Window shopping, virtually

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Researchers want to make shopping trips a special experience in future by enabling passers-by to operate window displays with hand and facial gestures. Four cameras record the 3-D positions of people’s hands, face and eyes and transform them into commands for selecting and purchase goods– even after the shop has closed.

A woman passing by the window display is captivated and asks her companion“Isn’t the leather bag chic?”“Which one do you mean? There are so many of them.” The woman points to one of the bags and as if by magic the luxurious purse appears on a display behind the shop window. Then she points to a button and the designer object rotates on the screen.“So that’s what it looks like from the back.” The woman passing by is impressed. She makes another gesture to zoom the bag towards her letting her to see every detail.

This particular shopping experience is courtesy of new type of 3-D camera system from the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI) in Berlin, Germany. Its interactive shop window enables people passing by to put goods behind shop windows onto a display with simple hand and facial gestures. Paul Chojecki is a scientist at the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, Heinrich Hertz Institute and he puts it this way:“Interactive shopping has been standard operating procedure in the web for a long time. Now, we’re putting this technology into pedestrian passageways and shopping centers with the entire unit behind the window.”

Four little cameras continually record the 3-D positions of the hands, faces and eyes of persons passing by. Then, image-processing software calculates the coordinates and transforms them into the corresponding inputs for selecting goods, viewing them in detail and immediately purchasing them– even after business hours. Anyone interested can have also themselves shown product information such as color, material, price, availability and information on the manufacturer. Paul Chojecki remarks that“there’s nothing comparable in Germany yet and today shops only use touchscreens in shop windows, if at all. But, you can interact with our interactive shop window without any physical contact, which is a benefit if hygiene is important to you.“

The interactive shop window consists of four cameras and visualization software. Two of these stereo cameras record the face and eyes while the other two record the motion of the hands. Image processing recognizes both gestures such as when you turn your hand and when you point to a button with your finger that you can see on a monitor. The researcher adds that“the system doesn’t store any personal data and only the coordinates of the body parts it recognizes are passed onto the visualization.”

Interactive shop window is compatible with all displays and the shop owner can select any monitor size or type of monitor from plasma, LED, LCD, projection or reprojection screens. Beyond this, shop owners can link the system with any software already there such as content management or merchandise information system enabling them to portray all of their stock of goods on the display. The way the payment process is taken care of is also left up to the shop owner. But that’s not all. The interactive shop window not only identifies how many people are in front of the shop window, but it also can suggest on the basis of the gathered data what products and information the people passing by are interested in. Finally, it has customized greeting texts on the display to guarantee a close bond to the customer.

The interactive shop window was developed for use inshoppingcenters and the retail trade, although Chojecki thinks it would be possible to install it in museums or at trade fairs. This 3-D recording system is only a prototype at present, but the researchers will be demonstrating it at the CeBit Fair in Hannover, Germany Fraunhofer’s joint stand March 1 to 5, 2011.

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Review: Library e-books easier, but still hassle

(AP) -- Libraries have been lending e-books for longer than there's been a Kindle, but until recently only a few devices worked with them. That's changed in the past few months with the arrival of software for reading library e-books on some popular devices: iPhones, iPads and Android-powered smart phones.

However, I'm sad to report that reading librarye-booksis still more hassle than buying them. The whole process could be smoother, and there are questions about how libraries are going about the transition to the e-book world.

But let's focus first on the good news: You can now download library books straight to your Apple or Android device. Once you've figured out the system and are lucky enough to find a book you want, it takes only a few minutes to start reading.

- First, you need a library card. Visit a local branch if you don't have one.

- Second, download a free application called OverDrive Media Console to your Apple or Android device. OverDrive Inc. runs the lending system for the 5,400 U.S. public libraries that offer e-books - a bit more than half of all public libraries.

- Third, follow the app's instructions to get an"Adobe ID"and tie your device to it. It's an e-mail address and password registered with Adobe Systems Inc. to prevent you from sharing borrowed books with the whole world. The books you borrow won't be readable on devices that aren't"authorized"with this ID.

- If you're still with me after dealing with three different parties just to get started, you can now tap"Get Books"in the app. That fires up the Web browser, where you can find your local library's website. Once there, you can search for e-books. You'll need to enter your library card number and usually a passcode that comes with it.

There's a particular lingo to learn. Your"shopping cart"of books that you want to check out is called"My eList."The books you have checked out already are"My eCheck Outs."Most libraries have entirely separate systems for physical books, and if you blunder into that part of the site, getting back to e-books can be challenging.

Each library has a limited number of copies of each e-book to lend out. If it has five electronic copies of"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,"then five patrons can have the book at once. Others have to place an"eHold"on it and wait till one of the five"return"the e-book, which happens automatically at the end of the borrowing period, usually three weeks, if the borrower didn't voluntarily return it earlier.

That's right: there's no more hunting around the house for overdue books, no more late fees. That alone should make up for some of the hassle of e-book borrowing.

But the selection of e-books is small, and the limited number of copies is frustrating. Right now, I'm No. 62 out of 98 people waiting to read Nassim Nicholas Taleb's"The Black Swan"at the New YorkPublic Library. It has 12 electronic copies, so I can expect one to free up in about four months.

The OverDrive Media Console has some limitations compared with other e-book software. You can't change page margins or the color of the page, and there's no iPad version.

Another e-book application deals with those shortcomings, but it can't load e-books straight from the Web. You need a Windows or Mac computer and Bluefire Reader, free software that works with the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, but not Android.

As with Overdrive, you need a library card and an Adobe ID. You also need Adobe Digital Editions, another free application. Instead of browsing for e-books on your Apple device, you do so on the computer. You download books to the computer and open them with Digital Editions.

Then, connect the Apple device to the computer with the usual cable. In iTunes click the name of the device and navigate to the Apps tab. Under"File Sharing,"you'll find an icon for Bluefire. Click the"Add"button and find the e-book file on your hard drive. Click"Open"to transfer it to the iPad.

This is clunky, but Bluefire has the advantage of being able to load books from the many online bookstores that use Adobe ID, including Google Books. So one app can hold both your library books and commercial ones.

Using a similar process, you can load library books on to Barnes&Noble Inc.'s Nook e-book readers and Sony Readers. Instead of iTunes, you'll use computer's file system or Adobe Digital Editions. Sorry, you're out of luck if you have an Amazon Kindle, which doesn't accept books protected by Adobe ID.

For those willing to figure out the system, library e-books can be rewarding. But many steps in the process are poorly thought out and unfriendly to the user. For instance, to download a book to an Android phone using OverDrive, you have to tap three different"Download"buttons on three different screens.

Another source of frustration is the way the nation's e-books are divided among thousands of libraries. Some branch out there might have a spare copy of"The Black Swan,"yet I'm stuck in the long line of the local library. One national e-book library would be better.

But the current system, though unfriendly to users, probably serves the interests of locallibraries, which can point to e-book lending as one way they're staying current and relevant. And it's hard to see that publishers would have a big interest in streamlining e-book lending - they want people to buy e-books or even printed copies instead.

So we're probably stuck with what we have: a system where you can trade the time it takes to learn the system for free e-books. It's not great, but it's free.

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Mexico to pioneer iris technology on ID cards

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Mexico will on Monday become the first country to start using iris scans for identity cards, according to the government, which claims the scheme will be highly secure.

"The legal, technical and financial conditions are ready to start the process of issuing this identity document,"Felipe Zamora, responsible for legal affairs at the Mexican Interior Ministry, told journalists Thursday.

The documents, which will include the eye's image as well as fingerprints, a photo and signature, will be 99 percent reliable, Zamora said.

Critics, including the National Human Rights Commission, have slammed the system, expressing concern that compiling personal data could violate individual rights.

The move will be introduced gradually, with some 28 million minors taking part in a first two-year stage, due to cost 25 million dollars.

The cards are due to start for adults from 2013.

Iris recognition is increasingly used in airports, controlling access to restricted areas, and prisoner booking and release.

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3-D means headaches to many, yet companies push on

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From Hollywood studios to Japanese TV makers, powerful business interests are betting 3-D will be the future of entertainment, despite a major drawback: It makes millions of people uncomfortable or sick.

Optometrists say as many as one in four viewers have problems watching 3-D movies and TV, either because 3-D causes tiresome eyestrain or because the viewer has problems perceiving depth in real life. In the worst cases, 3-D makes people queasy, leaves them dizzy or gives them headaches.

Researchers have begun developing more lifelike 3-D displays that might address the problems, but they're years or even decades from being available to the masses.

That isn't deterring the entertainment industry, which is aware of the problem yet charging ahead with plans to create more movies and TV shows in 3-D. Jeff Katzenberg, CEO of Dreamworks Animation SKG Inc., calls 3-D"the greatest innovation that's happened for the movie theaters and for moviegoers since color."

Theater owners including AMC Entertainment Inc. and TV makers such as Panasonic Corp. are spending more than a billion dollars to upgrade theaters and TVs for 3-D. A handful of satellite andcable channelsare already carrying 3-D programming; ESPN just announced its 3-D network will begin broadcasting 24 hours a day next month.

Yet there are already signs that consumers may not be as excited about 3-D as the entertainment and electronics industries are.

Last year, people were willing to pay an additional $3 or more per ticket for blockbuster 3-D movies such as"Avatar"and"Toy Story 3."But that didn't help the overall box office take: People spent $10.6 billion on movie tickets last year, down slightly from the year before. People went to the theater less, but spent more.

3-D TV sets were available in the U.S. for the first time last year, but shipments came in below forecasts, at just under 1.6 million for North America, according to DisplaySearch. Nevertheless, TV makers such asSamsung ElectronicsCo. and Panasonic are doubling down on 3-D and introduced more 3-D-capable models this month at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Those models cost more than regular ones and require glasses, just like in theaters.

Research into how today's 3-D screens affect viewers is only in its early stages. There have been no large-scale scientific studies.

A study of 115 South Koreans watching 3-D screens close up found that 3-D caused more eyestrain than 2-D. The research prompted the Korean government to recommend that viewers take a break of up to 15 minutes after an hour of 3-D viewing. But that study was based on glasses with red and green lenses rather than the ones used in theaters and with TVs.

Based on an unscientific, online survey, the American Optometric Association estimates that 25 percent of Americans have experienced headaches, blurred vision, nausea or similar problems when viewing 3-D.

TV makers do their own testing, but don't publish results. Samsung warns on its Australian website that its 3-D TVs can cause"motion sickness, perceptual after effects, disorientation, eye strain, and decreased postural stability."The last part means viewers risk losing balance and falling.

"We do not recommend watching 3-D if you are in bad physical condition, need sleep or have been drinking alcohol,"the site continues.

Nintendo Co. says children aged 6 or younger shouldn't play with its upcoming 3DS handheld gaming system with 3-D technology, because it might affect vision development.

3-D screens and glasses create the illusion of depth by showing different images to each eye. That simulates the way objects that are at different distances in real life appear in slightly different places in each eye's field of view.

That's enough for most of us to perceive a scene as having depth. But our eyes also look for another depth cue in a scene: They expect to need to focus at different distances to see sharply.

More specifically, our eyes track an approaching object by turning inward, toward our noses. Bring something close enough, and we look cross-eyed. 3-D screens also elicit this response when they show something approaching the viewer.

The problem is that as the eyes turn inward, they also expect to focus closer. But a screen isn't moving closer, so the eyes have to curb their hard-wired inclination and focus back out. This mismatch between where the eyes think the focus should be and where the screen actually is forces them to work extra hard.

"That causes at least part of the discomfort and fatigue that people are experiencing,"says Martin Banks, an optometry professor at University of California, Berkeley.

The problem is magnified if the screen moves close to the viewer - exactly what's happening if 3-D viewing moves from the movie theater to living rooms to game gadgets like the 3DS.

There is at least anecdotal evidence of a growing problem. David Hays, an optometrist in University Place, Wash., says patients came in after seeing"Avatar,"complaining of eyestrain or the inability to see the 3-D effect. He expects to see more as the technology spreads.

Roger Phelps, an optometrist in Ojai, Calif., says viewers who suffer the most with 3-D are those who have trouble getting their eyes to converge properly in normal life.

"If you tend to get carsick easily, you might be one of those,"Phelps says.

Yevgeny Koltunov, a 39-year-old New Yorker, has gone out of his way to find theaters showing 2-D versions of such movies as"Iron Man 2"and"Alice in Wonderland."His daughter, 13, also refuses to see 3-D movies.

"It doesn't look all that spectacular to me,"Koltunov says."For the most part, they give me a headache and make me dizzy, by the end."

Moviemakers do hold back on 3-D effects to minimize eyestrain."Avatar"avoided gimmicks such as objects suddenly appearing to jut out of the screen. Filmmakers also try to make sure that the most significant part of a scene, such as the lead actor's face, appear to be at the same distance as the screen. That way, the eyes are less confused.

But this approach also limits moviemakers' creative freedom, and it doesn't solve the eyestrain problem entirely.

Banks is working on a longer-term solution. He and his team at Berkeley's Visual Space Perception Laboratory have put together 3-D"glasses"- really, a desk-bound contraption - with lenses that accomodate the eyes' natural inclination to focus at different distances. He says the setup reduces eyestrain and mental fatigue from 3-D images, though it may not eliminate them entirely.

A reporter who tried the device found it provided a very lifelike illusion of a box coming toward him on a track.

At the University of Arizona, optical sciences professor Hong Hua is working on wearable, helmet-like displays that also allow the eyes to focus at different distances.

Commercial versions of these setups are at least several years away, and even then, are more likely to be professional tools for remote surgery or industrial design rather than consumer items.

Even further away is the prospect of live holograms, which could create 3-D images that could be viewed without glasses, from all angles.

Until then, Phelps recommends sufferers sit as far back as they can in 3-D theaters. Another solution: close one eye, or put a Post-It note over it like an eye patch. That way, 3-D goes back to being 2-D.

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Flexible screens expected to inspire a host of new devices

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Later this year, Hewlett-Packard researchers say, they expect to deliver to the U.S. Army a working prototype of what they're calling a"Dick Tracy wristwatch"- a lightweight, wearable device that soldiers in the field can use to view digital maps and other data on a flexible plastic screen that won't shatter or crack like glass.

Though it will be spartan by design, researchers say HP's prototype could be one of the first in a new wave of products incorporating flexible electronic displays. Freed from the constraints of a rigid glass screen, designers could one day build flexible plastic displays into clothing, wall coverings and perhaps even e-readers or tablets that can roll up like a newspaper.

"You can start thinking about putting electronic displays on things where you wouldn't ordinarily think of having them,"said Nick Colaneri, a scientist and director of the Flexible Display Center at Arizona State University."How about a stack of thin displays that I can peel off and stick on things, sort of like a pad of Post-It notes?"

Long before those hit the market, however, flexible plastic displays will provide tablets, smart phones and other portable computers with big screens that weigh less and are far more durable than today's models, said Carl Taussig, director of advanced display research at HP Labs in Palo Alto, Calif.

"Unlike glass, plastic doesn't break when you drop it on the floor,"said Taussig, whose employer has a vested interest inelectronic displays, as the world's biggest seller of personal computers.

Experts have long predicted a big future for flexible displays. The Defense Department has funded efforts to develop lightweight screens that soldiers can use in hostile environments. A host of computer-makers and electronics companies are working on commercial applications.

"We're quite bullish on this market,"said Jennifer Colegrove, vice president for emerging technologies at DisplaySearch, an industry research and consulting firm, which estimates that sales of flexible displays will grow from $85 million in 2008 to more than $8 billion in 2018.

But technical issues have made it a long and sometimes frustrating quest. Mountain View, Calif.-based Plastic Logic showed off a prototype e-reader with a flexible display last year, dubbed the"Que,"only to announce later that its commercial release would be delayed indefinitely.

Standard components for liquid crystal displays, used in most portable computers today, generally require a rigid glass to keep images from being distorted. Traditional displays also depend on transistors that are embedded in glass through processes that involve temperatures high enough to melt or distort plastic.

Taussig's team at HP, however, is working with plastic film that is both lighter and thinner than glass, and which can be stored in rolls. Their method resembles, in a sense, the way newspapers are printed from giant spools of paper.

The process starts with rolls of plastic that has been treated with thin layers of metal and other material. The plastic is run through a press that imprints a microscopic, three-dimensional pattern, which can then be etched to create transistors on the film. These can transmit instructions to electrically charged particles or diodes contained in a second layer of plastic, which then displays text or images.

While it's not yet ready for commercial use, Taussig said he's convinced the roll process can be far cheaper than current"batch"methods for making glass displays, which require vast clean rooms and precision robotics to keep each pane from being damaged in production.

Other groups in Taiwan and elsewhere are developing manufacturing processes in which layers of transistors are laid down on sheets of plastic temporarily bonded to a pane of glass. Colaneri said display manufacturers could adopt that approach while using much of their existing equipment.

But eventually, Colegrove said, HP's"roll"approach may be a less expensive process for making flexible screens in large volume. Currently, she added, the cost of the glass display might be $30 to $40 for a typical e-reader like the Amazon Kindle that sells for $139.

The prototype that HP is building for the Army also takes advantage of low-power features associated with E Ink, the technology used in most e-readers. As a result, Taussig said the device will be able to run on the power from a small, flexible solar panel that can be part of the wristband.

E Ink uses black and white particles with opposite electrical charges, floating in tiny capsules of liquid. Electrical signals cause the particles to form a pattern of letters, words or other images. The display requires little power because it has no backlighting and uses electricity only to create a new page.

While that's good for static displays, such as maps or blocks of text, Taussig said his team is also working with organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs, to build flexible displays capable of showing color and video. That will take more time, he added, although he said HP has proved the concept with very small displays.

Other companies are working on the same goal. Samsung touted a 4.5-inch flexible prototype using OLED technology at this month's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Sony and LG have also shown off flexible display prototypes in recent months.

The first consumer products using flexible displays will likely have the same rigid frames as today's laptops and tablet computers, Colaneri said. Even if the screen can bend, he explained, researchers have not yet developed flexible processors and other computer components.

Next will come products with screens that are curved or molded permanently into innovative shapes, he added, while a screen you can roll up and stuff in your pocket may be several years away.

FLEXIBLE DISPLAYS:

-Advantages: Flexible plastic displays can be thinner, lighter and more durable than glass, which can lower manufacturing costs, increase product life and make new designs possible.

-Applications: First will likely be smart phones, tablets and notebook computers. It could eventually be used in clothing, wall displays and other products that can be curved or rolled.

-Challenges: Requires new manufacturing processes and transistor materials. Hewlett-Packard is working on a method for imprinting and etching spools of plastic film; others are working with sheets of plastic temporarily bonded to glass.

ONE WAY OF MAKING FLEXIBLE DISPLAYS:

Hewlett-Packard's process starts with a spool of plastic film, about 50 microns thick, which has been coated with metal and other materials.

The plastic is run through a press, much like a roll of newsprint is sent through a printing press to make a newspaper, except the plastic is stamped with a microscopic, three-dimensional pattern before it is rolled onto another spool.

In similar fashion, the film is then etched to create the layer of transistors that form the lower plane of the display. The transistors will convey digital signals to charged particles or diodes in a top layer, creating symbols or images.

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From bathroom to bedroom, homes get 'smart'

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Mobile phones aren't the only things getting smart. Home appliances are too.

On display at theConsumer Electronics Show(CES) here along with the latest smartphones and touchscreen tablet computers are ovens, dishwashers, washing machines, dryers, refrigerators and other products for the"connected"home.

South Korea's LG Electronics is displaying its"Thinq"home applianceswhich are connected to a home Wi-Fi network and can be controlled by a smartphone or a computer.

They include washing machines that can be instructed from the office to run at the most cost-effective times and a camera-equipped robot vacuum cleaner, the Hom-Bot, which can be instructed remotely to clean the floor.

The camera embedded in the robot can also be used to keep an eye on the house while the owner is away.

Also fromLG Electronicsare refrigerators with touchscreen LCD displays that let users keep tabs on where items are located in the refrigerator and when they expire.

An owner can access the information while shopping via a smartphone and check whether they have enough milk or orange juice, for example.

In case of a problem such as a door left open, the LG refrigerator can send an alert to an owner's smartphone or computer.

Tom deSalvo, a spokesman for Kenmore, the appliance brand of retail titan Sears, said the company is researching the possibilities of being able to turn an oven or a clothes dryer on or off using a smartphone.

Safety questions have not made this a reality yet, he said, but as of next year, the temperature of a Kenmore oven, for example, can be regulated from a distance using a smartphone.

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Visitors admire the EN-V Xiao (Smile), an urban mobility concept from GM, at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas on Friday.

US home appliance giant General Electric is making its first appearance at CES to show off its home energy management solutions including"Nucleus,"which gives consumers information about electricity consumption.

Nucleus, which is expected to be available later this year, works withsmart meters, smart appliances, programmable thermostats and software applications to help homeowners monitor their usage and reduce their electricity bills.

Joseph McGuire, the president of the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, said US government energy standards -- and tax credits for energy efficient appliances -- were a big driver for innovation in the sector.

Ultimately, though, it's consumers who will decide, he said, with the ability to cut down on electricity bills a prime motivating factor.

It's not just the standard household items such as washers and dryers which are taking advantage of the latest technology, other products on display here are too.

Cedric Hutchings, co-founder of Withings, a French start-up showing off a baby monitor, a blood pressure monitor and other products at CES, said smart devices are opening up all kinds of new possibilities for the home.

The Withings baby monitor features a camera equipped with night vision that can send pictures and audio to an iPhone or any other device with a connected screen.

A microphone allows parents to talk to the child from another room and they can set alarms to be awoken if a baby's sleep is disrupted.

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Light-up cereal boxes powered by shelves on display at CES

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(PhysOrg.com) -- Cereal boxes with blinking lights may or may not be the next big thing, but the underlying technology could prove useful for many other potential applications. At the recent CES in Las Vegas, Fulton Innovation displayed its light-up boxes of General Mills' Honey Nut Cheerios and Trix cereals, which are wirelessly charged by the shelves they sit on.

The technology behind the luminous cereal boxes is called eCoupled, which uses inductive coupling to transform tabletops, shelves, and even parking lots intopowersources for battery-powered devices. The surfaces are equipped with a primary transmission coil, which can provide power for multiple devices equipped with secondary receiving coils.

The devices go beyond cereal boxes to kitchen blenders, smartphones, ebook readers, laptops,electric vehicles, and more. Instead of plugging these devices into an electric outlet, you could power them by simply placing them on a surface equipped with the eCoupled technology (or in the case of the electric vehicles, driving onto an eCoupledparking lot).

At CES, Fulton Innovation demonstrated how the technology could be used to make a“self-heating” can of soup. The soup can had a heating coil built into the packaging. When placed on an eCoupled surface and an“on” button is pressed on the packaging, the soup would heat up and a light would turn on when it was ready.

The technology could also be used to communicate data from various devices to a smartphone. For example, a frying pan could alert you when your food is simmering. Or when you’re at the grocery store, you could use your phone to check how much milk you have left in your refrigerator.

Even if the light-up cereal boxes never take off, the same technology could be attractive for manufacturers as a way to wirelessly track quantities and expiration dates, or for stores to wirelessly manage inventory. Also, battery-powered toys could be charged by the shelves they sit on, so their power would never run down.

As demonstrated at CES, Fulton Innovation says that the technology is all there. The challenge now is to standardize the technology, and then sell it to stores. In 2008, Fulton Innovation helped found the Wireless Power Consortium, which is developing the international standard for wireless charging, called Qi (pronounced“chee”). With this universal standard in place, the company hopes that commercialization will soon follow.

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Stanford researcher uses living cells to create 'biotic' video games (w/ Video)

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(PhysOrg.com) -- The digital revolution has triggered a wild proliferation of video games, but what of the revolution in biotechnology? Does it have the potential to spawn its own brood of games? Stanford physicist Ingmar Riedel-Kruse has begun developing"biotic games"involving paramecia and other living organisms. He hopes the games lead to advances in education and crowd-sourcing of laboratory research while helping to raise the level of public discourse on bio-related issues.

Video game designers are always striving to make games more lifelike, but they'll have a hard time topping what Stanford researcher Ingmar Riedel-Kruse is up to. He's introducing life itself into games.

Riedel-Kruse and his lab group have developed the first video games in which a player's actions influence the behavior of living microorganisms in real time– while the game is being played.

These"biotic games"involve a variety of basic biological processes and some simple single-celled organisms (such as paramecia) in combination withbiotechnology.

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The goal is for players to have fun interacting with biological processes, without dealing with the rigor of conducting a formal experiment, said Riedel-Kruse, an assistant professor of bioengineering.

"We hope that by playing games involving biology of a scale too small to see with the naked eye, people will realize how amazing these processes are and they'll get curious and want to know more,"he said.

"The applications we can envision so far are on the one hand educational, for people to learn about biology, but we are also thinking perhaps we could have people running real experiments as they play these games.

"That is something to figure out for the future, what are good research problems which a lay person could really be involved in and make substantial contributions. This approach is often referred to as crowd-sourcing."

Applying their lab equipment and knowledge to game development, Riedel-Kruse's group came up with eight games falling broadly into three classes, depending on whether players directly interact with biological processes on the scale of molecules, single cells or colonies of single cells.

The results of their design efforts are presented in a paper published in the 10th anniversary issue of Lab on a Chip (the first issue of 2011), published by the Royal Society of Chemistry. The paper is available online now.

Initially, Riedel-Kruse said, the researchers just wanted to see whether they could design such biotic games at all, so this first round of development produced fairly simple games.

"We tried to mimic some classic video games,"he said. For example, one game in which players guide paramecia to"gobble up"little balls, a la PacMan, was christened PAC-mecium. Then there is Biotic Pinball, POND PONG and Ciliaball. The latter game is named for the tiny hairs, called cilia, that paramecia use in a flipper-like fashion to swim around– and in the game enables kicking a virtual soccer ball.

The basic design of the games involving paramecia– the single-celled organisms used in countless biology experiments from grade school classes to university research labs– consists of a small fluid chamber within which the paramecia can roam freely. A camera sends live images to a video screen, with the"game board"superimposed on the image of the paramecia. A microprocessor tracks the movements of the paramecia and keeps score.

The player attempts to control the paramecia using a controller that is much like a typicalvideo gamecontroller. In some games, such as PAC-mecium, the player controls the polarity of a mild electrical field applied across the fluid chamber, which influences the direction the paramecia move. In Biotic Pinball, the player injects occasional whiffs of a chemical into the fluid, causing the paramecia to swim one direction or another.

Riedel-Kruse emphasized that paramecia, being single-celled organisms, lack a brain and the capacity to feel pain."We are talking about microbiology with these games, very primitive life forms. We do not use any higher-level organisms,"he said."Since multiple test players raised the question of exactly where one should draw this line, these games could be a good tool to stimulate discussions in schools on bioethical issues."

The game on the molecular level involves a common laboratory technique called polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, an automated process that lets researchers make millions of copies of an organism's DNA in as little as two hours.

In this game, called PolymerRace, the player is linked to the output of a PCR machine that is running different reactions simultaneously. While the reactions are running, the players can bet on which reactions will be run the fastest.

"The game PolymerRace is inspired by horse races, where you have different jockeys riding different horses,"Riedel-Kruse said."There is a little bit of bio-molecular logic involved and a little bit of chance."

The third game uses colonies of yeast cells that players have to distinguish based on their bread-vinegar like smell– olfactory stimuli anyone can experience just by walking into a bakery.

"The idea is that while we as humans play the game, we interact with real biological processes or material,"he said. His research group thinks that aspect of the games could help motivate children and even adults to learn more about biology, which is increasingly important to society.

"We would argue that modern biotechnology will influence our life at an accelerating pace, most prominently in the personal biomedical choices that we will be faced with more and more often,"Riedel-Kruse said."Therefore everyone should have sufficient knowledge about the basics of biomedicine and biotechnology. Biotic games could promote that."

Riedel-Kruse wants to maximize the educational potential of these games to enable lay people to contribute to biomedical research. The team hopes that by publishing his group's initial efforts, other researchers in the life sciences will be prompted to explore how their own research could be adapted to"biotic"video games.

Other researchers have developed biologically relevant Internet-based video games such as Fold-It, which lets players try different approaches to folding proteins, and EteRNA, developed in a collaboration between Stanford and Carnegie Mellon University, which lets players propose new molecular structures for ribonucleic acids (RNA).

Fold-It and EteRNA were developed to address specific research questions. Fold-It was strictly a simulation; and although EteRNA will actually test some proposed structures in the laboratory, the players themselves do not have direct interaction with biological processes in real time as in Riedel-Kruse's biotic games.

Part of Riedel-Kruse's continuing work will include close collaborations with Rhiju Das, an assistant professor of biochemistry at Stanford and one of the developers of EteRNA, and Daniel Schwartz, professor in the School of Education at Stanford. The three co-founded the"Bio-X.Game Center"to develop and apply biotic games to education and research.

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Computer could make 2 'Jeopardy!' champs deep blue

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(AP) -- The clue: It's the size of 10 refrigerators, has access to the equivalent of 200 million pages of information and knows how to answer in the form of a question. The correct response:"What is the computer IBM developed to become a 'Jeopardy!' whiz"?

Watson, which IBM claims as a profound advance inartificial intelligence, edged out game-show champions Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter on Thursday in its first public test, a short practice round ahead of a million-dollar tournament that will be televised next month.

Later, the human contestants made jokes about the"Terminator"movies and robots from the future. Indeed, four questions into the round you had to wonder if the rise of the machines was already upon us - in a trivial sense at least.

Watson tore through a category about female archaeologists, repeatedly activating a mechanical button before either Ken Jennings or Brad Rutter could buzz in, then nailing the questions:"What is Jericho?""What is Crete?"

Its gentle male voice even scored a laugh when it said,"Let's finish 'Chicks Dig Me.'"

Jennings, who won a record 74 consecutive"Jeopardy!"games in 2004-05, then salvaged the category, winning $1,000 by identifying the prehistoric human skeleton Dorothy Garrod found in Israel:"What is Neanderthal?"

He and Rutter, who won a record of nearly $3.3 million in prize money, had more success on questions about children's books and the initials"M.C.,"though Watson knew about"Harold and the Purple Crayon"and that it was Maurice Chevalier who sang"Thank Heaven for Little Girls"in the film"Gigi."The computer pulled in $4,400 in the practice round, compared with $3,400 for Jennings and $1,200 for Rutter.

Watson is powered by 10 racks of IBM servers running theLinux operating system. It's not connected to the Internet but has digested encyclopedias, dictionaries, books, news, movie scripts and more.

The system is the result of four years of work by IBM researchers around the globe, and although it was designed to compete on"Jeopardy!"the technology has applications well beyond the game, said John Kelly III, IBM director of research. He said the technology could help doctors sift through massive amounts of information to draw conclusions for patient care, and could aid professionals in a wide array of other fields.

"What Watson does and has demonstrated is the ability to advance the field of artificial intelligence by miles,"he said.

Watson, named for IBM founder Thomas J. Watson, is reminiscent of IBM's famous Deep Blue computer, which defeated chess champion Garry Kasparov in 1997. But while chess is well-defined and mathematical,"Jeopardy!"presents a more open-ended challenge involving troves of information and complexities of human language that would confound a normal computer.

"Language is ambiguous; it's contextual; it's implicit,"said IBM scientist David Ferrucci, a leader of the Watson team. Sorting out the context - especially in agame showfilled with hints and jokes - is an enormous job for the computer, which also must analyze how certain it is of an answer and whether it should risk a guess, he said.

The massive computer was not behind its podium between Jennings and Rutter; instead it was represented by an IBM Smart Planet icon on an LCD screen.

The practice round was played on a stage at an IBM research center in Yorktown Heights, 38 miles north of Manhattan and across the country from the game show's home in Culver City, Calif. A real contest among the three, to be televised Feb. 14-16, will be played at IBM on Friday.

The winner of the televised match will be awarded $1 million. Second place gets $300,000, third place $200,000.IBM, which has headquarters in Armonk, said it would give its winnings to charity while Jennings and Rutter said they would give away half theirs.

In a question-and-answer session with reporters after the practice round, Rutter and Jennings made joking reference to the jump in technology Watson represents.

"When Watson's progeny comes back to kill me from the future,"Rutter said,"I have my escape route planned just in case."

Jennings said someone suggested his challenge was like the legend of John Henry, the 19th-century laborer who beat a steam drill in a contest but died in the effort. Jennings prefers a comparison to"Terminator,"where the hero was a little more resilient.

"I had a friend tell me, 'Remember John Henry, the steel-drivin' man.' And I was like ... 'Remember John Connor!'"Jennings said."We're gonna take this guy out!"

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Taiwan develops face-recognising vending machine

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A face-recognising vending machine developed in Taiwan is able to offer hair-growing tonic to balding men and razors to people with beards, one of the inventors said Friday.

Thevending machine, from Taipei-based Innovative DigiTech-Enabled Applications and Services Institute, is equipped with a camera that reads the faces ofshoppersand then suggests products according to their gender and age.

"Our facial-recognition technology is more active than what has been developed in the United States and Japan, because it can actually offer shopping advice,"said Tsai Chi-hung, a researcher at the institute.

As well as perceiving male baldness or facial hair, it is also able to suggest beauty products for young women and health drinks for older ones, according to Tsai.

The machine can also record the choices of shoppers who do not follow its tips to learn from its"mistakes"to be able to offer better suggestions in the future, he said.

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IBM computer taking on 'Jeopardy!' champs for $1M

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It's the size of 10 refrigerators, and it swallows encyclopedias whole, but an IBM computer was lacking one thing it needed to battle the greatest champions from the"Jeopardy!"quiz show.

It couldn't hit a buzzer.

But that's been fixed, and on Thursday the hardware and software system named Watson was to play a practice round against Ken Jennings, who won a record 74 consecutive"Jeopardy!"games in 2004-05, and Brad Rutter, who won a record $3,255,102 in prize money.

"'Jeopardy!' felt that in order for the game to be as fair as possible, just as a human has to physically hit a buzzer, the system also would have to do that,"IBMspokeswoman Jennifer McTighe said."Now Watson has its own real buzzer."

The practice round was to be played on a stage at an IBM research center in Yorktown Heights, 38 miles north of Manhattan and 2,458 miles east of"Jeopardy!'s"home in Culver City, Calif. A real contest among the three, to be televised Feb. 14-16, also will be played at IBM, but the date hasn't been made public.

The winner of the televised match will be awarded $1 million. Second place gets $300,000, third place $200,000. IBM, which has headquarters in Armonk, said it would give its winnings to charity while Jennings and Rutter would give away half theirs.

The practice round is the first public demonstration of the computer system, IBM said. But Watson, which is named for IBM founder Thomas J. Watson, has been engaging in secretive practice rounds with other past"Jeopardy!"contestants, McTighe said. The company won't say how Watson did in those sparring matches.

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The system, which is powered by 10 racks of IBM servers running theLinux operating systemand has 15 terabytes of random-access memory, or RAM, has been in the works for four years. It has digested encyclopedias, dictionaries, books, news, movie scripts and more, IBM says. It has access to the equivalent of 200 million pages of content. It is not connected to the Internet, so it does not doWeb searches.

The company says Watson rivals a human's ability to answer questions posed in natural language - rather than computer code - with speed, accuracy and confidence. Unlike earlier computers, it can deal with"Jeopardy's!"subtleties of language, including puns and riddles.

IBM scientist David Ferrucci, a leader of the Watson team, said last month that using"Jeopardy!"to develop the computer system"is going to drive the technology in the right directions."

"It asks all kinds of things,"he said."It has the confidence aspect - don't answer if you don't think you're right. You also have to do it really quickly."

Watson is reminiscent of IBM's famous Deep Blue computer, which defeated chess champion Garry Kasparov in 1997. But while chess is well-defined and mathematical,"Jeopardy!"presents a more open-ended challenge.

Winning at"Jeopardy!"is not the main prize, IBM says. The technology could mean speedier diagnosing of medical conditions and researching of legal case law, for example.

"This could be something important,"said"Jeopardy!"executive producer Harry Friedman,"and we want to be a part of it."

Each contestant will have a podium, just as on normal"Jeopardy!"shows hosted by Alex Trebek. But given the size of the servers, Watson will be represented by an IBM Smart Planet icon on an LCD screen that fluctuates to reflect its processes.

And just as humans have been doing for 47 years on the game show, Watson has learned to come up with an answer in the form of a question.

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Programmable credit card featured at CES

Meet the credit card of the future.

Built by Dynamics, these credit cards pack some serious computing power. They're one of the coolest - and most instantly practical - things I've seen at the 2011 InternationalConsumer Electronics Show.

One of the cards includes five buttons, A through E, allowing the cardholder to set a pass code to unlock the card.

When the correct code is entered, the magnetic strip on the back is entirely rewritten digitally and is ready for use.

Without that code, thecredit cardcan't be used.

"If you lose the card or someone steals it, it's a dead piece of plastic,"Dynamics CEO Jeff Mullen told me.

Each of the cards looks and feels exactly the same as a conventional credit card. The electronics on the inside are encased in the card's thin - .033 of an inch - plastic profile. They're also waterproof, Mullen said.

The battery life is good, too, lasting four years, Mullen said. Most credits cards expire and are reissued after three years.

Another version of the card allows the holder to maintain two different accounts, say a personal and corporate account.

By tapping one of two buttons, the card's magnetic strip is again rewritten to allow access to that account.

There's also a card that allows holders to use their rewards points just like cash. Citibank announced this week that it would begin a trial run of this card.

"If you're short on cash or credit, you can use your rewards points at any merchant,"Mullen said.

The cards were recognized at the trade show with one of CES's Best ofInnovationshonors.

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Japanese firm invents mirror to spot the flu

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As Japan's flu season gets into full swing, a local technology firm Tuesday unveiled a mirror-like thermometer that can detect and identify a person who is feverish.

"ThermoMirror,"which looks like a table mirror, measures the skin temperature of the person looking into it, without the need for physical contact, said the firm, NEC Avio Infrared Technologies.

The person's temperature is displayed on the surface, and the device has an alarm that will beep when detecting a subject who is feverish.

With two versions priced at 98,000 yen and 120,000 yen ($1,180-$1,440) each, the product costs less than 10 percent of thermography cameras used at airports to screen for people who might have communicable diseases, the company said.

"We foresee uses at corporate receptions, schools, hospitals and public facilities,"NEC Avio said in a statement.

The company said it aimed to sell 5,000 units in one year.

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Car tech dazzles at Consumer Electronics Show

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Automakers are taking a drive into the future at the Consumer Electronics Show.

The annual event is traditionally a showplace for mobile phones, computers and television sets butcar makersare grabbing a lot of attention this year with the latest in automotive technology and a glimpse at what's to come.

US automaker Ford even chose Las Vegas over next week's Detroit Auto Show to reveal its first all-electric car, the Focus Electric, which can get up to 100 miles (160 kilometers) on a singlebatterycharge and goes on sale this year.

Audi attracted crowds to its CES stand with a demonstration of a"head-up display"that resembles a videogame, projecting important information like a car's speed or directions in hologram fashion on the windshield directly in front of the driver.

"It shows you where to turn, the speed limit and your speed so you don't have to look down at the dashboard,"said Jessica Silvia, a spokeswoman for the German automaker, which has also been experimenting with self-driving cars.

Audi's self-driving cars were not seen zipping around CES but a concept car developed by General Motors was -- the two-wheel EN-V, or Electric Networked Vehicle, which can park itself or be summoned using a smartphone.

Test rides in the two-seater bubble-like EN-V, which was making its debut in the United States after first being shown at the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai, were a popular diversion among CES attendees.

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An attendee looks GE's new Residential WattStation plugged into a Chevrolet Volt electric car at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show on January 8, in Las Vegas. The annual event is traditionally a showplace for mobile phones, computers and television sets but car makers are grabbing a lot of attention this year with the latest in automotive technology and a glimpse at what's to come.

Ford showed off the 2012 Ford Focus version of MyFord Touch, atouchscreennavigational and entertainment display mounted on the dashboard that besides being touch-responsive can also understand 10,000 voice commands.

"I can get destinations, I can get songs. I just have to tell it what I want,"said Paul Aldighieri, a Ford spokesman."We don't want you to control the content with your hands we want you to tell the car what you want."

The information on the screen is color-coded -- blue for climate, red for entertainment, green for navigation and yellow for phone -- to minimize the amount of time a driver takes their eyes off the road.

Ford also introduced a new software program called Sync Applink which can access mobile applications like Pandora Internet radio after being connected to an Apple iPhone, a Blackberry or an Android-powered smartphone.

Aldighieri said Ford was working on putting a full Web browser in the car.

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An EN-V Xiao (Smile), an urban mobility concept from GM, on a demonstration drive at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 7. The annual event is traditionally a showplace for mobile phones, computers and television sets but car makers are grabbing a lot of attention this year with the latest in automotive technology and a glimpse at what's to come.

"It's part of the future,"the Ford spokesman said, although he quickly added that it"would be locked out while you're driving."

QNX Software Systems, a subsidiary of Blackberry maker Research In Motion, gave a demonstration of a dashboard-mounted display a spokesman described as a"mobile office."

Once a Blackberry is synched to the car using Bluetooth"you can see your contacts, your email messages, your text messages,"said Sheridan Ethier.

"It'll read your emails back to you while you're driving,"Ethier said."It's a nice way to drive your vehicle and stay connected to the office."

Audi chairman Rupert Stadler said staying connected -- even when behind the wheel -- is the future.

"In every other aspect of our lives, the Internet and all it has to offer has become increasingly mobile,"Stadler said in a CES keynote speech.

"We're making the Internet mobile in an automobile,"he said, with interfaces designed to minimize driver distraction.

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Digital health tech on display at electronics show

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Technology companies showed off the latest innovations on the digital health care front at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) alongside the newest smartphones, touchscreen tablet computers and 3D television sets.

For the second year, organizers staged a full-day"Digital Health Summit"featuring sessions such as"The Doctor in Your Hand: ExploringMobile HealthOptions"and"Does Technology Motivate People to Stay Healthy?"

Exhibitors saiddigital technologycan help significantly lower health costs, give people the ability to be more actively involved in their care through self-monitoring and improve doctor-patients communications.

"The intersection of health and technology is really ripe for an explosion,"said Jason Goldberg, 33, president and founder of Ideal Life, a Toronto-based company that makes monitoring devices.

"Technologies formally were cost prohibitive,"Goldberg said.

"But I can now sit down at the kitchen table for breakfast and check my blood sugar,"he said, and transmit the data in real-time to ahealth care providerusing a device that costs less than $100.

Elliot Sprecher, senior data analyst for Israeli company IDesia, developer of a heartbeat sensor, said digital technology should lead to"better patient awareness of their own physical health."

"Typically if you're an informed consumer in any market you're going to get better service,"Sprecher said.

"For example, an electrocardiogram (ECG) is usually taken maybe once a year,"he said."That's not enough to capture the possibility of any real substantialheart problem.

"If you were taking readings every day eventually you'd also see the affects of bad lifestyle,"Sprecher said."Conversely you'd see the improvement if you started an exercise program."

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Attendees relax in massage chairs at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vega, Nevada. Technology companies showed off the latest innovations on the digital health care front at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) alongside the newest smartphones, touchscreen tablet computers and 3D television sets.

Ideal Life's Goldberg said digital devices can have a big impact on chronic condition management.

"You can do that with simple, easy to use, affordable, familiar devices,"he said."A blood pressure cuff, a glucose meter."

Chuck Parker, executive director of Continua, an industry consortium that works to ensure the interoperability and of medical devices, said digital technology"has the opportunity to really lower the cost of health care overall."

"Individuals can collect data and send it and the health care professional on the other end can interact with it,"he said, potentially cutting down on some expensive emergency room visits.

"There's absolutely no question that digital technology is going to impact health in a positive way,"said Ananth Balasubramanian, senior director for product management at iMetrikus, a Sunnyvale, California-based company which securely transmits self-monitoring health data.

"The big thing is how the industry overcomes all of the political factors, the complete entrenchment of the system right now,"he said."That needs to be changed."

Dr. Amar Setty, a Baltimore-based medical technology consultant, agreed that a number of barriers remain before full advantage can be taken of the digital revolution in the medical field.

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The Wheeme robot from DreamBots Inc massages the back of an attendee at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada. Technology companies showed off the latest innovations on the digital health care front at the annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) alongside the newest smartphones, touchscreen tablet computers and 3D television sets.

"There's just too many different vendors dealing in too many proprietary systems,"Setty said, adding that the vast promise of electronic health records also remains elusive for the moment.

"Privacy and liability are big matters,"he said."People are scared to enter the space in some ways.

"Physicians are somewhat scared because they don't want to be sued because they let a patient's record get out,"he said.

At the same time, Setty said he has seen"a lot of consumer-based mobile applications that are really interesting.

"Especially for people who want to exercise -- apps to help motivate them and track their data,"he said.

"I think really at the moment the industry is centered on individuals who are motivated to take charge of their own health care,"Setty said."What I'm personally looking for is something for everyone."

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Inkjet, laser, Memjet? Fast color printers on tap

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(AP) -- For a long time, the two choices in desktop printers have been inkjet and laser. This year, a significant twist on the inkjet is hitting the market and promises high speed - think one color page per second - at relatively low cost.

The company behind the new technology, Memjet, hopes to snag a significant share of the $250 billion-per-year worldwide printing market.

"We're bringing revolutionary change to the industry,"said Len Lauer, Memjet's CEO.

Memjet can be several times faster than a regular inkjet because instead of having a small print head that sweeps across the page, over and over, Memjet's head is as wide as the page and doesn't move. As the paper travels underneath it, 70,000 microscopic nozzles spurt ink all at the same time.

High-end laser printers can match Memjet's speed but they cost more, both to buy and to use. Lauer expects Memjet-equipped printers to hit the market this year for $500 to $600. The ink will cost about 5 cents per page, compared with 12 cents to 25 cents per page for laser toner or consumer inkjet ink.

The page-wide heads and tiny nozzles are made possible by advances in micro-electro-mechanical systems, or MEMS. These are parts made out of silicon using many of the same techniques that go into making computer chips, so manufacturers can create tiny and very precise mechanical assemblies. MEMS are also used in digital cinema projectors and in the sensors that capture the motion of the Nintendo Wii's remotes and such smart phones as the iPhone. Other companies have demonstrated wide inkjet heads, but Memjet appears to be the first to make it a finished desktop product.

The inventor of the Memjet head is Kia Silverbrook, an Australian, but the privately held company is based in San Diego. Lauer comes from another San Diego-based company, wireless technology developer Qualcomm Inc., where he was chief operating officer.

The first Memjet for the office market will be sold by computer maker Lenovo Corp. in China early this year and by other partners in Taiwan and India, the companies announced this week. Memjet hasn't announced a partner for the U.S., but Lauer said the printer would be sold here this year as well.

In a demonstration this week at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, a prototype of the office printer churned out color pages, one per second, of a quality indistinguishable from a good inkjet printer.

"It's a disruptor in that it's very fast for a very low price,"said Keith Kmetz, a printing industry analyst for IDC. The technology"has had the market abuzz,"he said, but he added that there's more to market success than technology. Memjet has still has to prove that its partners can market the printers effectively. Memjet has talked about its technology for years while it straightened out some kinks, so it won't catch well-established players such as Hewlett-Packard Co., Lexmark International Inc. and Canon Inc. by surprise.

"I haven't noticed in my conversations with them that they're gravely concerned,"Kmetz said.

Memjet isn't targeting consumers with its printers, at least for now. The home printer market is even tougher than the office market, because manufacturers such as HP subsidize their products heavily, then make the money back from sales of ink cartridges. Fast printing isn't as important to consumers, who are also printing less and toting more information and pictures around on their smart phones.

Memjet is targeting commercial printing applications, such as photofinishing, with a unit that prints page-wide glossy photos. The goal is to replace drugstore minilab prints, which are still mostly created using light-sensitive paper and noxious chemicals. Memjet's unit is smaller, cheaper and faster. Prints from a prototype shown this week weren't as vividly colored as regular minilab prints, but Lauer said the technology is still being tweaked.

Label printers with Memjet's heads are already in use. This means that a company such as FedEx Corp., for example, that prints millions of barcode labels every day could now add color to them, perhaps for its logo or other information that should stand out, Lauer said. The technology could also be used in cash registers, which would let retailers print out coupons in color on receipts. However, the 8.5-inch wide Memjet head is too broad for a cash register, so Memjet would have to make a smaller one.

One customer, Lauer said, uses the labelprinterto print tens of thousands of personally addressed direct-mail envelopes every day, without needing to pre-print the color with standard, high-volume"offset"printing.

"Yes, you can now get your junk mail in color,"Lauer said.

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Automakers showcase technology to go

Cars are fast becoming smart phones on wheels. Or at least that's the case with those on display here at the Consumer Electronics Show, where automakers are out in force this week trying to hitch a ride with tablet computers, Internet-connected TVs and robotic floor sweepers.

"They're frantically scrambling for a way to position themselves as being technologically savvy,"said Doug Newcomb, senior technology editor for auto information website Edmunds.com."After all, good luck selling a $2,000 navigation system to a customer who has good, if not better, freenavigationon their phones."

Some parts of the massive Las Vegas Convention Center seemed more like the Detroit auto show as automakers put their gadget-laden vehicles on display for the more than 100,000 visitors expected for the big tech showcase.

"There is a revolution taking place,"said Audi Chairman Rupert Stadler in a CES keynote address Thursday."Some of the most exciting new consumer electronics aren't the ones in your living rooms or in your offices. They're the ones in your cars. We're redefining what it means to be a really fast computer."

Audi revealed an in-car touch pad that can recognize letters or digits - even Chinese characters - written with a finger so the driver doesn't have to fumble with typing. In the works: a night-vision"assistant"that uses a thermal imaging camera to spot pedestrians and other objects in the dark.

Hyundai MotorCo. showed off its new Blue Link system, which slows a stolen car down to a crawl and can send text messages to your phone when the vehicle travels outside pre-set boundaries, a feature known as geofencing.

Ford MotorCo. touted its MyKey technology, expected to roll out later this year, that would allow parents to block explicit satellite radio programming and limit driving speed when teens are behind the wheel.

Toyota MotorCorp. unveiled its EnTune service, which allows drivers to buy movie tickets on the go, among other functions. For its part, General Motors Co. displayed a new rear-view mirror equipped with its satellite-based OnStar communication system that can be installed on non-GM cars.

It wasn't just automakers. Pioneer Electronics Inc., known for its stereos, showed off technology that can instantly stream YouTube videos to an in-cabin screen. And mobile phone carriers Sprint Nextel Corp. and Verizon Wireless said they were looking at expanding data networks to accommodate ever-more-connected vehicles.

"Consumers are going to expect that whatever they can do at home or on their laptops and smart phones they can also do in their cars,"said Rebecca Lindland, an automotive analyst with IHS Global Insight.

It's all part of the growing field of telematics - technologies that help smart phones, tablets and other devices"communicate"with vehicles.

Technologies in development would allow drivers and passengers to monitor their home security cameras, get instant traffic updates from other connected drivers and play video games with opponents around the world - all on the move.

But as automakers pack cars with more computerized brains and link them to sprawling data networks, some worry that the same kind of malware and hijinks that plague other electronics could make the vehicles unsafe.

Hackers could access private information stored on digital dashboards or take control of a car from afar, said Thilo Koslowski, an auto analyst with technology research firm Gartner Inc. The lack of strong data firewalls in cars"could be an accident waiting to happen."

And even if secure, the new smorgasbord of in-car options - for example, Facebook updates recited aloud - could cause information overload for consumers and distracted driving, Koslowski said.

This week, Consumer Reports magazine criticized the MyFord/MyLincoln technology from Ford, which includes an in-dash touch screen that can control the car's cabin temperature, among others. The system, the magazine reviewers said, was"complex and buggy"and a"complicated distraction while driving"that first-time users might find"impossible to comprehend."

Gadgets for distracted driving have become a market of their own. Companies have flooded CES with technologies that claim to curb unsafe driving habits.

The Anti-Sleep Pilot, which uses simple touch tests to measure alertness, aims to calculate a driver's fatigue level based on factors such as alcohol intake and length of the work day. The Mobileye C2-270 uses a sensor mounted on the windshield to set off a buzzer when the vehicle nears other cars, motorcycles or pedestrians.

Taser International Inc. showed off its Protector software, which uses a Bluetooth signal to lock phones' texting, e-mailing and Web-surfing capabilities when inside a moving car. Other systems, such as PhoneGuard, activate when the vehicle exceeds a certain speed.

ZoomSafer's new FleetSafer Vision uses a special algorithm to collect information from service providers such as AT&T and vehicles' telematics systems to create a report about on-the-go phone use by corporate drivers.

Insurance companies such as Allstate, Progressive and State Farm have recently announced gadgets that can track mileage and behind-the-wheel habits, promising better rates for the safest and most efficient drivers.

And there's more innovation on the way.

OnStar has partnered with Verizon on a prototype system that would run on the high-speed 4G wireless network. It would feature cameras and sensors inside and all around the vehicle that can quickly record an accident. Collisions, such as parking lot fender-benders, could trigger the system to send an e-mail with an attached video clip to the vehicle's owner.

Motorists can also use voice commands to call up YouTube, Twitter, Skype and other sites on an in-vehicle display. The system could also link up to a home-monitoring system to control the thermostat and lights.

Another prototype technology being developed with help from Toyota, Atlantic Records and other companies would allow passengers watching on-demand video in the car to pause it and then finish it at home.

"Adding all these accessories can make it tough to understand how this all works,"said Derek Kuhn, vice president of sales and marketing for QNX Software Systems Co., which worked on a system for BMW that can read e-mails and text messages aloud to drivers."You want to make this so simple that the driver doesn't have to think about what they're doing."

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World's first iPhone-connected blood pressure system with online monitoring

What is more convenient then keeping tabs on your blood pressure with your smartphone? The first Apple iPhone-connected blood pressure monitor system has been launched, which even allows for online monitoring and blood pressure data storage.

The Withings Blood Pressure Monitor allows you to easily measure your blood pressure. Just connect the device (it looks a lot like the device doctors wrap around your arm to check blood pressure except no doctor's office visit necessary) directly to your iPhone and all data is recorded and saved to a personal and secure online account. You can retrieve the information as well via an iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad.

Cost: $129. The Withings Blood Pressure Monitor, which was announced at this week'sConsumer Electronics Showin Las Vegas, should be available to consumers by next month. For more information visit www.withings.com.

Also worth mentioning: The iHealth Blood Pressure iPod Dock for $99.95. Just download the free iHealth app at iTunes and connect the dock to aniPhone, iPod Touch or iPad to monitor and track blood pressure.

Suffice it to say, the use of any such health device should be done with the knowledge and advice of your own doctor.

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Phones providers aim to replace wallets, IDs

For many people, smart phones are almost as indispensable as wallets. And soon, your smart phone could replace your wallet. A collection of the biggest wireless carriers, handset makers and software developers are putting their weight behind a technology called near-field communication.

That standard will allow yourcell phoneto make payments at a cash register, scan computer chips embedded in ads and posters for discounts and product info, and eventually incorporate driver's licenses and other forms of ID.

"This isn't just about payment,"said Jaymee Johnson, director of strategic development at T-Mobile USA Inc."It's fundamentally focused on transforming the ways customers shop, save and pay."

T-Mobile,Verizon Wirelessand AT&T Inc. recently launched a joint venture called Isis to standardize and promote near-field communication, or NFC, technology and applications.

The technology enables a variety of new applications.

For example, a retailer could embed a paper-thin NFC chip in the price tags on its shelves.

When you wave your NFC-enabled phone over the tag for, say, a digital camera, it will direct the Web browser on your phone to a site with more info about that camera.

The tag could also wirelessly transfer a coupon for that camera to your phone.

So you pick up the camera and take it to the register to pay.

No need to dig out your credit card or cash.

Just swipe your phone, which also contains all your credit card info, over the NFC-enabled register, which recognizes the coupon, applies the discount, and debits your bank account.

Voila, the digitalwallet.

Or tap on a tagged movie poster to bring up the YouTube trailer to the film.

Or imagine any of the other hundreds of possibilities once individual app developers start tinkering with the software and writing programs for the phones and chips.

NFC tags could be easily, inexpensively and invisibly embedded in magazines, for instance, to bring up videos or animations related to an article, or in the automobile stickers on a dealership's lot.

DVD cases could have tags attached to let you quickly catalog every disc in your personal library. No need to photograph bar codes or other markers. Just swipe.

If this dream sounds like you've heard it before, it should.

Near-field communication is similar to another short-range wireless technology that was heavily hyped a few years ago but then faded: radio frequency identification, or RFID.

While RFID is used in a few niche consumer applications - highway-toll passes and a small percentage of credit and debit cards, for example - NFC is poised to flood the market.

In fact, if thewireless carriershave their way, widespread adoption of NFC devices might take only a year or two.

Nokia has been supporting near-field communication for a few years, but the company'ssmart phoneshave limited market share in the U.S.

Now, a host of other manufacturers that do have a big presence in America are about to jump in.

While it will be months before major retailers start including NFC chips in their cash registers and displays, NFC-equipped smart phones are already rolling out.

The first handset maker with a big U.S. presence to adopt NFC is Samsung.

Samsung recently released the Android-powered Nexus S smart phone with a built-in NFC reader.

In fact, it's the first version of Android from Google Inc. to support NFC, and Google is making freely available the tools needed to tinker with that capability.

"We're open-sourcing the NFC software stack, and we've provided Android developers with (application programming interfaces) that will allow them to build applications that take advantage of NFC,"a Google spokesman said.

To see how retailers might actually use the wireless chips, Google gave out NFC tags to retailers in Portland, Ore.

Owners of smart phones with the NFC hardware are able to scan the chips with their handsets to see whatever data the retailer has encoded in the tag.

Johnson at T-Mobile, who's also a spokesman for the new venture Isis, noted that the three carriers have more than 200 million customers among them.

And the turnover rate on the phones those customers own is fantastically high.

"You think about how quickly handsets turn over now. If you have your handset for a year, you're ready to upgrade,"Johnson said."That's a cycle that really works to our advantage in really rapidly turning over a new technology."

Apple Inc., one of the biggest drivers in smart phone trends, is rumored to be implementing NFC hardware in the next version of the iPhone.

NFC requires additional hardware in the device, meaning older phones can't simply get a software upgrade to enable the capability.

But there are work-arounds.

Visa Inc., for example, is working on a standard with Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase&Co., Wells Fargo&Co. and U.S. Bancorp to develop microSD cards with built-in mobile payment capability that could simply be inserted into certain existing phones.

But pushing NFC into the hands of consumers is only half the battle.

The other half is persuading retailers to install the high-tech cash registers and networks needed to connect with these wireless wallets.

Johnson said Isis will piggyback on Discover Financial Services' payment network, which is already accepted at more than 7 million locations nationwide.

But a far smaller number actually accept so-called contactless payments.

Johnson acknowledged that rustling up retail support is critical to making NFC a success but said Isis is pitching NFC as not just a payment tool.

It's also a way for companies to launch interactive loyalty and rewards programs for their customers, and get better, faster data on what products their customers want most.

"That's a story that we're eager to tell and that merchants have been very receptive to,"Johnson said.

So far, Isis has not yet announced any merchant partners, but Johnson said announcements will be coming in the first half of 2011.

Johnson declined to say how much money the carriers have invested in building out the Isis network but said it's a top priority.

"This is a big bet,"he said."This is a big opportunity for the carriers."

The one major carrier that's not on board with Isis yet is Sprint Nextel Corp.

Sprint said it is looking at a variety of options for enabling mobile payments, which could include joining Isis.

Near-field communication on handheld devices will initially focus on providing interactive information and mobile payment. But the technology could also one day allow documents such as driver's licenses and passports to be stored digitally on a phone.

"That is the next frontier,"Johnson said.

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