The quest to create affordable, durable, and mass-produced “smart textiles” has been given fresh impetus through the use of the wonder material Graphene. An international team of scientists, led by Professor Monica Craciun from the University of Exeter Engineering department, has pioneered a new technique to create fully electronic fibers that can be incorporated into the…
Experts to Use Drones to Discover More About Killer Whales
Drones will be used to discover more about the social lives of killer whales and help conserve these amazing mammals, which are at risk of extinction. Experts from the University of Exeter, who are working with the Center for Whale Research, believe the use of the drones could revolutionise our understanding of whale behaviour. They…
New Cheap Method of Surveying Landscapes Can Capture Environmental Change
Cheap cameras on drones can be used to measure environmental change which affects billions of people around the world, new research from the University of Exeter shows. Experts have developed a new way of surveying vegetation which greatly advances the tools available to ecologists and land managers seeking understand dryland ecosystems. Using standard ‘point and…
Sonic Net Could Save Birds and Aircraft, Study Suggests
Introducing a noise net around airfields that emits sound levels equivalent to those of a conversation in a busy restaurant could prevent collisions between birds and aircraft, saving passenger lives and billions in damages, new research has found. A study published in Ecological Applications led by Professor John Swaddle, visiting Research Associate at the University of Exeter,…
New Mobile Phone App for Grassroots Mapping
University of Exeter academics have created an app which could help aid humanitarian rescue work in disaster-struck regions by using geographic data to map landscapes. The android mobile phone application means for the first time a standard smart phone can be converted into a self-contained remote sensing device. The app, created by a group of…
Research Pioneers Nanotech for Gas Sensing
The pioneering team, which includes two second year Exeter undergraduates, have created a new type of device that emits light in the infrared part of the spectrum. Many important gases strongly absorb infrared light and this characteristic absorption can be used as a way of sensing them. However, most existing infrared gas sensors use conventional…
Volcanic Event Caused Ice Age During Jurassic Period, New Research Suggests
Pioneering new research has shed new light on the causes behind an ‘ice-age’ that took place on Earth around 170 million years ago. An international team of experts, including researchers from the Camborne School of Mines, have found evidence of a large and abrupt cooling of the Earth’s temperature during the Jurassic Period, which lasted…
Breakthrough Graphene Production Could Trigger Revolution in Artificial Skin Development
A pioneering new technique to produce high-quality, low cost graphene could pave the way for the development of the first truly flexible ‘electronic skin’, that could be used in robots. Researchers from the University of Exeter have discovered an innovative new method to produce the wonder material Graphene significantly cheaper, and easier, than previously possible.…