Amazon Opens 2 New HQ on the East Coast: NYC and Arlington, VA

After almost a yearlong search with fierce competition among U.S. cities eager for the new business, Amazon settles on the Queens neighborhood in New York City and the city of Arlington, Virginia for its new HQ on the East Coast

Image via Amazon

It’s not every day that a tech giant builds a new headquarters. Amazon announced that the company was in search of a new American location to house a second HQ apart from its primary location in Seattle, Washington in 2017. Cities all over the country were eager to bring in Amazon to their states, thus ensuring new jobs and employment for their residents. City after city sent in their applications, with hefty promises and tax cuts to attract the e-commerce giant. Amazon had remained silent on the issue over the course of the year. It was only in the past week that Amazon finally revealed its front runners and surprising decision to choose two locations instead of one.

“We can recruit more top talent by being in two locations. These are fantastic cities that attract a lot of great talent.”

— Amazon

Apart from Seattle, Amazon’s second largest location up till now housed up to 3,100 employees. The two new headquarters, in Queens, New York and Arlington, Virginia will house up to 50,000 new employees. The new positions are lucrative for the local economies, giving a much needed boost to NYC in particular, as each job is listed at $150k and up. The states in turn have delivered huge tax benefits to Amazon with billion-dollar tax cuts.

Image via Amazon

Image via Amazon

Amazon has cited talent as being a top driver in the decision-making process. Both NYC and Virginia are home to many enterprising companies and tech talent, thus offering Amazon the opportunity of cross-pollination and exposure to ongoing ideas, initiatives and some of the country’s best known talent.

In addition to these two centers, Amazon has also announced the development of a new customer service center including transportation and logistics in Nashville, Tennessee. Given the company’s large annual production and profitability, Amazon is expected to have a significantly beneficial influence for local economies in terms of wages, education and local business supporting the tech giant’s enterprise.

Amazon had invested significant resources to the development of its primary headquarters in Seattle, WA, including the development of biospheres and eco-initiatives. Both residents and visitors alike are curious to know how the new HQ in Queens and Arlington will look and function.

CalTech & ETH Zurich Teams Aim to Harness Renewable Energy

Hydrogen and Helium Molecules

Energy powers all human activity, ranging from electricity, air conditioning and heating in your home to the vehicles you drive or take to your destination. Since 2011, research teams at CalTech and ETH Zurich have been working together to harness and produce alternative forms of renewable energy and thus provide clean, renewable and abundant sources of energy to power all human activity.

Powered by the Sun, future fuels could consist of only sunlight, air and water and thus provide unlimited, clean and renewable energy for cars, laptops, GPS systems and daily household and commercial activities. One of the primary methods takes concentrated heat from the sun to convert water and CO2 into hydrogen (H2) or carbon monoxide (CO). Combining the two would make liquid fuel that could power daily activities. Researchers at ETH Zurich have been working to further develop a pure hydrogen model and thus avoid any complications associated with carbon production. The liquid fuels generated could also be used in fuel cells, as suggested by CalTech researcher Sossina Haile.

Sossina Haile and William Chueh next to the benchtop thermochemical reactor used to screen materials for implementation on the solar reactor. Image via CalTech

Converting H2O and CO2 into H2 and CO is a known process but doing it efficiently and cost-effectively has not been easy. Rare elements such as platinum or iridium have been used as catalyst so trigger the conversion.

Prof. Dr. Hansjörg Grützmacher and Dr. Monica Trincado. Image via ETH Zurich

Numerous projects are underway at ETH Zurich to find ways to harness hydrogen more efficiently and to produce solar fuels effectively. One of the most recent successful projects was completed by Prof. Grützmacher and his research group. The team discovered that formaldehyde can be used to store hydrogen.

Developing ways to harness renewable energy sources requires knowledge of how to first produce the fuel efficiently, then to store it and distribute it. The abundance of solar energy direct from the Sun makes it a very compelling choice. Finding the most effective way to do this would have tremendously beneficial results.

Apple’s Patent for New Smart Headphones Can Detect How They Are Worn

Just by listening to a user’s voice, technology in Apple’s new headphones can help you ensure that you never put on your headphones the wrong way again.

Beats headphones on the Apple Store

The new headphone technology will be able to detect how the headphones are being worn, solving the problem that some users have of wearing the headphones the wrong way. Using an array of new microphones, the audio accessory will be capable of switching channels automatically.

Image via Apple

Addressing a Common Problem: Putting on Headphones the Wrong Way

In the patent application published on November 8th of this year at the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Apple’s team clearly describes the new technology’s purpose: "System and method for automatic right-left ear detection for headphones." The new headphones can thus detect how the person is wearing the headset, automatically readjusting so that the left-channel audio will play out of the left-hand ear cup and the right-channel audio out of the right-hand ear cup. At the same time, the headphones themselves are not labeled with left and right designations in the design or direct labeling like other manufacturers have chosen to do.

The new technology consists of a set of five microphones placed strategically around each earcup - front, back, top, below to the left of the earcup and one inside towards the user’s ear. The technology listens to the user’s voice, checking the volume and thus figuring out which edge is closest to the person’s mouth and thus determines the orientation of the headphones. After the orientation is determined, the audio signal is then fed into each of the ear cups appropriately.

Image via Apple

Another benefit of having multiple microphones is eliminating external noise when a person wearing the headset, makes calls or voice commands. Having five microphones in each ear cup of a pair of headphones would make it easier to isolate a person’s voice from background noise. In addition to making clearer phone calls, the technology would also help Siri better understand voice commands in varying surroundings. Apple has also filed a prior patent in October, "Electronic Devices with Configurable Capacitive Proximity Sensors," for proximity sensor electrodes in the earcup to hep determine the ear’s presence and shape to figure out if it is the left or right ear. Interestingly enough, the new technology can be used in a pillow to help figure out the way a person is sleeping.

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Beats headphones on the Apple Store

Dual Mode Technology: Speaker on the Fly

Apple has been working on several headphone improvements, ranging from its patent on “Spatial Headphone Transparency” which adjusts an audio feed to sound like it is coming from a person’s surroundings instead of headphones. Another idea for a headphone that can function as a speaker has also been proposed called a “dual-mode” headphone as well as headphones that have sensors useful for healthcare and sports fitness monitoring. This next-generation headphone design can transform a stereo loudspeaker automatically, offering new technology integrations for potential EarPods, AirPods or Beats models in the future.

Image via Apple

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Image via Apple

While Apple proactively files patents for many technology ideas, the company does not always necessarily develop these ideas into full-fledged products. However, headphones are potentially different given Apple’s keen interest in audio from iTunes to Apple Music, HomePod, Apple TV and now Apple’s own movie and TV shows. Well known industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo also estimated in 2017 that Apple would sell 28 million AirPods or more this year.