Ever wished you could do away with all the chargers and their cables for all the gadgets you own? Fret not, for help is here. Witricity - a portmanteau for wireless electricity is the technology that will make your life easier. While it might sound like a new cool thing, it actually is not. The technology has been around for quite some time now but hasn't been very popular.

WiTricity works on the principle of mutual induction, the same technology that drives transformers used for power distrubtion. In layman's terms, mutual induction help transfer power from one electrical circuit to another without physical contact (by means of wires). For this to work, like how it does in transformers, the parts of the 2 circuits involved are closely coupled. Hence distance between the 2 circuits is the limiting factor. If you consider your wall charger as one circuit and your mobile phone as another, there will be limits to how far the devices can be for the phone to be charged. This distance is what researchers are trying to increase to make the technology more practical and wide spread.

Intel recently demonstrated advances in this field at the Intel developer conference that happened last week. They were able to power a 60-watt light bulb from a power source that was 2 meters (7 feet) away at around 40% efficiency. The technology is expected to gain wide spread adoption in another 3-5 years. Till then we are stuck with cables.



Find more details here and here.

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MIT OpenCourseWare commonly referred to as OCW, is a web-based publication of virtually all MIT course content. For those who haven't heard of MIT, it is the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the premier universities in the world. Information is shared in the form video/audio lectures, class notes, exams, recommended books and course syllabus.

To quote the OCW description at their website:

MIT OpenCourseWare is a free publication of MIT course materials that reflects almost all the undergraduate and graduate subjects taught at MIT.
OCW is not an MIT education.
OCW does not grant degrees or certificates.
OCW does not provide access to MIT faculty.
Materials may not reflect entire content of the course.


Now the cool part:
1) There is no registration
2) Dowloads of course material and other details are free
3) There are discussion groups to interact with other people taking the course

Bookmark the course index page available here.
Find all Audio/Video lecture based courses here.

Courses covered range from Architecture and Planning, Engineering, Health Sciences and Technology, Humanities, Arts, Social Sciences, Management and Science.

Some of my favorite courses:
1) Circuits and electronics
2) Linear Algebra
3) Structure and interpretation of computer programs (SICP)

The OCW website doesn't seem to have the lectures for the SICP course, but I found them here.

There is no excuse anymore for not having a world-class source of educational information at the click of your mouse. Enjoy!

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