The innovative product I am really looking for

12/14/2011 12:47 PM EST

It is an interesting idea. What if an eyeglasses is made so that you can see in 3D?

12/14/2011 3:43 PM EST

Bill, I was with you until you said, "Colors could range from blue for lower-frequency RF, to red and violet for the GHz-and-higher RF bands."

Clearly, clearly, that's backwards. Blue goes to the higher frequencies.

My quest for innovation comes with the discovery of this faster-than-c neutrino. The history of our so-called "laws of physics" has been where a previous law eventually is determined to be only a special case of a more generalized law. The obvious example being Newton's laws. Einstein didn't prove them wrong, as much as incomplete. Similarly, arithmetic, algebra, calculus.

My belief has been, the same might hold true for special relativity?

12/14/2011 4:12 PM EST

I agree with you from a physics standpoint on the false color--but I am thinking common-place pyschology here ("cooler" lower frequencies versus "hotter" higher ones). But I'll take it either way, if you can do implement it.

12/14/2011 4:23 PM EST

Bill,
You should love this video: http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2011/12/seeing-em-waves-with-a-single-led.html

Similar to your idea, but yes, he had to move it around to get the image.

It would be cool, but the chemical can't cause cancer, holes in the ozone or limbs to fall off. Hard to find something like that.

12/14/2011 4:27 PM EST

I'm looking for something more in the near term of possibility. I'd like a still/video camera the size of a watch. Essentially, it could be a cell phone camera without the phone part. There are a number of cases where use of a camera might be cool but it not practical. For example, You can't have your camera out during take off and landing phases of a commercial flight. But, some of the most interesting photographs from plane view occur during those parts of the flight. You have to put your camera away, but not your watch. 6 Mpixel with a micro SD card for storage. That's all I ask.

12/14/2011 5:48 PM EST

Machine that washes, dries and folds my cloths and then puts them away in their proper place. Ah, yes, I want a robot maid.

12/14/2011 6:26 PM EST

A Stainless Steel Rat: A mechanical tool that will gnaw away small amounts of metal with low reaction force, like a hand nibbler but precise. Don't mind if it is slow, as long as it is easy to clamp, can maybe advance itself a few mm before needing manual repositioning. Lasers, dentist drlls, abrasive blasting, water jet, micro-grinding wheel, bandsaw, all tried.

I have a professional Dremel (flexible drive 24000rpm, 120W continuous) but it's almost impossible to use for anything I have really needed it for (OK, on two jobs it was a lifesaver).

Probably an IR diode laser will do the job eventually? Not on copper though :-)

12/15/2011 10:34 AM EST

I would like to have a robotmaid who will do everything for/with me.

12/15/2011 11:39 AM EST

Remember gauss' law...You don't need to map the RF field levels in three dimensions...you only have to map them on some closed two-dimensional surface and you can calculate the field strength everywhere inside the enclosed volume...assuming the room is empty. ;)

A flexible sheet with small horn antennas (like octopus suckers) and a simple passive rf field strength meter (diode, LPF) might do the trick. If manufactured properly it could have good spatial resolution.

12/15/2011 2:47 PM EST

The RF spray sounds kind of boring. I don't see a lot of popularity with that one. What I want for Christmas is a quiet laser lawnmower that never needs sharpening, and a flying car. The car must also look cool and evoke immediate envy. Oh yeah, and the robot maid mentioned earlier (female, of course). The more realistic and anatomically correct, the better.

12/15/2011 2:52 PM EST

If you move reflectors like metal furniture or people around inside (or outside) the room it will move the locations of the deep fades. So if you carry around the receiver what you see are heisenfades.

12/15/2011 10:49 PM EST

Sadly, your spray is all but impossible. You are asking for a material that absorbs low-energy radio photons and spits out visible photons in response. Unfortunately, visible photons have about 500 times the energy as radio photons. While it is not impossible to create materials that can absorb multiple photons and use the energy to emit fewer, higher energy photons, these materials are generally limited to low quantum efficiencies and merely combining the energy of two photons into one. A material that could combine the energy of hundreds or thousands of radio photons into a single visible photon is just not going to happen, and even if it did, the amount of visible light generated would not be enough for your application.

In short, there just is enough energy in the radio fields to do what you want to do, even if you could design a material to do it.

12/16/2011 7:54 AM EST

You say "all but impossible":to an engineer, that's the definition of a worthy challenge!

12/16/2011 1:18 PM EST

Maybe the aerosol spray consists of molecules that are unstable in some way, and will go into desired fluorescence-mode with that little bit of extra RF push. That way, you wouldn't need to add so much energy to the molecules to get them to go into fluorescence mode.

Or maybe you'd flood the area with aninvisible "black light" (UV) to pump the aerosol molecules to the energy edge, and then the impinging RF would push them past it--sort of an optical/RF pump scheme. Think out-of-the-box here! Look at what was done with light-curable adhesives, now common in dental and other areas.

12/16/2011 10:55 PM EST

I like the concept of an RF sensing spray. That sounds a lot like the Northern Lights, except that you need about 100Db more sensitivity.
My dream invention would be a men's cologne, "The Smell of Money". If it would really work, and convey the belief that the wearer was rich, I could sell that product and wind up with way more money than Mister Gates, and a lot more respect from all who purchased my product. IT might not actually be a good product, but it certainly would be popular.

12/17/2011 4:30 PM EST

Smoke and mirrors are the way forward: Could you diffuse nano-particles between films like hi-re iron filings? Think Etch-a-Sketch film.
Pre-biasing them might still be an option. I am thinking coherers here (although way more sensitive).
Polarisation and interference effects can make things visible, in an opto-RF design. You might see some H- or E-field effects on an LCD display array, biased right.

12/21/2011 3:53 AM EST

I could make this for you, but you wouldn't like the smell of the gas. (!!).
Just put an enviromentalist/green lobbyist in the room, they always panic at the first hint of RF radiation.

12/21/2011 4:00 PM EST

I love your idea. I have been trying to accomplish the same thing using sensors and and a display. I think a true 3d display of the RF environment would be really helpful for everyone, students, scientists, hobbyists and maybe lead to some very interesting discoveries. The human mind just works better if it can "see" what is going on instead of trying to see based on the math. Maybe some type of CCD could be developed that would be sensitive to the RF spectrum and allow us to "view" what is going on.

12/22/2011 11:47 AM EST

You can visualize RF fields with software simulation if you know what the conditions of your RF source are.

12/26/2011 9:05 PM EST

I would really like a PC (laptop/tablet/whatever) that does what I want it to do instead of what I mistakenly tell it to do. Nothing really out of this world but basic stuff like composing email with proper grammar/spelling and checks for those common mistakes(Microsoft Word does much of this now). Correct email addresses based on content/context would also be a major help. I might suggest it for a number of people that I know as well...:)

1/5/2012 10:07 AM EST

Gee! Very interesting comments!
What I don't like about the idea of the spray is that it would be more of a "fireworks" entertainment than an actual useful tool. Yes, the features I agree with, but how long would the "image" last? A couple of seconds? Too short-lived for me. As others have pointed out, a camera is more like it, where I can get an image, and record it, so that then I can analyze it and do what I need to do with the information.
Unfortunately, this idea is like the perpetual motion concepts: totally against the laws of physics, therefore unrealizable.
Contrat this with the following: a set of 4 to 8 stick-on match box sized modules that you attach to the walls of the room, which then detect all the RF stuff in there, and send the data to your smart device (of your choice), which compiles it all and gives you the picture you need, as colorful as you need. But hey! that is doable today!!!

1/5/2012 10:57 AM EST

I spent many years working on the design of RF equipment and many hours chasing spurious radiation from transmitters in excess of that allowed by various regulatory agencies. I often dreamed of something like your spray but I always envisioned a pair of glasses that contained a frequency converter to upconvert the frequency I was working on to something in the visible spectrum. "RF Eyeballs"