Sony earmarks $1.2bn for image sensors

Sony plans to invest about $1.21 billion to double its production of image sensors used in digital cameras and smartphones, as the popularity of those devices continues to rise worldwide, reports The Salt Lake Tribune.

The investment includes the electronics giant's planned repurchase of a factory that it sold to Toshiba in 2007. Until now, the factory has primarily been used to make processors for Sony's PlayStation 3 game console.

But Sony said it will refurbish the facility so that it can meet growing demand for imaging sensors. The company hopes to double capacity to 50 000 wafers per month by the end of March 2012.

Kodak has revealed the ESP C310, a budget multifunction printer (MFP) that prints, scans, and copies, at CES in Las Vegas this week, notes PCMag.

The C310 has WiFi connectivity, and can also print from iPhones, iPods touch, and iPads connected to the WiFi network. It has a 1.5-inch LCD with simplified control panel for copying, scanning and printing.

It can print directly from SD, memory stick or MMC memory cards. Users can sort through their memory card images by year, month/day, directly from the printer with the 'Sort' feature. Built in sensors automatically detect the paper type to optimise print quality.

Exposure to radiation from medical imaging procedures such as X-rays and CT scans has become common among American children, a new study has found, reports the Bloomberg Business Week.

This has prompted researchers to call for steps to be taken to ensure appropriate use of the tests to protect children. Increasing use of diagnostic imaging has led to concerns about radiation exposure. Although X-rays emit relatively little radiation, CT scans emit more and may raise the risk for cancer, particularly in children.

Compared with adults, infants and children are at higher risk for tumours because their developing tissues are more sensitive to radiation, the researchers noted.