VoltJots | Electronics and IoT

Issue 75

Author

VoltJots
January 08, 2026

Welcome to the latest edition of the VoltJots newsletter, linking you to the very best electronics and IoT news, products, and projects.

Hope you enjoy! Until next week,

VoltJots

NEWS & ARTICLES

Once the heart of many home servers, the Raspberry Pi has stepped back as storage needs and service demands grew, with small x86 PCs now offering more reliability and value. The Pi remains a fantastic device for other uses, though.

Engineers often prototype with microcontrollers like Arduino or ESP32, but those setups can struggle in real industrial environments. Learn the practical limits of MCUs and why switching to a PLC is the smarter move for robust factory automation.

A new sensor from the Institute of Metal Research detects strain, how fast it changes, and temperature simultaneously with just one active material layer, cutting out the usual need for multiple materials and complicated electronics.

By partnering with PQStation, Inturai now offers quantum-resistant encryption on ESP32 microcontrollers, protecting billions of connected devices in key industries like defence and home security.

Open source robotics is speeding up automation and AI by sharing frameworks and designs worldwide, but it also brings challenges like standardisation, cybersecurity, and working with proprietary tech.

A team created a germanium semiconductor that conducts electricity with zero resistance, improving speed and cutting energy loss in electronics.

Before 2026 kicks off properly, here’s a round-up of 2025’s most-read educational pieces, including history, tech tutorials, industry news, and project ideas.

PROJECTS & TUTORIALS

The Pi Pico Planetarium uses a Raspberry Pi Pico 2W and a 480x320 display to show a real-time map of stars, planets, and constellations, syncing time via Wi-Fi for accurate night sky views.

This project combines the ESP32-S3 with MCP and Xiaozhi AI to build a fully customisable voice assistant that processes speech in real time and controls smart home devices while keeping your data private.

This project turns a Raspberry Pi Pico into a graphics card with added VRAM and HDMI output, plus Wi-Fi and extra pins for keyboard input and internet data fetching.

The device uses a precise digital temperature sensor with 0.25°C accuracy, powered by solar energy and a supercapacitor to run continuously without batteries. It wirelessly sends encrypted data every 15 minutes and fits inside a waterproof box with a clear cover.

Here's a neat project: a tiny pan-tilt robot eye built with ESP32 boards and micro-servos streams live video over Wi-Fi and can smoothly rotate to track faces in real time.

Instead of sorting through countless resistors, this design uses a series of mechanical decade counters to program resistance values from 1 to almost 10 M Ohms with just a few clicks.

This project uses an Arduino Uno with a flame sensor and MQ2 gas sensor to spot fire or gas leaks early, triggering a buzzer and flashing red LED, while sending sensor data to your computer for monitoring.

PRODUCTS

This kit turns your NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano into a powerful AI prototyping platform by adding an 11.6-inch IPS touchscreen, 8MP servo gimbal camera, voice interaction module, and 30 electronics modules. It also provides 39 Python tutorials and features I2C, UART, and GPIO expansion ports for versatile AI and sensor projects.

By combining Bosch Sensortec’s MEMS sensors with Espressif Systems’ wireless SoCs, the ESP-SensairShuttle platform supports multi-scenario sensing and helps developers with education, research, and application validation globally.

Bourns introduces BTJ thermal jumper chips that bring together 170 W/mK thermal conductivity and high insulation resistance, designed for heat detection and dissipation in mobile and power electronics.

Designed for industrial and consumer gear, these 40V eFuses deliver fast response, low resistance, and configurable recovery modes to safeguard components on common voltage rails.

The new TSZ901 op amp by ST combines microvolt-level offset, high temperature stability, and a 10 MHz bandwidth to handle demanding sensor and current measurement tasks with precision and speed.

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