Emerging Technologies

Question 1

3D Printing

Answer 1

Create 3D objects

• A 3D model from CAD is “sliced” into thousands of very thin layer
• 3D Printer “Print” those layer by layer

Advantage
Very fast and cheap to create prototype or custom design
Can create shapes / forms that is impossible for traditional manufacturing (e.g. hollow components => reduce weight => good for aircraft)
Print multiple material and create functional parts (e.g. Artificial organs use for transplant)

Disadvantage
Slow and expensive to mass produce
Common material is plastic => environmental issue
printing guns or weapons

Question 2

4G / 5G

Answer 2

1G - Analog voice only
2G - Digital with very slow data, SMS
3G - Voice, Mobile network, MMS
4G - Current - mobile network
5G - Very fast mobile network and very low latency

Advantage of 5G
Low latency allows more real time application
e.g. Remote car driving
Fast access speed => streaming UHD video, multi user application (game, conference)

Disadvantage for 5G
Very small area of coverage for each cell tower
Poor penetration power for signal => need even more tower in urban area
more tower => more expensive to setup the infrastructure

Question 3

Artificial Intelligence

Answer 3

Computer program to simulate how human think

Question 4

Augmented Reality

Answer 4

Overlay computer image on top of real life image
e.g. Heads up Display of car navigation, Google glass

Application
Product design, entertainment, car navigation

Question 5

Biometrics

Answer 5

Tracking biological feature of user
Applications
Authentication, fitness tracking, 
voice controlled device (Siri)
locating criminal (face recognition on public camera)

Advantages
No need to install anything on human

Disadvantages
Privacy issue
Violating human rights (like full body scanner in airport)
Not as accurate as direct data entry (false positive/negative)

Question 6

Cloud computing

Answer 6

Online service provider providing computation power
User can run their computation intensive operation on those provider server

Advantage

• No need to setup, purchase and maintain those machine
• Can access data and result everywhere
• Faster to complete (since you can virtually hire as many server as you like, of course, with cost)
• Can support device with very limited computation power (see remark)

Disadvantage

• Service might be quite expensive (in long run)
• Data is on “cloud”, possible privacy or leaking of data issue
• Need internet to access (well….. )

Remark
Cloud computing is not probably needed for everyday scenarios, most of the time those requires computation power that it beyond a desktop computer can do, then you may use those cloud computing.

But there’s a new type of cloud computing that supports device with limited computation power. One example is some smartphone photo album has auto people / item recognition (google photos), which the photo is shoot on smartphone but the recognition is done on the cloud.

Question 7

Computer assisted translation

Answer 7

e.g. Google Translate

Question 8

Holographic Data storage

Answer 8

Compare to traditional optical storage, e.g. DVD, data bits are stored in 2D, side by side, spreading on the surface of the media, Holographic is able to store multiple bits on each spot (i.e. 3D storage)

Large capacity, but Currently expensive

Question 9

4th generation optical storage

Answer 9

1st gen: CD, 650MB
2nd gen DVD, 4.7GB
3rd gen Blu-Ray, 20GB
4th gen, 1TB+

Question 10

Holographic imaging

Answer 10

free standing 3D image

Question 11

Quantum cryptography

Answer 11

Data encrypted and transmitted with photon

Very secure and data will became corrupted if intercepted during transmission => interception can be identified

Question 12

Wearable computing

Answer 12

Computing device that can be part of clothing or accessories.

most common ones are fitness trackers, smart watches and maybe in future smart glasses (like google glass)

usually low power device, may rely on other computing device like smartphone or even cloud computing to support the functionality.

Question 13

Ultra high definition TV

Answer 13

UHD TV refers to 4K or 8K TVs, in contrast to Full HD, which is 1920x1080 pixels, they have 4 or 8 times pixel.

4K is very common nowadays, but content is still limited.

Question 14

Vision enhancement

Answer 14

Wearable device to help improve vision for user, e.g. people with weak eyesight or glasses for color blind

Question 15

Virtual Reality

Answer 15

Application include Entertainment, Aid in design, virtual conferencing, virtual Concert

Current situations:
Device can be quite cheap (about 400 USD for a Quest 2), and can be untethered from computer (standalone)
Hand tracking thus no need to use hand controller
User isolated from real life environment, might be dangerous
Seizures or sea-sick like syndromes from VR

Question 16

QR Code

Answer 16

Quick Response Code, also refer as 2D Barcode
Store the data in a 2D pattern of black and white square
Can store more than 2K bytes of data, while barcode is usually about 20 numbers
There are 3 large squares for alignment of the code
QR Code has error correction algorithm which allows the code to be partially covered (so people put logo in the middle of the code)