Tread carefully around the green shoots of recovery

Talk of “green shoots” never fails to remind me of the wonderful Hal Ashby movie “Being There”, in which an illiterate gardener played by Peter Sellers ends up advising the US president on economic policy.  

This week’s news that the UK’s economy may be experiencing the first signs of spring brought Ashby’s forgotten classic to mind once again. Although one would hope that our economic policy isn’t being formed by a vagrant knocked down during one of George Osborne’s late night  “burger runs”.


According to one of the key measures of business and economic conditions - Markit’s Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) - the UK’s manufacturing sector enjoyed something of a surge in June,  growing at its fastest rate in more than two years.

Anything above 50 indicates growth, and the PMI rose to 52.5 from an upwardly revised 51.5 in May. Analysts have put the growth down to a surge in orders both home and abroad, and in particular healthy exports to economies beyond the Eurozone. PMI data also suggests that the construction and service sectors are enjoying a period of accelerated growth.

These positive indicators are reinforced by the results of the British Chamber of Commerce’s (BCC) quarterly economic survey, which points to strong export balances and growing business confidence.

The EEF’s chief economist Lee Hopley welcomed the latest indicators as a cause for “cautious optimism”, and called on the UK to continue to look to build on its exports outside the non-EU markets.  Meanwhile, BCC director general John Longworth described it as a “crucial moment”  but warned that government needs to keep its “feet on the gas” to avoid choking off any burgeoning recovery.

This call was reiterated by CBI director general John Cridland who in a speech to business leaders in London this week said that economic growth depends upon the UK’s medium sized businesses having access to finance.

Cridland called on the government to make sure it treads carefully in its efforts to regulate and stabilise the banking system. ‘Choking off supply to shore up recovery will only hold back the very firms that should be driving growth’ he said.

Economists have also sounded a note of caution over weakening activity in the Chinese economy, which they fear could impact the UK’s recovery.

‘While good news is always welcome, manufacturers should not get carried away as we have seen short-lived recoveries before, said Carl Williamson, manufacturing sector lead at Lloyds Bank Commercial Banking. ‘The sector’s future health will be determined by continued global economic performance, notably in the Far East, as well as with our primary trading partners on the Continent.’

Is it too early to talk about green shoots? Certainly not. But as we’ve seen before green shoots are fragile, they’re easy to starve or trample. Government and business must now work hard to ensure the optimum conditions for growth and give these green shoots space to grow. In the words of Peter Sellers’ illiterate gardener, ‘as long as the roots are not severed, all is well. And all will be well in the garden.’

Eye in the sky monitors pollution levels

Leicester scientists have installed pollution-detecting technology in a plane to map air quality around the city.

Leicester University physicists used their air quality measuring spectrometer to produce “heatmap” style images of pollution levels in Leicester as part of the Airborne Air Quality Mapper (AAQM) project.

Windows 8 Tops 5 Percent

Microsoft ended last week's Build developer conference on a high note — increased Windows 8 market share.

The operating system topped 5 percent market share in June, according to stats from Net Applications, finally eclipsing Microsoft's Vista OS. Still, Windows 7 and Windows XP still rule, with 44.37 percent and 37.17 percent of the market, respectively.

Skype Overhauls Android App, Hits 100M Installs

Skype today celebrated a milestone 100 million Android app installations with the launch of a revamped app for Google's mobile OS.

With Android 4.0, Skype wanted an app "that makes your interactions easier and puts conversations first," the company said in a blog post.

Raspberry Pi automates your tomato farm

Check out the tomato plants [Devon] grew using a monitoring system he built himself. It’s based around a Raspberry Pi. As far as grow controllers go it falls a bit short of full automation. That’s because the only thing it can actuate is the black water line seen hovering above the plants. But [Devon's] work on monitoring and collecting sensor data should make it easy to add features in the future.

Briefcase mill

Take the machine shop with you; that’s the mantra which drove [Ryan] to build this CNC mill in a briefcase. That album will give you a taste of the final product. But you’ll want to dig through two pages of his forum thread starting with this post in order to behold the build process.

Robots inspect cables

The bearer cables and tethers of bridges, elevators, and cable cars are exposed to high levels of stress. For this reason, their functional reliability must be monitored on a regular basis. A new robot recognizes fissures before they pose a danger.

Using RFID for fiber composites

Antennas that are capable of transmitting radio waves turn components into intelligent objects. Researchers have now found a way to embed these antennas in fiber composites. As a result, the technology also works with carbon and glass fibers.

To embed RFID tags in fiber composites, ultra-thin antennas are needed (right: UHF, left: HF transponder). Credit: Fraunhofer IIS


It is barely visible to the naked eye: the work pieces in the production hall look normal. But the first impression is deceiving. The airplane components are "intelligent" and can communicate with the skilled workers in their vicinity. Not only can they tell them what they are, they can also provide information on who has worked on them as well as on the next work step. A radio frequency identification chip (RFID) transmits the information. It measures just a few square millimeters and transmits details about the component quickly, efficiently, and consistently to a receiver via radio waves. Until now, only a handful of companies use the technology for documentation purposes in production processes. Most often, RFID is used for access control purposes, or to record time, for instance on employee smart cards.

How well an RFID transponder works depends mainly on the material that surrounds it. The material can have a negative influence on the transponder antenna's range, as well as on the quality of data transmission. Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS in Nuremburg have now developed an RFID transponder whose antenna works reliably on fiber composites as well. Components such as glass or carbon fibers are both lightweight and robust, and are thus used increasingly in airplane and vehicle production. However, these fibers have a particularly strong influence on frequencies. Until now, their exact behavior with regard to RFID has not been well known on the wireless system, and this is why production steps are still documented with a pencil and paper.

Carbon fibers compromise the performance of RFID chips

"We took a close look at the frequencies relevant to RFID technology: 125 kHz (LF: low frequency), 13.56 MHz (HF: high frequency), and 868 MHz (UHF: ultra high frequency). We measured the extent to which glass and carbon fibers affect the reliability of the trans- ponder," says Tobias Dräger, an engineer, in describing the work of the IIS team. The result: while LF, HF, and UHF work well with glass fibers, they showed weaknesses with carbon fibers. The high frequencies in particular compromised the performance of the RFID chip significantly. "Carbon fibers are, similarly to metal, conductive. As a result, they dampen radio signals considerably– especially at 868 MHz," says Dräger's colleague Dr. Iker Mayordomo.

But thanks to their relatively large range of up to 15 meters, UHF frequencies are very well suited to applications in logistics and production. In the past, if RFID was used with incompatible materials such as metals, a very expensive transponder was required to reach this level of performance. "The antennas and transponders required make these customized systems very large. At the same time, integrating them into fiber composites is difficult," says Dräger in discussing the initial situation. Together with partners from the aviation industry and research, his team has successfully developed a trans-ponder that can operate reliably within conducting components, which are also subject to physical stress. The scientists have designed an ultra-thin antenna that can be embedded in materials underneath a protective glass fiber layer. Together with Schreiner LogiData, a manufacturer of RFID transponders, IIS has already developed the first test series.

According to Eurostat, the statistics office of the European Union, about six percent of German companies were using RFID in 2011. In Europe, the figure was four percent. Maximilian Roth, an engineer and RFID expert at the Center for Intelligent Objects ZIO of the IIS in Nuremberg, is convinced that this is about to change. "New applications in the area of fiber composites, which is booming, will further increase the relevance of RFID for industry. There are currently a number of other pilot projects underway in the market that are conducting major tests for the use of RFID in logistics, traffic, and production." Fraunhofer IIS is already working on its next project in parallel, the EU-sponsored "SmartFiber" initiative. Researchers working on the project are using RFID technology to transmit energy and data to sensors that are embedded in fiber materials. This makes it possible, for instance, to monitor the entire structure of wind turbines.

New technology means improved safety for radiation workers

The University of Reading has played a leading role in the development of new technology that will reduce health risks for those working in jobs where there is a danger of radiation exposure.

How Much Is Your Gmail Account Worth?

Many people don't realize just how valuable their email account is. Now, thanks to researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago, a nifty tool called Cloudsweeper calculates how much your account would be worth, if cyber-criminals ever managed to get control.

Whenever someone's email gets hacked, whether through a phishing attack, malware, guessing passwords, or plain brute-force, a common complaint goes something like this: "Why did I get hacked? There is nothing interesting in my account." The thing is, the criminals aren't looking for exciting gossip buried within your correspondence or looking at the pictures you've emailed people. They are looking for valuable data, such as passwords to other accounts.

Your email account is quite frequently used for password resets. If someone gets control of your account, that person can search through the saved messages and figure out what other sites use the email address for account recovery. Access to your online banking account, login credentials for Facebook and Twitter, and details for iTunes and Amazon accounts are all accessible via your email account. I know many people who treat their email accounts as secret storage, frequently emailing private keys and password reminders to themselves.

My Gmail Is Worth $15Enter Cloudsweeper, a project from researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago. The tool scans all the messages in your account to figure out what other services use the address to send password reset emails, or to login to the service. The tool also tracks services that sent the actual password when the user clicked on the "forgot password" link. The tool assigns a dollar figure to the data pieces found to determine how much the account is worth in the underground market.

I ran one of my Gmail accounts through Cloudsweeper, and it determined my account would be worth approximately $15.30 to bad guys. I was surprised, because I use this account purely for accessing Google services and don't use it to sign up for third-party services (I keep a separate account for that) or for regular correspondence (a different account for that). I'd forgotten that I did use this account for one of Twitter accounts, as well as my Kindle account on Amazon. According to the tool, my Amazon.com account was worth approximately $15 to the criminals and Twitter was worth $0.30.

There were some false positives, as a result of the fact that I long ago used this account for my PayPal account. I've since then changed the email address associated with PayPal, but since I still had some of their emails archived, CloudSweeper flagged the service as a potential risk. I asked a friend to scan his account, and Facebook popped up (worth $5) on his list of risks, except he doesn't have an account on that social network. The alert seems to have been fooled by various Facebook friend requests he received in the past that he never deleted.

How Much Are You At Risk?Cloudsweeper uses prices for account types and data collected from various sellers across multiple underground forums to calculate how much the information in the user's email account is worth, said Chris Kanich, assistant professor at UIC's computer science department and principal organizer of the project. It uses OAuth, so you just have to be logged in to the account when you run the "audit" from the project's page. No passwords are stored, and you can just revoke permissions at the end so the tool no longer has any visibility into your account.

If nothing else, this tool is great for spring cleaning, to wipe out some of the old emails that you don't need to keep anymore. Close accounts you aren't using, or at least make sure your information has been removed. And once you realize just how valuable your account is, perhaps you will consider setting up two-factor authentication to protect yourself?

Reverse engineering a wireless protocol

Like all good tinkerers, [Andrew] decided to figure out how his wireless security system worked. Yes, it’s an exercise in reverse engineering, and one of the best we’ve seen to date.

Rapid-readout bacteria test can detect antibiotic resistance

Researchers at EPFL have built a matchbox-sized device claimed to test for the presence of bacteria in minutes instead of up to several weeks.