The capacity of optical storage discs – CD, DVD or Blu-Ray and HD-DVD – could be increased eightfold with a new trick developed by engineers working for Thomson in Germany. Optical discs are covered with millions of identical microscopic pits, but on the new discs those pits will be differently shaped. The laser beam used to record each pit on the disc surface is split down the middle, with one false
Fires in tall buildings regularly claim lives because firemen cannot carry trapped people down ladders fast enough. An Israeli inventor, Eliyahu Nir, suggests a simple and sensible solution.
A specialised emergency truck would carry an extendible boom that could be raised to a window in a burning building. Jaws at the top of the boom would then expand to clamp a small platform inside the window frame, while a spiralling tube would be dropped from the frame down to the ground.
Anyone trapped inside the building could then step out of the window, onto the platform and into the mouth of the tube. Before they know it they are spiralling safely down to the ground. Nir claims that friction and the tube’s twisted shape should slow their descent, while a soft mat laid on the street below would break their fall.
Read the full fire tube patent application.
Learn more about the invention …
Tags: innovation
