In 5 Years You’ll beam up your friends in 3-D from your Mobile Phone

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The Next Five in Five is based on market and societal trends expected to transform our lives, as well as emerging technologies from IBM’s Labs around the world that can make these innovations possible.
In the next five years, technology innovations will change people’s lives in the following ways:
You’ll beam up your friends in 3-D
In the next five years, 3-D interfaces – like those in the movies – will let you interact with 3-D holograms of your friends in real time. Movies and TVs are already moving to 3-D, and as 3-D and holographic cameras get more sophisticated and miniaturized to fit into cell phones, you will be able to interact with photos, browse the Web and chat with your friends in entirely new ways.
Scientists are working to improve video chat to become holography chat – or “3-D telepresence.” The technique uses light beams scattered from objects and reconstructs a picture of that object, a similar technique to the one human eyes use to visualize our surroundings.
You’ll be able to see more than your friends in 3-D too. Just as a flat map of the earth has distortion at the poles that makes flight patterns look indirect, there is also distortion of data – which is becoming greater as digital information becomes “smarter” – like your digital photo album. Photos are now geo-tagged, the Web is capable of synching information across devices and computer interfaces are becoming more natural.
Scientists at IBM Research are working on new ways to visualize 3-D data, working on technology that would allow engineers to step inside designs of everything from buildings to software programs, running simulations of how diseases spread across interactive 3-D globes, and visualizing trends happening around the world on Twitter – all in real time and with little to no distortion.
Batteries will breathe air to power our devices
Ever wish you could make your laptop battery last all day without needing a charge? Or what about a cell phone that powers up by being carried in your pocket?
In the next five years, scientific advances in transistors and battery technology will allow your devices to last about 10 times longer than they do today. And better yet, in some cases, batteries may disappear altogether in smaller devices.
Instead of the heavy lithium-ion batteries used today, scientists are working on batteries that use the air we breath to react with energy-dense metal, eliminating a key inhibitor to longer lasting batteries. If successful, the result will be a lightweight, powerful and rechargeable battery capable of powering everything from electric cars to consumer devices.
But what if we could eliminate batteries alltogether?
By rethinking the basic building block of electronic devices, the transistor, IBM is aiming to reduce the amount of energy per transistor to less than 0.5 volts. With energy demands this low, we might be able to lose the battery altogether in some devices like mobile phones or e-readers.
The result would be battery-free electronic devices that can be charged using a technique called energy scavenging. Some wrist watches use this today – they require no winding and charge based on the movement of your arm. The same concept could be used to charge mobile phones. for example – just shake and dial.
You won’t need to be a scientist to save the planet
While you may not be a physicist, you are a walking sensor. In five years, sensors in your phone, your car, your wallet and even your tweets will collect data that will give scientists a real-time picture of your environment. You’ll be able to contribute this data to fight global warming, save endangered species or track invasive plants or animals that threaten ecosystems around the world. In the next five years, a whole class of “citizen scientists” will emerge, using simple sensors that already exist to create massive data sets for research.
Simple observations such as when the first thaw occurs in your town, when the mosquitoes first appear, if there’s no water running where a stream should be – all this is valuable data that scientists don’t have in large sets today. Even your laptop can be used as a sensor to detect seismic activity. If properly employed and connected to a network of other computers, your laptop can help map out the aftermath of an earthquake quickly, speeding up the work of emergency responders and potentially saving lives.
IBM recently patented a technique that enables a system to accurately and precisely conduct post-event analysis of seismic events, such as earthquakes, as well as provide early warnings for tsunamis, which can follow earthquakes. The invention also provides the ability to rapidly measure and analyze the damage zone of an earthquake to help prioritize emergency response needed following an earthquake.
The company is also contributing mobile phone “apps” that allow typical citizens to contribute invaluable data to causes, like improving the quality of drinking water or reporting noise pollution. Already, an app called Creek Watch allows citizens to take a snapshot of a creek or stream, answer three simple questions about it and the data is automatically accessible by the local water authority.
Your commute will be personalized
Imagine your commute with no jam-packed highways, no crowded subways, no construction delays and not having to worry about being late for work. In the next five years, advanced analytics technologies will provide personalized recommendations that get commuters where they need to go in the fastest time. Adaptive traffic systems will intuitively learn traveler patterns and behavior to provide more dynamic travel safety and route information to travelers than is available today.
IBM researchers are developing new models that will predict the outcomes of varying transportation routes to provide information that goes well beyond traditional traffic reports, after-the fact devices that only indicate where you are already located in a traffic jam, and web-based applications that give estimated travel time in traffic.
Using new mathematical models and IBM’s predictive analytics technologies, the researchers will analyze and combine multiple possible scenarios that can affect commuters to deliver the best routes for daily travel, including many factors, such as traffic accidents, commuter’s location, current and planned road construction, most traveled days of the week, expected work start times, local events that may impact traffic, alternate options of transportation such as rail or ferries, parking availability and weather.
For example, by combining predictive analytics with real-time information about current travel congestion from sensors and other data, the system could recommend better ways to get to a destination, such as how to get to a nearby mass transit hub, whether the train is predicted to be on time, and whether parking is predicted to be available at the train station. New systems can learn from regular travel patterns where you are likely to go and then integrate all available data and prediction models to pinpoint the best route.
Computers will help energize your city
Innovations in computers and data centers are enabling the excessive heat and energy that they give off to do things like heat buildings in the winter and power air conditioning in the summer. Can you imagine if the energy poured into the world’s data centers could in turn be recycled for a city’s use?
With up to 50 percent of the energy consumed by a modern data center goes toward air cooling. Most of the heat is then wasted because it is just dumped into the atmosphere. New technologies, such as novel on-chip water-cooling systems developed by IBM, the thermal energy from a cluster of computer processors can be efficiently recycled to provide hot water for an office or houses.
A pilot project in Switzerland involving a computer system fitted with the technology is expected to save up to 30 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year, the equivalent of an 85 percent carbon footprint reduction. A novel network of microfluidic capillaries inside a heat sink is attached to the surface of each chip in the computer cluster, which allows water to be piped to within microns of the semiconductor material itself. By having water flow so close to each chip, heat can be removed more efficiently. Water heated to 60 °C is then passed through a heat exchanger to provide heat that is delivered elsewhere.

Ixplora



I find some of these ideas they are working on interesting but a couple also scare me.
Personalized Commutes and geo tracking enabled on the phone to me is just another intrusion into my privacy.
The 3D phone display will be awesome though as long as it is not like Nintendo's 3DS format which makes my eyes go crazy from time to time.
I remember waiting on line in Disney's Space Mountain ride years ago, looking at the displays of future technology we were to expect.
Some of it came true, some of it did not.
I sit here now with the same amount of wonder for what is and where are we going next.
Thanx. . . AB

Sounds like the beginning of SkyNet!

I'd hate to be on the toilet and get that really important phone call

What happens once everyone is transfixed in a false world projected by technology? The technology takes control.

I think all of it sounds cool, but the deeper I think into some of those applications I start to feel uneasy about them in the sense of what big brother would actually do with it.

Are they going to tell us which way we can drive to work now? And what happens when we would prefer the scenic route?

And if these systems are going to basically monitor/run so many aspects of our lives, what happens to the jobs that people have doing that stuff now? (Referring to the energy)

The holographic tabletop system could revolutionize things like home schooling, online education, etc...not to mention the endless entertainment aspects, virtual offices, etc..

Exciting gadget, could cause a very large scale tech bubble.

The batterys thing, well, we will see how well that goes. I am skeptical about people discussing new forms of energy, even a better batterys.

If the power thing is solved, then these holographic centers could eventually be put all over the place, and turn a empty room into anything you can think of with a simple program...sit in a old cottage with thick wooden beams, the next moment, a dark underground cavern, or a renassance style cathedral interior...programming interior meshes may become the new hot thing for artists.

everyone get your CG on...a new industry may be emerging (I mean, who wouldn't want a big dragonhead poking out of their wall breathing fire)

reply to post by forall2see


Actually, I watched the animation, and it reminded me of seeing the interior of a brain...all these signals shooting all around carrying information about the system.

the world is becoming a big neural network...sorta nice. in 100 years, gaia may wake up.....and now you know the purpose of humans...it is to awake the planet itself

I've gotta admit, as cool as that sounds, I won't be running down the the stores to buy this phone. I enjoy 3-D films at the cinema, but I'm not fussed about 3-D TV's, or phone conversations either.

Normally, I speak to people on the phone cos I don't want to see them in person!

Hey , that's a good thread, thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

S&F for you.

I wonder how feasable it would be to create an entire room out of holographic projectors

do that and "skin it" and you got yourself a holo chamber (as in star trek's holo chambers).

reply to post by SaturnFX


They are already making 'touchable' holograms.


Maybe soon I can change a crummy apartment building into a virtual palace and rent it out to people for tons of money.

Originally posted by SaturnFX
reply to post by forall2see

 

the world is becoming a big neural network...sorta nice. in 100 years, gaia may wake up.....and now you know the purpose of humans...it is to awake the planet itself

Sounds good... if all of the people could understand the simple concept of compromise it would really be an extraordinary leap.

I'm also with you on the battery thing. While watching that portion of the video I thought, why not use collective solar power? Or we can all get onsie pajamas like Peter Griffin and drag our feet to create more static power. We can call it the hair standing revolution!

reply to post by AnteBellum


Okay, that I admit is pretty cool. That could easily be the future of video gaming.

reply to post by AnteBellum


Great thread. great intution. We always become more never less. It is very easy to be seduced. Where are we going? Efforts to make us spend more, use more energy, become more dependent, pharmaceutical companies creating the virus with the antitote already in their possession? The meek shall inherit the world! I am not religious, but spiritual! Mobile phones? Even the WHO (world health organisation) are saying they are a problem!
How many problems are being created? I agree with most here at ATS, investigate, be true to your inner instincts/intution. We all have different perceptions of what is true and what is not, but between us all we have a good concensus!

With love and peace

I would venture a guess that consumer level holography is more like 10+ years away, but would be satisfactorily surprised to see it in less than that.

If they really wanna make the best use of the future of SatNav systems, get the roadways fitted for autodrive vehicles. Why be concerned with traffic routes, conjestion and reroutes when autodrive would solve the bulk of that problem.

Science is advancing science for the sake of science. Very little of this is being done for the practicallity of the everyday person. Once the US Govt and Military have thoroughly invested in the tested and deployment of many of these systems, we might see some version of these tech advantages.

Nice, I like the Holophone thingie and the tiny heat absorption. And the low-energy transistors.
I don't know about the breathing batteries, I prefer to reserve the air for the living stuff...
What about natural electro-magnetic absorption? Human things generate an electro-magnetic fluff all around as do most living stuff... I know it's a faint source, but who knows? At this rate they may be able to reduce energy requirements so much as to enable this...

Great thread, perhaps we are about to learn Gods Ilusions are based on 3D technology?
Or is this universe based on 6D?
It is truly jaw dropping the advances the Scientists are making.

Great! Just need batteries that will last and a job that will pay for that new electronic gadget. Soon we won't need TV/computer monitors to clutter up the desk, just a projection of some sort.

Future of Tech, scary and a bit good at the same time. Such as with the holograms, for cell users and the fun of movies and games with them.

IBM=monitoring everything.
The plan of being able to map out environments, doubt it would be limited to just the outside, but people's houses as well. Sounds like a nice marketing scheme. Theoretically hologram commercials will pop up when they scan and notice something in your house is outdated.

3-D chat via mobile phone, well that sounds pretty cool!

Yeah some of the technologies I read about are scary and kind of creepy. I am not a fan of GPS tracking on my phone and have it turned off. I also don't like the GPS tagging on pics when I take them.

I didn't realize it tagged my pics til I loaded them to flickr and it told me what kind of phone took it, the date and the time. I wish I could turn that off.

I dont' really want everyone knowing where I am, not that I have anything to hide, it's just I like my privacy!

That's interesting, but I don't see why we would need that.

And I am still waiting for the holographic storage, it was supposed to be in the stores by now...

Edit: I forgot to say that I don't have a cell phone, so that may be a reason why I don't see a need for this.