TECH BYTES

SELF-DRIVING SHIPS

Rolls Royce is looking to make commercial shipping safer and more efficient by collaborating with Intel to make intelligent, self-driving ships. The vessels will be less prone to human error and better equipped to navigate and avoid hazards. They’ll still have a crew on board, but they’ll be freed up to focus on more valuable tasks.

ELECTRIC GUM

Japanese researchers have developed chewing gum that never loses its flavour. It uses the ‘piezoelectric effect’, where a material generates an electric charge when squeezed. When this gum is chewed, it creates a small electric current that tricks your tongue into experiencing different tastes. Don’t expect raspberry ripple yet – testers report that the gum tasted of dried sardines.

BETTER SPECS

Wave your bifocals goodbye. TouchFocus, a Japanese company, has developed glasses that can change focus from short- to long-sighted. By touching a sensor on the frame, liquid crystals set in the lower half of the lenses alter the focus in that area. Tapping it again switches the focus back.