Arne Bergström, Scientor Research & Development
Good judgment you get from experience.
Experience you get from poor judgment.
(Prof Dr von Sandmeier)PAST AND PRESENT PROJECTS (click
on underlined text for more information)
- Bergströms
have been in the computer business since the days of Charles Babbage
The first (and the only working) 19th century mechanical computers
in the world, based on the ideas of Charles Babbage, were manufactured
in 1852-53 at J W Bergström's mechanical factory in Stockholm, not
far from Scientor's present premises.
- Simpson's rule
generalized to non-equidistant intervals
Simpson's rule for numerical integration requires the integrand to
be known at equidistant intervals. By using affine transformations Simpson's
rule is recast in a simple rotation-invariant form, valid also for non-equidistant
intervals (and even for non-unique functions). The simple rotation-invariant
form found actually turns out to be due to a property of the parabola first
discovered by Archimedes.
- Hidden, interactive
commands in ordinary text - S Polish from SciAce introduces a new dimension
in word processing
Historically, two different fields of use have converged into modern
computer systems: the typewriter and the calculator. The capabilities of
the computer to calculate and to make logical choices are unexploited in
present wordprocessors. S_Polish is a testbed to study the advantages of
permitting calculations and logical choices hidden as hypertext commands
inside text documents, e g, to select wordings which depend on the outcome
of such calculations.
- A simple recipe
to convert output to a form readable on Internet
A problem when using Internet is that many, especially older, platforms
do not provide output compatible with Internet publication. For platforms
which can give printer output a simple, detailed recipe is given for exporting
documents from such platforms to Internet.
- Microprocessors
and spectral analysis in Armatic's prize-winning banknote verifier from
1982
A viable scheme for identifying banknotes in, e g, vending machines
must accept banknotes of different denominations and/or currencies in the
same slit, independently of orientation and positioning. In the patent
licensed by Armatic this is achieved by making a spectral analysis of the
reflected light integrated over the entire banknote, hence making the analysis
independent of orientation and positioning. The Armatic banknote verifier
was awarded the Modern Elektronik Prize in 1991, and has helped transform
the Armatic company from a small garage shop into a multimillion dollar
export enterprise.
- Exotic bending
of light is used in OptiSensor's prize-winning optical touch key and optical
touch pad
Based on the strange behaviour of the electromagnetic field outside
a surface at total internal reflection, this invention was awarded the
first prize in the SwedeInnovation81 nationwide inventor's contest in 1981.
The invention permits a glass surface to become a touch key, insensitive
to all forms of external disturbances (soiling, moisture, ambient light,
fields, material objects etc), yet extremely sensitive to touch by a finger
tip.
- How to get
a picture through an ordinary slit monochromator - the image monochromator
By an optical trick involving extreme out-of-focus imaging, the image
monochromator achieves the somewhat paradoxical feat of transmitting an
entire picture through an ordinary slit monochromator, thus providing an
instrument which gives a video picture in one wavelength band only. The
image monochromator acts like an interference filter which can be continuously
tuned in wavelength and wavelength resolution.
- Exact analytical
solution of the electrodynamic equations
Spherically-symmetric, space-time separable solutions are found to
the electrodynamic equations (Maxwell's equations plus conservation of
charge, mass/energy and momentum). Surprisingly enough, the final solution
to this formidable system of nonlinear partial differential equations turns
out to be simple expressions in elementary analytical functions.
- Electrodynamic
confinement - the secret of ball lightning and a new field of science and
technology ?
The ball lightning phenomenon has been a mystery to science since no
known mechanisms can explain how such large energy contents (1-10 MJ have
been reported) could remain confined for comparatively long periods of
time (typically 10 seconds). The explanation is here sought in a newly
discovered electromagnetic confinement mechanism with potentially profound
scientific and technological implications (cf patent application PCT/SE96/00966).
- Theoretical
analysis of perpetual motion concepts
A theoretical analysis of possible perpetual motion concepts is made
using Noether's theorem. Symmetry properties of space and time seem, not
unexpectedly, to severely limit the prospects of constructing perpetual
motion machines, and to confine the regime - if any - of conceivable perpetual
motion concepts to a special class of relativistic phenomena.
- Car-versus-pigs
lottery
For the entertainment of the reader who has read this far, a solution
(wellknown but still counterintuitive) is given to this thought-provoking
problem involving a priori and a posteriori information.
PRESENT RESEARCH INTERESTS
ADDITIONAL WORKS (in
Swedish)
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This page last updated on March 18, 1997.
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Sweden.