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posted by mrpg on Saturday May 06 2017, @06:06PM   Printer-friendly
from the like-Geordi-La-Forge dept.

Scientists at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have developed a holographic imaging process that depicts the radiation of a Wi-Fi transmitter to generate three-dimensional images of the surrounding environment. Industrial facility operators could use this to track objects as they move through the production hall.

Just like peering through a window, holograms project a seemingly three-dimensional image. While optical holograms require elaborate laser technology, generating holograms with the microwave radiation of a Wi-Fi transmitter requires merely one fixed and one movable antenna, as Dr. Friedenmann Reinhard and Philipp Holl report in the current issue of the scientific journal Physical Review Letters.

"Using this technology, we can generate a three-dimensional image of the space around the Wi-Fi transmitter, as if our eyes could see microwave radiation," says Friedemann Reinhard, director of the Emmy Noether Research Group for Quantum Sensors at the Walter Schottky Institute of the TU Munich. The researchers envision fields of deployment especially in the domain of industry 4.0 -- automated industrial facilities, in which localizing parts and devices is often difficult.


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  • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday May 06 2017, @09:14PM (2 children)

    by kaszz (4211) on Saturday May 06 2017, @09:14PM (#505559) Journal

    Won't you need a (plastic?) lens to focus the 2-5 GHz waves onto said passive array design?

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  • (Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday May 06 2017, @10:30PM (1 child)

    by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Saturday May 06 2017, @10:30PM (#505585) Homepage

    Friend, it is retarded to recommend the use of an optic lens for frequencies considered to be low by modern standards, and anyway, this technology is retarded because it requires the objective to be between the radiator and the passive array. Germans should know better, this is at least 40 year-old technology.

    But you're half-right about the optics: Computer vision and pattern recognition have been even more viable for this application, for decades. It seems the first German Muslim immigrant affirmative-action scientists passed physics 3 and cobbled together something cute.

    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:28PM

      by kaszz (4211) on Saturday May 06 2017, @11:28PM (#505605) Journal

      Ah, use software to implement the lens?

      Well, that would make physical assembly even simpler. If it's possible to make the whole antenna array flat like those printed circuits antennas without too poor performance it would be bullseye.