Thermal Camera Plus Machine Learning Reads Passwords Off Keyboard Keys

An age-old vulnerability of physical keypads is visibly worn keys. For example, a number pad with digits clearly worn from repeated use provides an attacker with a clear starting point. …read more Continue reading Thermal Camera Plus Machine Learning Reads Passwords Off Keyboard Keys

Building material made with lemons and coconut could help heat a home

Energy prices around the world have been rising alarmingly since 2021, with many of us now really starting to feel the pinch. Some have shared advice on how to heat the person rather than the home, but researchers at KTH are working on a building mater… Continue reading Building material made with lemons and coconut could help heat a home

Researchers predict, then prove strange solid-state heat switches

The discovery was founded on the useful, but confusing idea of quasiparticles, which act as if they exist, but really don’t. There are only three types of particle in a solid: protons, neutrons and electrons. When packed together in a solid, these indi… Continue reading Researchers predict, then prove strange solid-state heat switches

A Single-Resistor Radio Transmitter, Thanks to the Power of Noise

One of the great things about the Hackaday community is how quickly you find out what you don’t know. That’s not a bad thing, of course; after all, everyone is …read more Continue reading A Single-Resistor Radio Transmitter, Thanks to the Power of Noise

A Tiny Forest of Resistors Makes for Quick and Dirty Adaptive Optics

The term “adaptive optics” sounds like something that should be really complicated and really expensive. And in general, the ability to control the properties of optical elements is sufficiently difficult …read more Continue reading A Tiny Forest of Resistors Makes for Quick and Dirty Adaptive Optics

World’s first commercial sand battery begins energy storage in Finland

Wind and solar power are intermittent, generating power when it’s available rather than when it’s needed, so the green energy transition will require huge amounts of energy storage. This could end up taking many forms, from conventional lithium-based “… Continue reading World’s first commercial sand battery begins energy storage in Finland

Earth’s interior may be cooling down faster than we thought

The extremely hot interior of the Earth is slowly cooling down, but exactly how fast remains unknown. By studying how well a common deep-Earth mineral conducts heat, researchers from Carnegie and ETH Zurich have found that the planet’s interior may be … Continue reading Earth’s interior may be cooling down faster than we thought