Declining sales of stainless steel kitchen appliances are triggering a freefall in nickel prices. Tags have dropped 30 per cent this year, and some traders say prices will drop another 25 per cent by the end of the year. That’s despite announcements of several mine closings: Xstrata in the Dominican Republic. BHP Billion, and Industrial Metallurgical Holding. Nickel producers are getting hit with a double whammy of lower prices and higher costs for sulfuric acid, which is used to extract nickel ores. Refrigerator sales are off 9 per cent this year and electric ovens are off 14 percent.
Ford and Unifi, maker of Repreve, will gather and recycle 2 million plastic bottles at CES and other shows for conversion into the Repreve seat fabric used in the 2012 Focus EV.
Thanks to embedded electronics, medical devices are getting smaller and smarter than ever. Pacemakers and implantable defibrillators are now able to call physicians. MRIs, CT scanners, and ultrasound machines are gaining mobility. And the venerable Band-Aid may soon be able to detect illnesses ranging from fevers to heart arrhythmias. On February 21, join Design News senior editor Charles Murray for a wide-ranging discussion, "Embedded Angles for Medical Products," which will explore the latest developments in medical electronics. The discussion will examine advances in medical device technology and offer an inside look at the embedded electronics behind it.
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