The sense of touch may soon be added to the virtual gaming experience, thanks to an ultrathin wireless patch that sticks to the palm of the hand. The patch simulates tactile sensations by delivering electronic stimuli to different parts of the hand in a way that is individualized to each person’s skin.

Developed by researchers at City University of Hong Kong (CityU) with collaborators and described in the journal Nature Machine Intelligence (“Encoding of tactile information in hand via skin-integrated wireless haptic interface”), the patch has implications beyond virtual gaming, as it could also be used for robotics surgery and in prosthetic sensing and control.

‘Haptic’ gloves, that simulate the sense of touch, already exist but are bulky and wired, hindering the immersive experience in virtual and augmented reality settings. To improve the experience, researchers led by CityU biomedical engineer Yu Xinge developed an advanced, wireless, haptic interface system called ‘WeTac’.

X-AR uses wireless signals and computer vision to enable users to perceive things that are invisible to the human eye (i.e., to deliver non-line-of-sight perception). It combines new antenna designs, wireless signal processing algorithms, and AI-based fusion of different sensors.

This design introduces three main innovations:

1) AR-conformal wide-band antenna that tightly matches the shape of the AR headset visor and provides the headset with Radio Frequency (RF) sensing capabilities. The antenna is flexible, lightweight, and fits on existing headsets without obstructing any of their cameras or the user’s field of view.

MIT researchers customized a Microsoft Hololens to let them view objects using radio frequencies. If you have ever wanted to possess the superpower of x-ray vision, you may have thought it was only possible if you were from Krypton. However, thanks to a new technology, you may be barking up the wrong tree while thinking about Supergirl, as the reality of seeing through objects lies more with tech, making Iron Man or Batman a more appropriate idea.

Conor russomanno, founder and CEO of openbci eva esteban, embedded software engineer at openbci

Galea is an award-winning platform that merges next-generation biometrics with mixed reality. It is the first device to integrate a wide range of physiological signals, including EEG, EMG, EDA, PPG, and eye-tracking, into a single headset. In this session, Conor and Eva will provide a live demonstration of the device and its capabilities, showcasing its potential for a variety of applications, from gaming to training and rehabilitation. They will give an overview of the different hardware and software components of the system, highlighting how it can be used to analyze user experiences in real time. Attendees will get an opportunity to ask questions at the end.

Haptic holography promises to bring virtual reality to life, but a new study reveals a surprising physical obstacle that will need to be overcome.

A research team at UC Santa Barbara has discovered a new phenomenon that underlies emerging holographic haptic displays, and could lead to the creation of more compelling virtual reality experiences. The team’s findings are published in the journal Science Advances.

Holographic haptic displays use phased arrays of ultrasound emitters to focus ultrasound in the air, allowing users to touch, feel and manipulate three-dimensional virtual objects in mid-air using their bare hands, without the need for a physical device or interface. While these displays hold great promise for use in various application areas, including augmented reality, virtual reality and telepresence, the tactile sensations they currently provide are diffuse and faint, feeling like a “breeze” or “puff of air.”

Meta’s AR glasses could be launched in 2027.

Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Platforms is doubling down on its virtual reality (VR) products and plans to rope in augmented reality (AR) experiences. It looks to define its position in the technology industry a few years from now. Thousands of employees of the Reality Labs Division at Meta were recently presented with a roadmap for the company’s products, which was then shared with The Verge.

VR, AR, and neural interfacesAlthough Zuckerberg has spoken mainly of the metaverse that the company would build as the future of the internet, Meta now seems to have taken its foot off the pedal to make the metaverse itself and focus on the tools instead and improving them.

Coming out later this year is the Meta Quest 3, the flagship product from the company. It is expected to be twice as powerful but half the thickness of its predecessor—the Quest 2. Meta has sold more than 20 million Quest headsets so far, so the Quest 3 sales will be a benchmark to determine if customers are interested in these products.

Priced at $400, Quest 3 will also feature front-facing cameras that will make it less immersive than its predecessors but add the ability to deliver mixed reality experiences to users. Meta is hopeful that this will prompt users to keep the headsets on for longer and plans to ship 41 new apps and games with this headset.

During almost two-years of the COVID-19 pandemic, the growth of telemedicine and new ways of reaching people has changed and developed. In October 2021, NASA flight surgeon Dr. Josef Schmid, industry partner AEXA Aerospace CEO Fernando De La Pena Llaca, and their teams were the first humans “holoported” from Earth into space.

Using the Microsoft Hololens Kinect camera and a personal computer with custom software from Aexa, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet had a two-way conversation with live images of Schmid and De La Pena placed in the middle of the International Space Station. This was the first holoportation handshake from Earth in space.

Holoportation is a type of capture technology that allows high-quality 3D models of people to be reconstructed, compressed and transmitted live anywhere in real time.

Rodents are considered one of the animal pests with the greatest impact on agricultural production and public health, especially the brown or Norway rat (Rattus norvegicus), the black or roof rat (Rattus rattus) and the house mouse (Mus musculus). Its control is an increasing problem worldwide. The intensification of agricultural production methods as well as the increase in merchandise transport to sustain growing populations is leading to an increase in waste production causing the growth of these rodent populations. The estimated losses in crop production caused by rodents range from between 5% and 90% (Stenseth et al., 2003) and this can cause problems in food security during harvesting (Belmain et al., 2015). Other negative impacts result from some rodent species living very close to human environments that can have a direct influence not only on human health through potential transmission of gastroenteric diseases and zoonosis to householders but also on domestic livestock. Therefore, rodent pest control is crucial and nowadays, the only effective control method available is the use of anticoagulant rodenticides (ARs).

ARs are so named because they interfere with the blood coagulation processes. The processes of activating various coagulation factors depends on the amount of vitamin K in its reduced form that exists in the organism. ARs inhibit the enzyme vitamin K 2,3-epoxide reductase (VKORC1) that is responsible for reducing vitamin K and maintaining the balance between its oxidized and reduced forms. The inhibition of VKORC1 prevents the activation of the coagulation factors resulting in animal death by internal bleeding. However, the intensive use of ARs can cause rodents to lose their susceptibility and become resistant to them. Genetic resistances to ARs are mainly associated with mutations or single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the gene that codes for VKORC1 (vkorc1), causing amino acid substitutions in the VKORC1 protein ( Pelz et al., 2005 ). There are studies on this topic in several countries of central and northern Europe detecting rodent populations resistant to AR. Currently, there are at least 13 mutations mainly located in the exon 3 of the vkorc1 gene described in various countries of the European Union that confer resistance to specific ARs ( Berny et al., 2014 ; Goulois et al., 2017 ). In Eastern and Southern European countries, the information on the incidence of resistances to rodenticides is scarce, and it is becoming increasingly important to generate information on this subject ( Berny et al., 2014). In Spain, a mice population at the coastal countryside showing an adaptive introgression between house mouse and Algerian mouse that confers anticoagulant resistance has been described ( Song et al., 2011 ). While recently, four VKORC1 mutations in black rat were found in Toledo, Segovia and Zaragoza ( Goulois et al., 2016 ; Damin-Pernik et al., 2022 ). Any increase in resistant in rodent populations would lead to pest control issues that may causing serious agricultural, farming and public health problems.

Scientific advances have revolutionized the study of anticoagulant resistances in terms of understanding their genetic basis, physiological mechanisms and geographical distribution. The techniques based on the extraction and partial sequencing of genomic DNA allow a fast and precise monitoring of possible genetic resistances. Most of these tests involve laboratory studies using live rodents or blood samples taken from animals in the field. However, the improvement of DNA extraction techniques now allows the analysis of faecal samples (stool), increasing the number of samples that can be taken without the need for sampling by trapping or the management of dead animals (Meerburg et al., 2014). The importance of initial detection of genetic resistances due to mutations is crucial. The hypothesis of work, presenting it as a null hypothesis, is that there will be no rodent mutations in the vkorc1 gene in Spain.

While the chatter around the metaverse has slowed down, both social media companies and phone manufacturers have been experimenting with tech that could lead to commercial AR glasses. At the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Xiaomi unveiled its new prototype Wireless AR Glass Discovery Edition, which weighs 126 grams and has a “retina-level” display.

Xiaomi has used a pair of MicroLED screens with a peak brightness of 1,200 nits and free-form light-guiding prisms to recreate an image. The company said that when PPD (pixels per degree) reaches 60, humans can’t perceive individual pixels. The Xiaomi AR glass display boasts 58 PPD, so that’s close enough.

Xiaomi said it is using electrochromic lenses to adjust viewing in different light conditions. The glasses also have a complete blackout mode for a fully immersive experience — kind of making it like a VR headset.

Sensing a hug from each other via the internet may be a possibility in the near future. A research team led by City University of Hong Kong (CityU) recently developed a wireless, soft e-skin that can both detect and deliver the sense of touch, and form a touch network allowing one-to-multiuser interaction. It offers great potential for enhancing the immersion of distance touch communication.

“With the rapid development of virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR), our visual and auditory senses are not sufficient for us to create an immersive experience. Touch communication could be a revolution for us to interact throughout the metaverse,” said Dr. Yu Xinge, Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering (BME) at CityU.

While there are numerous haptic interfaces in the market to simulate tactile sensation in the virtual world, they provide only touch sensing or haptic feedback. The uniqueness of the novel e-skin is that it can perform self-sensing and haptic reproducing functions on the same interface.