use this software.
Read the Onshape blog.

Digital Engineering: How a private jet gets a high-end refurb

Ever wonder how private jets get overhauled from standard OEM layouts to exotic, artful interiors? It takes engineering expertise, specialty design skills, and true craftspeople. Increasingly, it also takes automation provided by middleware to weave a digital thread through CAD, BOM, ERP, and PDM software.
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How AI is quietly transforming simulation

Is AI really useful, or is it just a passing trend? Balavignesh Vemparala, an R&D Engineer II at ANSYS, lays out a compelling case for how artificial intelligence is already hard at work in the simulation world with real results for users. From faster solves to accelerated workflows, improved quality and traceability, generative models, and more, discover what you might be overlooking when it comes to real-world AI application. Worth the read.
Read this informative ANSYS blog.

100,000 streaming movies per sec: Researchers demonstrate 40-channel optical communication link

Researchers demonstrated a silicon-based optical communication link that combines two multiplexing technologies to create 40 optical data channels. The ring-shaped photonic crystal resonator (left) features a nanopattern inside (right) that splits a selected resonant mode for comb generation. Images taken with scanning electron microscopy. [Credit: Su-Peng Yu, NIST]

 

 

 

 

Researchers have demonstrated a silicon-based optical communication link that combines two multiplexing technologies to create 40 optical data channels that can simultaneously move data. The new chip-scale optical interconnect can transmit about 400 GB of data per second -- the equivalent of about 100,000 streaming movies. This could improve data-intensive internet applications from video streaming services to high-capacity transactions for the stock market.

"As demands to move more information across the internet continue to grow, we need new technologies to push data rates further," said Peter Delfyett, who led the University of Central Florida College of Optics and Photonics (CREOL) research team. "Because optical interconnects can move more data than their electronic counterparts, our work could enable better and faster data processing in the data centers that form the backbone of the internet."

A multi-institutional group of researchers describes the new optical communication link in the Optica Publishing Group journal Optics Letters. It achieves 40 channels by combining a frequency comb light source based on a new photonic crystal resonator developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) with an optimized mode-division multiplexer designed by the researchers at Stanford University. Each channel can be used to carry information much like different stereo channels, or frequencies, transmit different music stations.

"We show that these new frequency combs can be used in fully integrated optical interconnects," said Chinmay Shirpurkar, co-first author of the paper. "All the photonic components were made from silicon-based material, which demonstrates the potential for making optical information handling devices from low-cost, easy-to-manufacture optical interconnects."

In addition to improving internet data transmission, the new technology could also be used to make faster optical computers that could provide the high levels of computing power needed for artificial intelligence, machine learning, large-scale emulation, and other applications.

Using multiple light dimensions
The new work involved research teams led by Firooz Aflatouni of the University of Pennsylvania, Scott B. Papp from NIST, Jelena Vuckovic from Stanford University, and Delfyett from CREOL. It is part of the DARPA Photonics in the Package for Extreme Scalability (PIPES) program, which aims to use light to vastly improve the digital connectivity of packaged integrated circuits using microcomb-based light sources.

The researchers created the optical link using tantalum pentoxide (Ta2O5) waveguides on a silicon substrate fabricated into a ring with a nanopatterned oscillation on the inner wall. The resulting photonic crystal micro-ring resonator turns a laser input into 10 different wavelengths. They also designed and optimized a mode-division multiplexer that transforms each wavelength into four new beams that each have different shapes. Adding this spatial dimension enables a fourfold increase in data capacity, creating the 40 channels.

The researchers designed and optimized a mode-division multiplexer that transforms each of the 10 wavelengths into four new beams that each have different shapes. This fourfold increase in data capacity creates 40 channels. [Credit: Kiyoul Yang, Stanford University]

 

 

 

 

Once the data is encoded onto each beam shape and each beam color, the light is recombined back into a single beam and transmitted to its destination. At the final destination, the wavelengths and beam shapes are separated so that each channel can be received and detected independently, without interference from the other transmitted channels.

"An advantage of our link is that the photonic crystal resonator enables easier soliton generation and a flatter comb spectrum than those demonstrated with conventional ring resonators," said co-first author Jizhao Zang from NIST. "These features are beneficial for optical data links."

Better performance with inverse design
To optimize the mode division multiplexer, the researchers used a computational nanophotonic design approach called photonic inverse-design. This method provides a more efficient way to explore a full range of possible designs while offering smaller footprints, better efficiencies, and new functionalities.

"The photonic inverse-design approach makes our link highly customizable to meet the needs of specific applications," said co-first author Kiyoul Yang from Stanford University.

Tests of the new device matched well with simulations and showed that the channels exhibited a low crosstalk of less than -20 dB. Using less than -10 dBm of received optical receiver power, the link performed error-free data transmission in 34 out of the 40 channels using a PRBS31 pattern, a standard used to test high-speed circuits under stress.

The researchers are now working to further improve the device by incorporating photonic crystal micro-ring resonators that produce more wavelengths or by using more complex beam shapes. Commercializing these devices would require the full integration of a transmitter and receiver chip with high bandwidth, low power consumption, and a small footprint. This could enable the next generation of optical interconnects for use in data-center networks.

Open-source code for the photonic optimization software used in the paper is available at https://github.com/stanfordnqp/spins-b.

Source: Optica

Published June 2022

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