Developers propel ICT among LATAM farmers
Things can always go a step further, and the Argentineans at the NGO Cultural Association for Integral Development (ACDI by its Spanish initials), can surely attest to that. In August of 2003, and with funding from the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF), the NGO decided to promote traceability among small farmers to facilitate their entry into the export value chain. Two years later, after an investment of 1 million USD and the work of 40 developers, they realized that...
read moreNew technology eliminates water in washing machines
Three years ago, two Industrial Design students at the National University of Córdoba (UNC) Nicolas Araya and Nicolás Vuksanovic, needed to develop a final project for their Theory and Method class. They wanted to do something sustainable and reduce water consumption significantly, so they signed up to improve the performance of washing machines, which consume up to 60 L per wash in home machines and 250 L in the industrial ones. But they achieved much more: a machine...
read moreArgentine lab develops batteries for satellites & motorcycles
That developing satellites, or any other complex thing, has a huge spillover effect on the economy beyond a project’s budget, is well known by developed countries. Now, Latin Americans are beginning to explore the subject. Or at least this is the case with the investigators of The Research Institute of Theoretical and Applied Physical Chemistry (INIFTA) of the National University of La Plata, not far from Buenos Aires, who have developed high technology batteries with...
read moreUsing genetic engineering to improve crops
There’s no denying that Argentinean agriculture has been profoundly influenced by genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Monsanto’s Rundup Ready soybeans were approved in 1996, and by 2002 the strain accounted for 95% of crops planted. In 2001, a group of leading producers upped the ante and founded Bioceres, a company dedicated to the genetic improvement of seeds. By the beginning of 2012 the firm had 230 stockholders and had announced something of worldwide...
read moreResearches from Argentina give birth to ‘humanised’ cow
Argentina was first noticed in the biotechnology field 15 years ago, with the first transgenic cloned cow in Latin America, Pampa. Pampa produced in its milk the human growth hormone. Since then, the country has reached several milestones, but it was not until last year that Nicolas Mucci and German Kaiser, researchers at the Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA for its name in Spanish), along with Adrian Mutto from the Consejo Nacional de...
read moreNeurotechnology on the brain in Latin America
On the banks of the Parana River in Rosario’s Polo Tecnológico, the Argentinians at Interactive Dynamics are developing solutions based on man-machine interfaces. Already on the vanguard with interactive displays and virtual/augmented reality, they seemed to jump into the realm of science fiction in 2011. John Paul Manson, a founding partner of the firm, left the public stunned at TedxRosario 2011 when he directed a small robot with only his brain waves just as a...
read moreLow-cost robofarmer coming to a greenhouse near you
Robots are on the march. Every day, new developments and applications emerge to replace humans in dangerous areas: battlefields, nuclear plants, disaster areas and so on. Soon, they will also appear in the more bucolic territory of gardeners, florists and herb growers. At least this is what engineers are attempting at the Argentine National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA) who developed Trakür (‘fog’ in the Mapuche language), a robot for the safe...
read moreArgentine entrepreneur developing low-cost home automation system
Argentine Lucas Funes designed a home automation system for his final project when he was studying electronics in 2004, but it ended up going far beyond that. The project became a focus for EnOrbitas, a local incubator, and he launched a start-up with his brother Gonzalo in his garage. After trying out various technologies, the two presented Go Live Home last year, a combination of Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud-based software to create “smart...
read moreArgentine researchers developing low-cost prosthesis
In February 2011, DARPA presented an amazing robotic arm controlled directly by the brain. Robocop is no longer just a Hollywood fantasy but a reality that is close to improving the quality of life of millions. A few months later in Argentina, Aden Diaz Noceda and Diego Beltramone of the Laboratory of Rehabilitation Engineering at the National University of Cordoba, presented ElectroMioPrótesis, an innovative concept that promises to make the latest biomedical...
read moreNatural-language programming becoming a reality
Argentina’s Nadia Huebra is a rare bird. Given various awards in her teens, she decided to follow a career in systems engineering. Only great things could happen and, indeed, they did. She had yet to finish her degree when she set herself the goal of creating programming tool that used only natural language. For five years she studied semantics and formal linguistics, among other esoteric disciplines, to create MORE. MORE is a formal logical-semantics model....
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