Science Fiction
Dictionary
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
 |
Carbon Nanotube Speakers Are Flexible, Transparent
Carbon nanotube speakers have been created; by sending an audio-frequency current through a carbon nanotube thin film, it can be made into a superthin high-performance loudspeaker that emits sound in a wide-frequency range. The carbon nanotube speaker functions without any moving parts or heavy magnets. The video below shows a CNT speaker sewn onto a small, waving flag.
(Nanotube speaker video)
KaiLi Jiang and Shoushan Fan, professors at Tsinghua University in Beijing, and their colleagues at Beijing Normal University, drew out a thin film from CTN arrays and, then, tested the thin film for acoustic properties.
Shoushan Fan explains that when the team passed an alternating current through their CNT thin-film speaker, the film quickly switched back and forth between room temperature and 80°C. These swift temperature changes resulted in pressure oscillations in the air next to the thin-film. Fan reports the team found these thermally-induced pressure oscillations responsible for the sound emitted by the thin-film speaker.He notes that, when fully stretched, the nanotube speaker became transparent, causing the team to envision attaching it to the front of an LCD screen in place of standard speakers. Some of the more “exotic uses” they dreamed up for the speaker, he says, included the possibility stitching it into clothing to create a kind of “singing and speaking jacket.”
CNT flexible speakers could provide the essential ingredient that is missing in talking tape. In his 1998 novel Distraction, Bruce Sterling wrote about how talking tape, one of my favorite pieces of technovelgy, could help construct a building:
Oscar peeled a strip of tape from a yellow spool and wrapped the tape around a cinder block. He swept a hand-scanner over the block, activating the tape..."I'm a cornerstone," the cinder block announced.
"Good for you," Oscar grunted.
(Read more about talking tape)
Update 24-Nov-2008: Ashley found a great precursor to this idea in the works of Keith Laumer. In Diplomat at Arms (1982), his first story featuring the indomitable Retief, we encounter the command microphone:
Retief reached up and adjusted a tiny stud set in the stiff collar of his tunic. He tapped his finger lightly against the cloth. The sound boomed across the arena. A command microphone of the type authorized a Battle Commander was a very effective device...The Master of the Games stared at him aghast. This was getting out of control. Where the devil had the old man gotten a microphone and a PA system. (Read more about Laumer's command microphone)
In the context of the story, it is clear that the fabric of the tunic itself is the loudspeaker. End update.
From Nanotube speakers - the next big thin thing.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 11/22/2008)
Follow this kind of news @Technovelgy.| Email | RSS | Blog It | Stumble | del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit |
Would
you like to contribute a story tip?
It's easy:
Get the URL of the story, and the related sf author, and add
it here.
Comment/Join discussion ( 2 )
Related News Stories - (" Material ")
'Mooncrete' Lunar Regolith Concrete (LRC)
'And here they began to build...' - William Gibson, 1988.
Harvard Metamaterials Change Structure Instantly
'Annealed in any shape for a time, and codified, the structure of that shape is retained down to the molecules.' - Samuel R. Delany
Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer
'Nemourlon armor of reasonable weight resists penetration by most fragments and any bullet that is not both reasonably heavy and fairly high-velocity.' - Jerry Pournelle, 1976.
Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick
'Hasan always pitched a Gauzy - a one-molecule-layer tent, opaque, feather-light, and very tough.' - Roger Zelazny, 1966.
Technovelgy (that's tech-novel-gee!) is devoted to the creative science inventions and ideas of sf authors. Look for the Invention Category that interests you, the Glossary, the Invention Timeline, or see what's New.
Science Fiction
Timeline
1600-1899
1900-1939
1940's 1950's
1960's 1970's
1980's 1990's
2000's 2010's
Current News
Prairie Madness - And Space Sickness
'Space-sickness is one of the most unpleasant sensations that a human being can experience. Not all are subject to it...'
Can Stratospheric Aerosol Injection Control The Weather?
'...I saw a nice black heavy-looking cloud sailing by just now, and I can get the electrical machine out in five minutes to draw it down.'
SETI Suggests Prospecting The Solar System Without Landing
'From a distance it could resolve the cosmic rays reflected from various substances.'
Wolfram Alpha Mathematica Predicted by Science Fiction in 1948!
'The answer to the dumb student's prayer.'
Cislunar Space And The Space Lanes of Golden Age Science Fiction
'He had travelled the space-lanes of the solar system for the greater part of his life...'
NASA Moonbase Update
'The dinner was excellent. It was completely vegetarian — grown in specially prepared gardens in this Moon base...'
Neuralink Will Allow Humans To Communicate With ... Animals?
'Telepaths had their sensitiveness enlarged to an immense range by the pin-sets, which were telepathic amplifiers adapted to the mammal mind.'
Special Lights For Driverless Cars!
'That light is actually the Anamorphic Equalizer...'
'Old People Began to Cross The Continent In Their Own Cars'
'It was a relief to enter one of the comfortable autos, whisper a direction down the tube, and just know that you would be taken to your destination in the quickest, safest, and cheapest manner.'
Harrison Bergeron, Illustrated And Practiced
'But he didn't get very far with it before another noise in his ear radio scattered his thoughts. George winced...'
Starfall Manufacturing Drugs In Space
'The vast spinning sphere of Factory in the Sky loomed above and ahead of us, gleaming white against the unfathomable jet depths of surrounding space.'
The Solar Oberth Slingshot
'And if it doesn’t work,' inquired Lazarus, 'what does that make us? Sunspots?'
'Maybe The Woman Of Your Life Is Still Under Production'
'The Dillard people had performed a miracle and put all the works in a girl-modeled case.'
'If Anyone Is Watching Earth...'
'Our study of your race has convinced us that you are not fitted to leave your planet in the present state of your civilization.'
Epirus High-Power Microwave Defeats Drones
'...the spreading beam of the deranging ray struck them, and Then one toppled and fell. Then another.'
Cloud Of Space Rubbish From China's Long March Rocket
'Within seconds the material was spread out over fifty yards, in a matter of hours it might occupy several cubic miles of space...'
