Chapter seven

Other Emerging Technologies

Habtamu Abune
Learning outcome
After completing this chapter, you will be able to:
➢ Explain other emerging technology and their application in
different sectors.
➢Nanotechnology
➢Biotechnology
➢Blockchain technology
➢Additive manufacturing and 3D Printing
➢Computer vision
➢Cloud computing and quantum computing
➢Embedded systems
➢Cybersecurity
Nanotechnology
• Nanotechnology is science, engineering, and technology conducted
at the nanoscale, which is about 1 to 100 nanometers.
• Nanoscience and nanotechnology are the study and application of
extremely small things.
• They can be used across all the other science fields, such as chemistry,
biology, physics, materials science, and engineering.
• Nanoscience and nanotechnology involve the ability to see and to
control individual atoms and molecules.
• It’s hard to imagine just how small nanotechnology is. One
nanometer is a billionth of a meter or 10-9 of meters.
Applications of nanotechnology
• Medicine: customized nanoparticles at the size of molecules that can
deliver drugs directly to diseased cells in your body.
• This method should greatly reduce the damage treatment such as
chemotherapy does to a patient's healthy cells.
• Electronics: it has some answers for how we might increase the
capabilities of electronic devices while we reduce their weight and
power consumption.
• Food: it has an impact on several aspects of food science, from how
food is grown to how it is packaged.
• Companies are developing nanomaterials that will make a difference not only
in the taste of food but also in food safety and the health benefits that food
delivery.
Cont.…..
➢ Agriculture: nanotechnology can possibly change the whole
agriculture part and nourishment industry anchor from generation to
preservation, handling, bundling, transportation, and even waste
treatment.
➢ Vehicle manufacturers: Much like aviation, lighter and stronger
materials will be valuable for making vehicles that are both quicker and
more secure.
Biotechnology
• Biotechnology is technology based on biology
• It harnesses cellular and biomolecular processes to develop
technologies and products that help improve our lives and the health
of our planet.
• One example of modern biotechnology is genetic engineering.
• Genetic engineering is the process of transferring individual genes
between organisms or modifying the genes in an organism to
remove or add a desired trait or characteristic.
Cont.…
• New technologies and products are developed every year within the
areas of e.g.
• Medicine (development of new medicines & therapies),
• Agriculture (development of genetically modified plants, biofuels, biological
treatment) or
• Industrial biotechnology (production of chemicals, paper, textiles, and food).
Application of Biotechnology
• Agriculture (Green Biotechnology): Biotechnology had contributed a lot to
modify the genes of the organism known as Genetically Modified
Organisms such as Crops, Animals, Plants, Fungi, Bacteria, etc.
• Medicine (Medicinal Biotechnology): This helps in the formation of
genetically modified insulin known as Humulin.
• This helps in the treatment of a large number of diabetes patients.
• Gene therapy is a technique to remove the genetic defect in an embryo
or child.
• This technique involves the transfer of a normal gene that works over the non-
functional gene.
• Aquaculture Fisheries: It helps in improving the quality and quantity of
fishes.
• Environment (Environmental biotechnology): is used in waste treatment
and pollution prevention.
Blockchain technology
• Blockchain is a growing list of records, called blocks, that are linked
using cryptography.
• Each block contains a cryptography hash of the previous block, a
timestamp, and transaction data (generally represented as a Merkle tree).
• A blockchain is a time-stamped series of immutable records of data that is
managed by a cluster of computers not owned by any single entity.
• Each of these blocks of data (i.e. block) is secured and bound to each
other using cryptographic principles (i.e. chain).
• The blockchain is a simple yet ingenious way of passing information from A
to B in a fully automated and safe manner.
Cont.…
• “Blocks” on the blockchain are made up of digital pieces of
information. they have three parts:
1. Blocks store information about transactions like the date, time, and
dollar amount of your most recent purchase from Amazon.
2. Blocks store information about who is participating in transactions.
3. Blocks store information that distinguishes them from other blocks.
• In order for a block to be added to the blockchain, however, four
things must happen:
I. Transaction must occur.
II. Transaction must be verified.
III. Transaction must be stored in a block.
IV. Block must be given a hash.
The Three Pillars of Blockchain Technology
• Decentralization
• Information is not stored in a single Machine/entity
• Everyone in the network own the information.
• Transparency
• A person’s real identity is secure, and all the transactions that were done by their public
address is visible.
• A person’s identity is hidden via complex cryptography and represented only by their
public address.
▪ So, if you were to look up a person’s transaction history, you will not see “Bob sent 1 BTC” instead you
will see “1MF1bhsFLkBzzz9vpFYEmvwT2TbyCt7NZJ sent 1 BTC”.
▪ This level of transparency has never existed before within a financial system.
▪ It adds that extra, and much needed, level of accountability which is required by some of
these biggest institutions.
▪ Immutability
▪ Once something has been entered into the blockchain it cannot be tampered with.
Application of blockchain
• The sharing economy:
• By enabling peer-to-peer payments, the blockchain opens the door to direct interaction
between parties a truly decentralized sharing economy results.
• Crowdfunding
• Crowdfunding initiatives like Kickstarter and GoFundMe are doing the advance work for the
emerging peer-to-peer economy.
• Governance
• By making the results fully transparent and publicly accessible, distributed database
technology could bring full transparency to elections or any other kind of poll taking.
▪ In practice, this means company governance becomes fully transparent and verifiable when
managing digital assets, equity or information.
• File storage
• Decentralizing file storage on the internet brings clear benefits.
• Distributing data throughout the network protects files from getting hacked or lost.
Cloud, Autonomic and quantum computing
• Cloud computing:
• Networking of remote server that are hosted on the internet
• Public cloud: third-party provider manage the servers, application,
storage .
• Anyone can subscribe to the provider service and use it (i.e google doc)
• Private cloud: Hosted on organization onsite datacenter
• Hybrid cloud: private cloud are connected to public clouds, allowing
data and application to be shared between them
Cont.…
• Quantum computing
• Give client access to quantum computer over the internet
• With quantum computer, the data is stored in qubits

Reading Assignment
• Autonomic (self managing/configuring computing and protect itself)
and quantum computing characteristics
Computer vision
• It is a scientific field that deals with how computers can be made to
gain a high-level understanding of digital images or videos.
• It automate tasks that the human visual system can do.
• Computer vision tasks include :
• Acquiring, processing, analyzing and understanding digital images
• Extraction of high-dimensional data from the real world in order to produce
numerical or symbolic information, e.g. in the forms of decisions , OCR.
How computer vision work
1. Acquiring an image:
▪ Images, even large sets, can be acquired in real-time through video, photos
or 3D technology for analysis.
2. Processing the image:
▪ Deep learning models automate much of this process, but the models are
often trained by first being fed thousands of labeled or pre-identified images.
3. Understanding the image:
▪ The final step is the interpretative step, where an object is identified or
classified.
Types of computer vision
There are many types of computer vision that are used in different ways:
▪ Image segmentation partitions an image into multiple regions or pieces to be examined
separately. Object detection identifies a specific object in an image.
▪ Advanced object detection recognizes many objects in a single image: a football field,
an offensive player, a defensive player, a ball and so on.
▪ Facial recognition is an advanced type of object detection that not only recognizes a human face
in an image but identifies a specific individual.
▪ Edge detection is a technique used to identify the outside edge of an object or landscape to
better identify what is in the image.
▪ Pattern detection is a process of recognizing repeated shapes, colors and other visual
indicators in images.
▪ Image classification groups images into different categories.
▪ Feature matching is a type of pattern detection that matches similarities in images to help classify
them.
Applications of computer vision
• Some industrial applications of computer vision: (a) optical character recognition
(OCR) (b) mechanical inspection (c) retail (d) medical imaging (e) automotive
safety (f) surveillance and traffic monitoring
Embedded systems
▪ Embedded systems is a controller with a dedicated function within a larger
mechanical or electrical system, often with real-time computing
constraints.
▪ They are specific purpose computer.
▪ Embedded systems control many devices in common use today.
▪ Ninety-eight percent of all microprocessors manufactured are used in
embedded systems.
▪ Modern embedded systems are based on microcontrollers (i.e.
microprocessors with integrated memory and peripheral interfaces)
▪ Ordinary microprocessors (using external chips for memory and
peripheral interface circuits) are also common, especially in more
complex systems.
Advantages and disadvantages of embedded system

Advantages of Embedded
▪ Easily Customizable
▪ Low power consumption
▪ Low cost
▪ Enhanced performance
Disadvantages of Embedded systems
▪ High development effort
▪ Larger time to market
Basic Structure of an Embedded System Cont..
• Sensor − It measures the physical quantity and converts it to an electrical
signal which can be read by an observer or by any electronic instrument
like an A2D converter. A sensor stores the measured quantity to the
memory.
• A-D Converter − An analog-to-digital converter converts the analog signal
sent by the sensor into a digital signal.
• Processor & ASICs − Processors process the data to measure the output
and store it to the memory.
• D-A Converter − A digital-to-analog converter converts the digital data
fed by the processor to analog data.
• Actuator − An actuator compares the output given by the D-A Converter to
the actual (expected) output stored in it and stores the approved output.
Architecture of Embedded System
 Cybersecurity
▪ The protection of computer systems from the theft of or damage to their
hardware, software, or electronic data, as well as from the disruption or
misdirection of the services they provide.
▪ Protecting computer systems from unauthorized access
▪ Cybercrime is used to describe unlawful activity
▪ It is often committed by the people of destructive and criminal mindset either
for revenge, greed or adventure
▪ The field is becoming more important due to:
▪ Increased reliance on computer systems,
▪ Increasing of Internet and wireless network standards
▪ The growth of smart devices, including smartphones, televisions, and the various
devices that constitute the Internet of Things.
Cont.…
▪ Cybersecurity is often confused with information security
▪ Cybersecurity focuses on protecting computer systems from unauthorized
access or being otherwise damaged or made inaccessible.
▪ Information security is a broader category that looks to protect all
information assets, whether in hard copy or in digital form
Cybersecurity measures
The following are some security measures to be taken to prevent
cybercrimes:
▪ Staff awareness training
▪ Application security: Web application vulnerabilities are a common point of
intrusion for cybercriminals
▪ Network security: - is the process of protecting the usability and
integrity of your network and data.
▪ Leadership commitment: Leadership commitment is the key to cyber
resilience.
▪ Top management must be prepared to invest in appropriate cybersecurity resources,
such as awareness training.
▪ Password management: ensuring staff create strong passwords and keep
them secure.
Types of cybersecurity threat
• Ransomware: - It is a type of malicious software.
• It is designed to extort money by blocking access to files or the computer system until the
ransom is paid.
• Paying the ransom does not guarantee that the files will be recovered or the system restored.
• Malware:- itis a type of software designed to gain unauthorized access or to cause
damage to a computer
• Social engineering: - it is a tactic that adversaries use to trick you into revealing sensitive
information.
• Social engineering can be combined with any of the threats listed above to make you
more likely to click on links, download malware, or trust a malicious source
• Phishing: - it is the practice of sending fraudulent emails that resemble emails
from reputable sources.
• The aim is to steal sensitive data like credit card numbers and login information. It’s
the most common type of cyber-attack.
Benefits of cybersecurity
• Benefits of utilizing cybersecurity include:
• Business protection against malware, ransomware, phishing, and social
engineering.
• Protection for data and networks.
• Prevention of unauthorized users.
• Improves recovery time after a breach.
• Protection for end-users.
• Improved confidence in the product for both developers and customers.
Cybersecurity Vendor
• Three commonly known cybersecurity vendors include
• Cisco
• McAfee, and
• Trend Micro.
Additive manufacturing (3D Printing)
▪ The American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) equates the two
terms in their definition:
▪ “Additive manufacturing, also known as 3D printing, uses computer-aided
design to build objects layer by layer.”
▪ Author Deve Turbide
▪ Puts it simply, suggesting that additive manufacturing is “the industrial version
of 3D printing”.
• Additive Manufacturing: A Bytes-to-Parts Supply Chain
▪ Additive manufacturing (AM) describes types of advanced manufacturing
that are used to create three-dimensional structures out of plastics,
metals, polymers and other materials that can be sprayed through a
nozzle or aggregated in a vat.
▪ These constructs are added layer by layer in real-time based on digital
design.
End