Spray On WiFi ?!

from JoeUser Forums

This one caught my eye, and WebGizmo's. He thought it was air freshener.

A spray on antenna. Imagine you’re lost in the woods with a phone but zilch bars, Or on the side of a road out where there’s zero reception. Maybe after a hurricane or disaster, and the only antennas are miles away. Or on a battlefield.

There’s a plane overhead, but you can’t call for help. Yes you can, now (well, on VHF in the example below, because that’s the band planes use), but it works equally well with phones.

“The aerosol spray coats an object's surface with thousands of nanocapacitors and spray-on particles that can turn a wall -- or even a tree -- into a transmitter. "Within five minutes we had" the tree "connected and transmitting on VHF to an airplane 14 miles overhead -- double the range we could get from a standard antenna on the ground," Sutera said. Sutera's team sprayed a third generation iPhone antenna with the material and boosted the signal by almost 10 percent. "What we're talking about is a profound way of thinking -- a whole paradigm change on antenna technology," Sutera said. "What we'd like to think about" are "ways to enable wireless connectivity anywhere."

So, with this stuff, you can reach twice as far at x milliwatts or, the prior distance at half the power. Maybe your phone will last twice as long on a charge? Or, say you’re driving down the road and this stuff is sprayed on the lane paint? You’d have wireless connectivity wherever you went. Without cell towers. And a real information superhighway. Couldn’t resist writing that. Sorry.

Turns out that even underwater this stuff works. Regular antennas? 50 feet. The spray on nanocapacitors? More than a nautical mile. That might mean life or death for submariners.

Also, the material can have further uses with relation to self powered communication nodes. Amazing… so, I wanted you to see it.

And they have prototype kits, too:

 

 

 

 

Source:

http://news.discovery.com/tech/spray-on-wi-fi-120214.html#mkcpgn%3dmsn1

45,012 views 22 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

That's just friggin amazing, if it really works.

Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top

I think these 2 companies should collaborate

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Quoting JuniorCrooks, reply 2
I think these 2 companies should collaborate
End of JuniorCrooks's quote
I bet that stuff is carcinogenic...

 

EDIT: And this technology actually has a lot of bearing on some research I'm doing into infrastructure-centered autonomous vehicles. One of the major problems is getting the cars to be able to 1) easily communicate with each other, and 2) recognize things like road signs and lane dividers without resorting to actual image recognition (which AIs aren't good at).

Reply #4 from WinCustomize Forums Top

"Clothes hanger in a Can"   ;)

Reply #5 from Elemental Forums Top

Some how I doubt there is enough raw materials for the stuff to be sprayed onto every super-highway.

Although maybe some of the richer cities could have "AI lanes" where the stuff is sprayed on and only robotic autonomous cars are allowed on it. (for people that can't drive due to having no legs, no eyesight, or other disability?)

Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Scoutdog, reply 3
EDIT: And this technology actually has a lot of bearing on some research I'm doing into infrastructure-centered autonomous vehicles. One of the major problems is getting the cars to be able to 1) easily communicate with each other, and 2) recognize things like road signs and lane dividers without resorting to actual image recognition (which AIs aren't good at).
End of Scoutdog's quote

I encourage you to communicate with Mr. Sutera...

Quoting Tasunke, reply 5
Some how I doubt there is enough raw materials for the stuff to be sprayed onto every super-highway.
End of Tasunke's quote

That's the really cool part... It might only be sprayed on every 10 - 15 miles... but that's just a guess. I think this is yet another step towards decreasing energy requirements... and increasing production/efficiency. I think this could really be a boon.

What I like the most about this is that it involves rethinking the concept of "antenna" which we've just accepted for many decades. Recognizing the stuff we just accept and don't think about is the real challenge. Imagine what's really sitting right under our noses.

 

 

Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Very cool!!! Thanks Doc..... :)

Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Bry - Don't get it confused with the deodorant or air freshener. You'll have every conversation broadcast to hell and gone. ;)

Reply #9 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Where do I get one? I could make my own hotspots everywhere. Wow!

Reply #11 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Call for pricing. Probably expensive.

Reply #13 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Welcome, Lorenzo. :)

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top


The problem with this is, if I'm going to carry the can of metal nanoparticles in solvent and propellent, I'm going to carry the much smaller, cheaper, lighter metallized mylar blanket, and attach my antenna to it...

Reply #15 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Here's a thought. Say a million people buy the product and use it, everywhere!. Walk down the street and plug into the nearest tree, toadstool, fireplug, bush, blade of grass, light post ... etc. Be really confusing if you're in a big city where everything you see, from buildings to dog poop, is acting like one. The overlap would be comical to say the least.

Reply #16 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting Winnihym, reply 14

The problem with this is, if I'm going to carry the can of metal nanoparticles in solvent and propellent, I'm going to carry the much smaller, cheaper, lighter metallized mylar blanket, and attach my antenna to it...
End of Winnihym's quote

That would use up your battery really quickly... ;)

I'm guessing they'll make different sizes or even pre-sprayed sticky patches. But it certainly would be a great addition to an emergency kit, and certainly would help in cases of dodgy communications as well as military uses.

@ Uvah:  -sigh-

Reply #17 from Elemental Forums Top


If you think a solid sheet of metal radiating at RF frequencies is a battery user, you should try a porous network of conductors that have a finite resistance between them, and a capacitive link (through the pores) to everything else around them. :)  I'm betting transmission losses in the spray paint are in the 3dB/mm range.  A clean, pore free sputtered metal on a low-K dielectric like Kapton(TM) would be 1/10 of that, and I wouldn't have to carry the metal can.  You'd do better to tie the antenna directly to that spray can; at least it would be a half-wave radiator.

Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

For those of you interested in SF pre-capitulating real engineering, I recommend Vernor Vinge's Rainbow's End. The novel's setting features exactly the sort of novo-nano-thinking that Doc praises in this thread--it's a world where personal computing tech is wearable.

Reply #19 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Stop and think about it, aside from its obvious good uses, imagine a city like New York and 8 million people have a can of spray antenna. They'll be like dogs marking their territory. Sprayed antennae everywhere and on everything, on the buildings, trees, park benches, people living in high rises spraying outside their windows some thirty stories up. The higher the better for reception. You think people are distracted now with texting. Instant wifi no matter where you are. Amazing!

Reply #20 from Stardock Forums Top

 

I think my car could use re-painting?!?   hehe  :w00t:

Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Quoting Uvah, reply 19
Sprayed antennae everywhere and on everything
End of Uvah's quote

I get the feeling they haven't really thought this all the way through. Sure, you can boost the effective range of any given transceiver. But what happens when they're everywhere?

If you live in an apartment it's hard enough already to find a usable wifi channel that isn't loaded with interference. Can you imagine how bad it'll be with the entire neighborhood overlapping their networks' effective areas?

Reply #22 from Sins Forums Top

I'm painting my house with this.

 

O:)