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At the National Electronics and Computer Technology Centre Annual Conference and Exhibition 2008 (Nectec-ACE 2008), top 10 high light research and development works developed by local researchers at Nectec showed commercialized potential for use in real business and in economic industries.  

1. Humidity sensor

Humidity sensor is to check the humidity in paddy rise. The high humidity in paddy rice caused the rice's price down, so humidity sensor is to help measure the rice paddy's humidity in the silo. This local-made system could help the rice mills save two times cost when compared to using imported system.

This will help the rice owners to control the humidity environment and make the rice come with high quality so they can sell to the market with better price.

The sensor is now in test with a rice paddy mill in Supanburi province.

2. pH sensors

pH sensor is to help shrimp farm owners to control watering system in their farm. The system would measure pH value of water while giving a pH result automatically on a display device and this would allow the farm owners to know the pH status for further farm management.

Checking pH value in shrimp farm is important as the higher or lower of pH value will give impact on the growth of the shrimp. The suitable pH is at 7.

It also will be a sensor system to measure pH value in soil especially in rice field. Apart from measuring pH value as usual, it would be able to check the quality of soil.  

3. Pressure sensors

Pressure sensor is designed to detect the tire's pressure. It would send pressure information to the drivers automatically so they would know at all time on the tires status. If they are anything abnormal, the system will also alert the drivers so that they can fit the problem in advance. The sensor would come to prevent tire explosive problems that may occur due to too low or too high pressure in the vehicle's tires.

The system is now in test with a bulk of trucks at a logistics company and the centre hopes to make the system commercialise in the future.

4. I ntelligent network management system

It is free software for network monitoring, network probe and bandwidth management. The software has been designed for organisations operating on the open-source Linux operating system to enable them to manage their LAN at a lower cost. The application helps the organisations or schools to manage and speed up their existing network. It is suitable for use in small and medium organisations which have bandwidth of between 10 to 100 megabits per second.

It is based on two key software including Nagios and NTop. Nagios is a host and service-monitoring system designed to alert the user of network problems while Ntop is a network-traffic probe that gives the status of the overall network usage.

5. Engine control unit (ECU)

It is a sensor to make vehicles to run smoothly on different types of gasohol with varying levels of ethanol. It would enable vehicles to switch from gasohol E20 to E100 without any need for engine adjustments.

It will measure the percentage and the concentration of ethanol in a vehicle's fuel tank. Then, it will then send the information to the engine control unit (ECU), which will automatically adjust the engine depending on fuel type.

A vehicle's engine needs adjusting for gasohol with higher ethanol levels. Once the sensor is installed in the engine, there would be no need for such engine adjustments.

6. Non-invasive temperature-monitoring system

It is a system that scans body temperatures of visitor and alerts officials to anyone with a fever - the first sign of such infections. It is the collaboration between Nectec and Rajavithi Hospital .

The system has been placed at the Rajavithi hospital's outpatient department (OPD).

With the system in place, health officials do not have to take each OPD patient's temperature one by one. It can simply let the monitor scan the visitors and identify those with likely respiratory infection.

The system also helps reduce the chances of health officials contracting bird flu or severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) from patients and guards against an outbreak at the hospital. In the past, 10 per cent to 15 per cent of hospital staffers have been found to have contracted infections from OPD patients.

7. ABDUL (Artificial Buddy U Love)

Abdul is a new technology that allows MSN Messenger users to ask questions and search for information through the instant messaging program.

There are three key human language technologies developed in the lab to make Abdul a real personal assistant for MSN users. These technologies include a Thai and English dictionary called LEXiTron, an English-Thai machine translation program called Parsit and a search engine called Sansarn.

The research team has developed an engine called Chatbot which links various kinds of Web services and allows Abdul to interact with MSN users.

Once a request is sent to Abdul, the Chatbot program analyses the request and forwards it to target Web services such as LEXiTron, Parsit or Sansarn to process the result.

Abdul also links with other Web services related to weather forecasts, tourist information, restaurant information, intelligent transport system, stock and financial information, and government lottery results.

8. T-Box

T-box is the cellular jammer. It helps defuse bombs with reduced risk and save lives. The project received an honourable mention in IT Princess Awards 2007.

T-box has been built on the concept of interfering with the cellular phone signal, a common way for terrorists to detonate a bomb. The box comprises key integrated circuits which generate a signal, interfere with the incoming one and amplify the signal. Once the box is switched on, it sends a signal to jam the incoming cellular signal, preventing anyone from making mobile-phone communication within a 100-metre radius.

The first T-box was used to tackle the South's terrorism problem in late 2005 and about 50 T-boxes have been built for the Defence Ministry.The box has been designed to jam four cellular frequencies: 800, 900, 1,800 and 1,900 megahertz.

9. E-nose (Electronic Nose)

This technology imitates the abilities of the human nose to detect and recognise odours. To make the artificial nose detect odours, an electronic sensor is used to detect and recognise each odour separately. The analysis software is another important component of the application. When sensors detect odours, the raw data is sent to the software which identifies the type and degree of the odours.

It helps in the evaluation of the produce's freshness, measures its age and check for contamination and to maintain quality.

The technology is already in use to check the quality of wine and foods such as meat, vegetable, fish, rice grains and coffee beans. It helps exporters away from the problem of identifying the right time to export the fruit.

10. Lexitron

It is a free online dictionary service that gives users a brief pronunciation clip of the English translations in Thai. It provides a Thai and English dictionary.   Up to this year as the 10th year of Lexitron, the program has 79,000 English to Thai vocabulary entries and 51,000 Thai to English entries.