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Experimental brake lights wirelessly communicate with other vehicles

Your car's brake lights are simple, right? You step on the big pedal, the red lights on your vehicle's tail illuminate, and drivers behind you can see that you're slowing down. But what if your next car's brake lights could let drivers who aren't in line of sight know that you're slowing; what if they could let drivers rounding a bend know that you're slowed or stopped on the other side?

That's Ford's vision for its experimental Electronic Brake Light technology -- an odd moniker, as all brake lights are typically … Read more

Review: Digital Camera & Flash Light provide two core tools but few features

Digital Camera & Flash Light provides two very basic functions that every iPhone user will appreciate, but in very bare-bones packages that do little to enhance existing tools or apps. The digital camera component is barely an upgrade over the built-in camera and with unnecessary extra menus to boot, while the flashlight is the same as many other free tools in the same field but with no color options.

Your first choice when opening the app is to open either the digital camera portion or the flashlight. In both cases, options are minimal but required before you can use the … Read more

Mix and match film textures with Mextures for iOS

Mextures is a photo editor that focuses on applying multiple high-resolution textures to your images for some truly unique results. This app isn't like most photo editors that have you add a filter or a frame and then save the image; instead it requires a good amount of experimentation, mixing and matching textures to get the look you want.

On the first screen there are three buttons across the bottom: Camera, Inspiration, and Library. Camera and Library are self-explanatory for selecting a photo to use in the process, but the Inspiration button is where you'll find a gallery … Read more

Shape-shifting hydrogel takes cue from plants, moves to light

The emerging field of soft robotics, which involves mimicking the squishiness and stickiness of such creatures as octopuses, starfish, and squid, may be taking its next cue from a different source: plants.

Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley describe in the journal Nano Letters a new hydrogel that, inspired by phototropism (the phenomenon of plants moving toward light), can actually expand and shrink in a very controlled fashion via light.

"Shape-changing gels such as ours could have applications for drug delivery and tissue engineering," principal investigator Seung-Wuk Lee, associated professor of bioengineering, said in a school … Read more

Review: SketchUp Light turns images into sketched drawings

SketchUp Light combines multiple filters designed to turn your existing photos into hand-drawn variants on your iOS device; but because of slow load times and at times frustrating feature layouts, the app never delivers fully on its promise.

The opening screen for SketchUp is actually very attractive. It shows what pencil sketching can look like, though it may be misleading in that it is almost certainly a unique sketch, not a converted photo from the app. After you open an image and start converting it, the app's issues start to surface. While there are numerous sketch filters, from hand … Read more

Animated display lets cyclists trip the light fantastic

Kickstarter has been fertile ground for bicycle accessories. There have been smart handlebars, anti-theft bike lights, and wheel LEDs. Joining that illustrious lineup is Monkey Light Pro, a bike wheel display system that creates lit-up images and animations.

The Monkey Light Pro consists of four bars with 256 full-color LEDs, which mount inside the bike wheel. A Web-based application lets you build a playlist of images or animations to run on the system. Download that information to the device via Bluetooth and go riding. The images are stabilized at speeds between 10 and 40 mph and the battery lasts for up to 8 hours.… Read more

Review: IQ Light is a flashlight app that doesn't live up to expectations

You won't find IQ Light with competitor flashlight apps on the Google Play store, and that's not just because it isn't on the Play Store. This app fails so soundly at doing what you need it to that it isn't even worth downloading.

This app isn't available from Google's official market, so you need a side-loader to install it. Instead of using your camera's flash to light up the dark, this app turns your screen bright white. It's not bad if you only have to see a foot or two in front … Read more

Dish said to bid $2B for Lightsquared spectrum

LightSquared's wireless spectrum could be getting a new owner, according to a new report.

According to Bloomberg, Dish Network Chairman Charlie Ergen made a $2 billion bid last week for LightSquared's radio frequencies, which are owned by private investment firm Harbinger Capital Partners.

Bloomberg added, based on unnamed sources said to be familiar with the deal, that LightSquared has until the end of the month to make a decision.

Dish is already bogged down by other networking and communications deals floating around -- namely a $25.5 billion bid for Sprint Nextel. The nation's third-largest mobile provider … Read more

Finally, some good news for LightSquared and its 4G hopes

Things might finally be looking up for LightSquared, the much ballyhooed wireless startup with big plans to blanket the U.S. with 4G LTE service.

The company, which seemed doomed a year ago after the GPS industry successfully lobbied against its efforts to use 40MHz of unused satellite spectrum for terrestrial wireless broadband, may be getting a second chance after all.

This week the company received approval from the Federal Communications Commission to test the feasibility of sharing spectrum with the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). If all goes well with the testing, the company could use this … Read more