Category Archives: Newsworthy

What is Vapor Phase Reflow Soldering?

Vapor Phase Reflow Soldering is an advanced soldering technology. This is fast replacing other forms of soldering processes manufacturers presently use for assembling printed circuit boards in high volumes for all sorts of electronic products. Soldering electronic components to printed circuit boards is a complex physical and chemical process requiring high temperatures. With the introduction of lead-free soldering, the process is more stringent, required still higher temperatures and shorter times. All the while, components are becoming smaller, making the process more complicated.

Manufacturers face soldering problems because of many reasons. Main among them is the introduction of lead-free components and the lead-free process of soldering. The other reason is boards often can contain different masses of components. The heat stored by these components during the soldering process varies according to their mass, resulting in uneven heat distribution leading to warping of the printed boards.

With Vapor Phase reflow soldering, the board and components face the lowest possible maximum temperatures necessary for proper soldering. Therefore, there is no overheating of components. The process offers the best wetting of components with solder and the soldering process happens in an inert atmosphere devoid of oxygen – resulting in the highest quality of soldering. The entire process is environment friendly and cost effective.

In the Vapor Phase Reflow Soldering process, the soldering chamber initially contains Galden, an inert liquid, with a boiling point of 230°C. This is same as the process temperature for lead-free Sn-Ag solders. During start up, Galden is heated up to its boiling point, causing a layer of vapor above the liquid surface, displacing the ambient air upwards. As the vapor has a higher molecular weight, it stays just above the liquid surface, ensuring an inert vapor zone.

A printed circuit board and components introduced in this inert vapor zone faces the phase change of the Galden vapor trying to cool back its liquid form. The change of phase from vapor to liquid involves the release of a large amount of thermal energy. As the vapor encompasses the entire PCB and components, there is no difference in temperature even for high-mass parts. Everything inside the vapor is thoroughly heated up to the vapor temperature. This is the biggest advantage of the vapor phase soldering process.

The heat transfer coefficients during condensation of the vapor ranges from 100-400Wm-3K-1. This is nearly 10 times higher than heat transfer coefficients involved in convection or radiation and about 10 times lower than that with contact during liquid soldering processes. The excellent heat transfer rate prevents any excessive or uneven heat transfer and the soldering temperature of the vapor phase reflow process stays at a constant 235°C.

There are several advantages from the Vapor Phase Reflow Soldering process. Soldering inside the vapor zone ensures there can be no overheating. As the vapor completely encompasses the components, there are no cold solders due to uneven heat transfer and shadowing. The inert vapor phase process precludes the use of nitrogen. Controlled heating up of the vapor consumes only one-fifth the usual direct energy consumption, and saves in air-conditioning costs.

As the entire process is a closed one, there is no creation of hazardous gasses such as from burnt flux. Additionally, Galden is a neutral process fluid and environment friendly.

A Raspberry Pi HAT with 16-Channel PWM Servo

DC servo motors are a few of the things that the single board computer, Raspberry Pi or RBPi, finds uncomfortable. The reason being the specific and repetitive timing pulses these motors require for setting their position, which the RBPi is unable to provide in the absence of a real time clock. Although the Linux kernel can do the job, it leaves the RBPi rather over taxed.

A HAT or Hardware Attached on Top board eases the situation. It takes care of all the timing requirements, runs and controls 16 Servos, and is capable of delivering pulse width modulated or PWM signals up to 1.6 KHz using 12-bit precision. Additionally, all this is completely free running that leaves the RBPi to handle everything else.

The 16-Channel 12-bit PWM/Servo HAT from Adafruit can drive 16 servos simultaneously or output PWM signals. It communicates with the RBPi through only two pins using the I2C protocol. Additional RBPi processing overhead is not required for the on-board PWM controller on the HAT board to drive all the 16 channels at a time. Moreover, you can stack more HAT boards – up to 62 of them and control 992 servos – all with only the same two pins.

Adafruit offers a Python library that you can use to immediately set up and run the servos to make your robotic system come to life. When you need to run several servos, this HAT and the Python library to go with it are the simplest and perfect solution.

The HAT board requires two levels of DC voltages. The 3V3 DC comes from the RBPi to power the PWM chip and to decide the logic levels for the PWM signals and the I2C signals. The voltage is available as soon as you plug in the RBPi – shown by the PWR or the red LED on the RBPi.

The other voltage is required for the servos, for which you need to supply 5-6V DC. Usually, most servos will be happy with only 5V, and will work a little more strongly if you give them 6V. You can connect this supply via the DC jack or the blue terminals on the HAT board. A reverse-polarity diode protects the board in case you have the wires connected in reverse. However, do not use both the DC jack and the terminal block at the same time.

Keep in mind that servos need a lot of current from the 6V DC supply. Even if you are using micro servos, they will draw several hundred mA when moving. Larger servos will need more power and you should have provision of about 2A for up to four servos. That means it is not recommended drawing this power from the 5V supply of the RBPi, as it could cause your RBPi to behave erratically. Keeping the servo power supply and the RBPi power supply totally separate gives good results.

On the RBPi, there is a place for soldering a through-hole capacitor. It is a good idea to use one if you are driving many servos. Switching motors generate dips and spikes on the power lines and these can upset the RBPi. A capacitor takes care of the sudden variations – use n*100µF, where n is the number of servos.

A Stamp-Sized Radar Sensor from NXP

Radio waves are used for different purposes other than transmitting audio, video and for communication. One of their primary uses includes detecting the presence of objects in the atmosphere, including aircraft, clouds, and precipitation. This is done mainly through Radio Detection and Ranging or RADAR. By noting the time of flight that a single pulse takes to return after reflection from an atmospheric object, it is possible to estimate the distance of the object.

To detect a target, radar systems generate an electromagnetic pulse, focus it, and transmit it using an antenna. Objects in the path of the transmitted pulse scatter most of its energy. However, some of this scattered energy returns to the radar system and is gathered by the same antenna, which then feeds it into a receiver.

The receiver determines the time taken for the pulse to make a round trip from the radar to the target and back. As the electromagnetic pulse travels at the speed of light, its multiplication with the time of travel gives the total distance travelled by the pulse. Therefore, the actual distance to the target is half this total distance.

Manufacturers feel radar is a versatile gadget for use in automobiles. For instance, it can help the driver estimate the distance between his/her vehicle and other objects in front, sides, or back – promoting safer driving. Following this lead, manufacturers have been shrinking the size of the radar system to make it suitable for use in automobiles.

At present, the smallest radar is the 77GHz radar transceiver from NXP Semiconductors N.V. It is a single chip device, roughly the size of a postage stamp. Consequently, manufacturers can place the chip anywhere in the vehicle. This is a very big advantage to vehicle designers, as they are targeting driverless, fully automated driving in the near future, and need increasing numbers of sensors within the vehicle. In fact, Google engineers are already field testing working prototypes of the NXP device for their self-driving cars project.

The reference design from NXP is a 35×35 mm printed circuit board and it has a radar front-end, two MCUs for signal processing, and supporting components. Designers can use this in their self-driving cars, in the form of a cocoon comprising 10-20 tiny radar sensors all around the vehicle to provide a high-resolution, 360-degree view of the environment around it.

ADAS or Advanced Driver Assistance Systems also use radar as their core technology, using it to make driving easier and safer. For instance, they use it for adaptive cruise control, lane change assist warnings, forward collision warnings, blind spot monitoring, emergency braking, and automated braking. According to IHS Research, the market for radar-based ADAS will grow by 23 percent year-on-year, increasing from the current year to more than 50 million radar sensors.

Although alternate technologies presently exist for avoiding collisions, mostly in the form of laser-light and ultrasonics based systems, the 77GHz radar offers a superior performance under adverse conditions such as road grime, fog, and rain. So far, bulky hardware had made it difficult to use radars in vehicles, but not anymore.

The Rezence Standard for Wireless Charging

Typical wireless charging technologies depend on magnetic induction to transfer power from a ‘mat’ to the specially designed mobile device under charge. However, Rezence holds forth the concept of spatial freedom, which extends the wireless power applications to go beyond the mat to any surface and into almost any mobile device. Unlike magnetic induction, Rezence works on the principles of magnetic resonance. With Rezence, the wireless charging ecosystem has a number of unique benefits.

The Rezence standard allows superior charging range. This amounts to a true drop and go charging experience, with charging taking place through almost any surface and through several objects such as clothing and books. The new standard is able to charge many devices simultaneously even when they have different power requirements – including Bluetooth handsets, laptops, tablets and smartphones.

The Rezence standard is an ideal choice for charging in situations involving kitchen appliances, retail and automotive applications. Rezence powered charging surfaces do not conflict with metallic objects such as coins and keys. Additionally, use of this new technology minimizes the hardware requirements of the manufacturer as it leverages the existing Bluetooth Smart v4.0 technology. Therefore, users can have Smart Charging Zones in the future.

The world already has multiple wireless power standards. Ultimately, the consumer will decide the most popular wireless power technology it will use. Presently, wireless power is undergoing the same process of certification and testing that other technologies such as 4G, 3G, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi have had to go through. Although technology selection and adoption is primarily a market-based mechanism, development of standards is a process separate and distinct from the former.

The Rezence standard is actually the released version 1.0 of the A4WP specifications, released in January 2013. Only when an outside standards organization accepts a specification, it is truly considered a standard. Therefore, organizations, including the A4WP, sometimes use the two terms interchangeably – as a matter of semantics.

Other organizations, including A4WP, are technically at the stage of development of the specifications. Additionally, A4WP is working actively with standard bodies around the world to ensure their technology will be adopted regionally as well.

Various organizations have promoted their wireless power technologies over several years. However, most of the older technologies have proven to be impractical in real-world applications. For example, they work well for single devices when these are positioned perfectly on a charging mat. Moreover, the charging range remains limited and the inability to handle differing power requirements at the same time makes this technology impractical.

When working with wireless power system design, heating and power absorption are dependent upon metal thickness and magnetic field strength. The older wireless inductive charging systems mostly use 115 KHz, at which frequency common household objects such as metal stickers, paper clips and even coins have higher power absorption and consequently, heat up. The Rezence system, with its operating frequency of 6.78 MHZ, does not cause similar heating up of common metal objects.

Therefore, unlike the older charging systems, in the Rezence method of charging, common metal objects do not heat up to create a hazard or trigger the termination of the charging process.

Replace Your Hall Devices with LVDT-On-PCB

The use of solid-state devices such as magnetic sensors is very popular when necessary to sense position, velocity or directional movement. As they are non-contact and offer wear-free operation, electronics designers prefer to select them for their design. For example, the robust design of sealed Hall Effect devices make them immune to vibration, dust and water, offering a low maintenance solution for the user.

Automotive systems mainly use magnetic sensors for sensing speed, distance and position. For example, the angular position of crankshafts decides the proper firing angle of the spark plugs, air-bag control depends on position of car seats and seat belts and wheel speed detection is necessary for ABS or anti-lock braking system.

Magnetic sensors typically respond to a wide range of magnetic fields and therefore, they are used in a variety of different applications. Hall-effect sensors respond to magnetic field density around them, while generating a proportional electrical output signal. Magnetic fields show two important characteristics, the flux density and the polarity. When activated beyond a preset threshold, the hall-effect sensor develops a voltage linearly proportional to the flux density impinging upon it. However, hall-effect sensors are susceptible to external magnetic fields and/or the presence of metal objects nearby.

Replacing hall-effect sensors with LVDT or Linear Variable Differential Transformers offers superior immunity to noise and interference, while improving the sensitivity tremendously. By using inductive technology, designers avoid the use of magnets, thereby improving immunity to interferences. Now, with LVDT-on-PCB, the inductive sensor IC based on LVDT makes these sensors suitable for use in the automotive and industrial fields.

The device, LVDT-on-PCB, is suitable for several applications related to industrial automation and control systems. Among these are specific applications such as linear displacement measurement. Therefore, such sensors simplify sensing of fluid levels, gear position for transmission actuator positioning and proximity detection of brake lamp switch. Additionally, LVDT-on-PCB sensors are also useful in sensing angular motion such as in rotary controls and measuring pedal positions, rotating shaft positions and robotic arm positions.

As the LVDT senses without making contact, the reliability offered is high. For example, the associated IC LX3301A, from Microsemi, has an embedded 32-bit processing engine running on an internal oscillator of frequency range between 1 and 5 MHz, along with a 12 KB program memory. It offers two sensor input channels with integrated demodulators and two 13-bit ADCs with sample rates up to 2 KHz. The user can save their configuration in the user-programmable non-volatile configuration memory of size 16×16 bits.

The LX3301A processes signals that the inductive sensors generate. As the inductive sensors work on LVDT principles, the IC includes an integrated exciter to drive the PCB-based sensor coils of low inductance. A matched analog channel pair processes the sensor signals as a pair of sine/cosine waves, thereby rejecting the noise sources both internal to and external to the sensor assembly.

You can use the LX3301A for measuring displacement such as linear and/or angular/rotation and proximity in electromechanical systems. The resolution offered is excellent, for example, in applications involving 360-degree rotation, the device can achieve a measurement resolution up to or less than 0.5-degree. You can retain the configuration and calibrations for the sensor system in its internal EEPROM.

Protecting Pedestrians Using Ultrasound Techniques

With vehicular traffic increasing on the roads, pedestrians are shifting to the status of endangered species. Frequent news reports of pedestrians falling victims to collisions with motor vehicles bear testimony to the statement. Now, researchers want to provide a remedy. At the Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences or FRA-UAS, researchers have developed a pedestrian detection sensor that can differentiate a human being from among inanimate matter.

At FRA-UAS, Professors Andreas Pech and Peter Nauth have developed the pedestrian detection system utilizing highly sensitive and efficient ultrasonic sensors. It can discriminate a human being from an object in areas where a collision is likely. Typically, vehicles use such highly cost-effective ultrasonic sensors at their rear to help in parking. The researchers have added an algorithm for recognizing patterns from the signals coming from these sensors. The algorithm, the actual innovation from the researchers, generates a situational analysis within half of a second. This is then used to activate specific protection systems.

In a collision situation, there can be two possibilities. The first could be a vehicle-to-vehicle collision, where the system activates airbags and belt pre-tensioners as it detects an imminent collision with another vehicle. However, if the system determines that the collision situation involves a pedestrian and not a vehicle, it initiates measures that will reduce the impact. These measures could vary, such as, heightening the bonnet to mitigate the impact, providing an exterior airbag to be deployed prior to collision or even reducing the rigidity of the body of the vehicle.

According to the researchers, this pedestrian detection system is relatively more cost-effective in comparison to other systems available in the market. It is possible to retrofit this system even in lower priced vehicles. Moreover, such a pedestrian detection system is also useful in other areas of application. For example, in case of a building fire, where smoke detectors trigger fire alarms, the pedestrian detection system from FRA-UAS can help to locate human beings trapped inside the burning house or apartment.

Application of such a pedestrian detection system can be seen in the crosswalk flasher system installed at the Weaver Lake Elementary School in Maple Grove, Minnesota. The school added the automatic detection system to increase the safety of children who occasionally forget to push the button to activate a flashing beacon before starting to cross the road. The pedestrian detection system uses ultrasonic sensors for detecting the presence of pedestrians waiting at the curb and automatically activates a flashing beacon to alert the approaching vehicles to the presence of the pedestrian.

Ultrasonic detectors emit sound waves of frequency ranging beyond the hearing capabilities of humans. In the presence of moving pedestrians or vehicles, part of the transmitted sound waves reflects back to the receiver. The associated electronics computes the distance and speed of the object from the time and strength of the reflected signal. Ultrasonic detectors detect objects as far away as 30 feet.

The amount of sound energy reflected from the pedestrian depends on the nature of clothes the person is wearing. It also depends on the temperature, pressure, humidity and wind speed at the location.

Long Lasting Solar Aqueous Flow Battery

Yiying Wu, Professor of chemistry and biochemistry at the Ohio State University, Ohio State, and his team has combined a solar cell and a battery to form a single device. A novel solar panel on top of the battery captures energy from sunlight. The battery is able to source 20% of its energy from sunlight. Although the design is pending a patent, the researchers have published their findings in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

Tests conducted by the researchers show that their solar flow battery produces the same output as a lithium-iodine battery does, even when the solar flow battery had a lower charge. They charged and discharged both batteries 25 times. Each time, they discharged the batteries until the terminal voltage fell to 3.3 volts. Conventional lithium-iodine batteries have high energy densities, approximately twice that of lithium-ion batteries. Hence, lithium-iodine batteries have the potential to fulfill the needs of long-driving-ranged electric vehicles.

In the experiments, lithium-iodine batteries had to be charged up to 3.6 volts, before they could be discharged down to 3.3 volts. Comparatively, solar flow batteries produced the same energy output with a charge of only up to 2.9 volts, as the solar panel made up the difference in their terminal voltage. That represents an energy saving of nearly 20 percent.

The team has made two changes to their earlier design from 2014. The solar panel, which was a mesh earlier, is now a solid sheet. Additionally, they now use a water-based electrolyte within their battery. With water circulating within the battery, the team has assigned the new design to an emerging class called the aqueous flow batteries. Yiying Wu claims their solar battery with aqueous flow is the first of its kind.

The water-based solar battery is compatible with the current battery technology and is easy to maintain. The environmentally friendly technology can be very easily integrated with existing technology.

According to Wu, the design of the solar flow battery is adaptable and can be applied to grid-scale solar energy conversion and storage. In the future, electric vehicles might also benefit from the electrolytic fuels used in the solar flow batteries.

In the earlier design, Wu and his team had designed the solar panel with a titanium mesh, which passed air to the battery. The new design using water based electrolyte does not require air to function, and hence, the solar panel is now a solid sheet.

The solar panel has a red dye so that it can tune in to a specific range of wavelengths of solar light to capture and convert to electrons. The team calls their solar panel dye-sensitized and the electrons it produces serve to supplement the energy stored within the lithium-iodine battery.

The electrolyte within the battery helps to absorb the electrons produced by the solar panel. A typical electrolyte is actually part solvent and part salt. Earlier, the researchers had used the organic solvent dimethyl sulphoxide to dissolve the salt lithium perchlorate. They have now changed over to lithium iodide salt dissolved in water, as this is more eco-friendly and offers higher energy storage capacity at lower cost.

Raspberry Pi Rover to Mine Water on Mars

Water is an essential chemical for sustaining any sort of life on the planet Earth. From what knowledge space explorations have provided us so far, this is true for life elsewhere in the universe as well, but there are deviations. Mars being our closest neighboring planet, it is only natural for us to try to locate water there. Additionally, with the human population on our home planet close to its saturation point, it is essential we plan to distribute the excess populace on nearby planets. For this, we need to make sure of the presence of water there or at least, the possibility of generating it simply and easily.

Collaboration between the Gilmour Space Technologies, Australia and the Singapore University of Technology and Design is exploring the Mars Aqua Retrieval System or MARS. This is a prototype for harvesting water from the soil of the Red Planet. The team has built the prospecting rover for less than $10,000. Based on the famous Single Board Computer, the Raspberry Pi and an Arduino unit, the rover uses microwaves to heat up and release the frozen water present in the Martian soil.

Although designed to work on Earth, the proof of the concept takes its basic idea from the discoveries made so far by Curiosity and the Phoenix Mars Lander. These extraordinary rovers have indicated the presence of water on the Red Planet. This water either is in non-liquid forms such as ice or buried in its soil. Engineers have designed the rover MARS to extract water from the Martial soil, collect and store it. With NASA recently declaring the presence of running water on Mars, project MARS has taken on an even greater importance.

Detailed documentation of the project indicates scientists considered various methods for each step of the process. The final concept involved separating and collecting water using microwaves and a cold trap. According to tests conducted by the team, they claim to have collected four grams of water from frozen soil in four minutes.

The process of water collection involves cycles of locating the MARS system using its two powered wheels to move to the target area, lowering a microwave unit over the ground and then heating the area for about 20 minutes. This releases steam from the Red soil and it enters a collection pipe leading to a condenser bag, where the steam condenses into water that finally drips into a collection box. The entire process is similar to distillation in any chemistry laboratory.

Although NASA provided only a meager budget of $10,000, the team has managed to create a prototype that presently functions satisfactorily on Earth. The two SBCs the Arduino and the Raspberry Pi in MARS control the locomotion and timing, the arm movements and the on/off switching of the microwave. The prototype is able to withstand 30% of the pressure and temperature conditions present on Mars.

According to Adam Gilmour, CEO of Gilmour Space, the US space agency has reacted favorably to the details of the MARS design sent to NASA. Although, in its present form, the prototype is unlikely to leave Earth’s atmosphere, MARS will be available for public view at the Gilmour Space Museum, north of Australia’s Gold Coast.

A New 6 Axis Motion Sensor

Except for professional photographers using tripods, most people now use the camera within their smartphones to capture images of their surroundings. More often, unless your hands are exceptionally steady, the captured image is somewhat blurred. The act of holding the smartphone, aiming it properly to frame the image and touching the capture icon induces tremors and shakes that prevent the camera from capturing a steady picture.

To counter the lack of stabilization when capturing images on a hand-held gadget, manufacturers are incorporating mobiles with motion-sensors. These detect the tiniest of hand movements and cancel out the effects by making suitable corrections to the camera. Most motion-sensor devices are MEMS or Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems based solid-state devices.

A global semiconductor leader, STMicroelectronics is a manufacturer and supplier of MEMS devices for consumer and mobile applications. ST is now offering the most advanced six-axis motion-sensing MEMS device that fully supports image stabilization for smartphones, tablets and Digital Still Cameras.

The iNEMOTH is the new range of inertial motion sensors from ST and includes the 6-axis motion-sensing IC, the LSM5D53H, which combines a 3-axis gyroscope and a 3-axis accelerometer. LSM5D53H is a System-in-Package solution offering its users the smallest package size with an ultra-low-power processing circuit that makes it the industry’s lowest power consuming IC.

LSM5D53H uses two techniques for minimizing image blurring that usually happens because of camera motion while capturing a snapshot. The first technique is the EIS or Electronic Image Stabilization, while the other is the OIS or Optical Image Stabilization. Although these techniques were initially meant for use on professional cameras, they are increasingly being deployed in tablets and smartphones. They are helpful in reducing image blurring that is likely to occur when the user is taking a snapshot with an outstretched arm.

ST has the necessary expertise and designs high-end gyroscopes for OIS. The company also plays a pioneering role in providing dual-core gyroscopes. These are capable of handling user motion and gesture recognition simultaneously while providing camera image stabilization. The LSM5D53H builds on this expertise.

Within the LSM5D53H is a tiny, ultra-low-power MEMS module. The IC allows equipment manufacturers to minimize the size, cost, system complexity and extending battery life for mobile devices with imaging applications. While systems employing two single-function gyroscopes consume 5mA, LSM5D53H does the same work while consuming less than 1mA and 1.1mA in its high-performance mode.

Offering an optimal motion experience and always-on low-power features for the consumer, the LSM5D53H system-in-package offers a 3D digital accelerometer and a 3D digital gyroscope performing up to 1.6 KHz ODR. Manufacturers can connect the device to the camera module via a dedicated auxiliary SP interface, while the primary interface is available via I2C or SPI.

ST manufactures the various sensing elements using their specialized micro-machining processes. They develop the IC interfaces using CMOS technology as this allows them to design a dedicated circuitry. The ST manufacturing process then trims the circuitry to match the characteristics of the sensing element in the best possible manner. The acceleration range of the LSM5D53H is +/- 16 g, while it has an angular rate ranging +/- 2000 dps.

Solar Powered Drone Beams Internet

Certain regions of the Earth are presently out of the ambit of the Internet. Nearly 10% of the population or more than 4 billion people live so far from fiber optic cables or cell towers that they are unable to reach the Internet. Facebook is set to end this isolation by having a drone fly overhead while beaming Internet down to such areas.

At their Connectivity Lab, which is a division of Facebook’s Internet.org, researchers confirm the completion of such a drone. This is the first step Facebook is taking before it builds a larger fleet. They have not yet flown the craft, but Facebook has already been testing their concept over the UK with versions one-tenth the size. They intend to conduct flight tests of the full-size drone before the end of this year.

Facebook will be using the solar-powered V-shaped carbon fiber craft, named Aquila or Eagle (in Latin), for beaming down wireless Internet connectivity to expand Internet access. About a year ago, Facebook launched Internet.org. Although their intentions were to provide Internet access to those in the world who do not have a reliable connection, the project has received a lot of dissension for not adhering to net neutrality – especially in India.

Facebook has designed and built Aquila in 14 months. The drone will fly in the air for 90 days without touchdown. To launch it up into the air initially, technicians will be attaching Helium balloons to the plane.

With a wingspan of 46 yards or 42 meters, Aquila has to move constantly to stay aloft. Therefore, it will circle a three-km or two-mile radius. During the day, when the craft can generate energy from the sun, it will float up to 90-thousand feet or 30 Km. However, the craft drifts down to 60-thousand feet or 20 Km at night for conserving energy. While not planning to sell the drones at present, Facebook intends to use them for expanding Internet access.

The research team has been able to increase the data capacity of the lasers involved in the project. This is one of the biggest breakthroughs as the new system can communicate at speeds of 10 GB per second using a ground-based laser to talk to the dome on the underbelly of the plane. This is about 10 times faster than the current capabilities allow.

Facebook is not alone in their endeavors to bring wireless Internet to rural regions. Rivals Google also have a program up their sleeve – Project Loon. They plan to put up high-altitude Helium balloons with transmitters attached. Although Google has not launched their project yet, they claim it is in a more advanced stage compared to where Aquila is at present.

Therefore, very soon, you may see a huge 900 lb. drone nearly the size of a Boeing 737, slowly circling 11 miles up in the sky. Currently, Facebook’s mission is mired in controversy. All over the world, critics are questioning several practices of Facebook’s Internet.org on security, fairness and privacy grounds. There is a danger countries may spy on and repress their citizens. In addition, first-time users of the Internet might be limited to what Facebook provides them as news and information.