Transparentius
From: Art Lebedev via Engadget
Safety tends to take a prominent role in my blog, for several reasons. For one thing, I think safety in design sort of go hand-in-hand. You can't consider safety without considering such things as human factors, new technologies, or the economic feasibility of safety. However, I think there is just something beautiful about a unique take on safety. It is making something mundane, something we often take for granted, and making it into a desirable object or idea.
Now, if you'll let me bring it back to the concept at hand, we have Art Lebedev's Transparentius concept. It's a pretty simple concept: a semi truck, a camera, and some way to project a large image onto a flat surface. The camera would take live video of what was going on in front of the truck and communicate it to those in tow. The idea is that safety can be enhanced if you were able to see around the truck in front of you.
Thermahelm
From: Thermahelm
Good design improves lives, and this product is no exception. Designed with the most accident-prone motorists on the road in mind , this self-cooling helmet could prevent often-fatal brain injuries resulting from motorcycle accidents.
Fitted to an existing safety helmet, the device would envelope the head and, in the event of an impact, trigger an endothermic (i.e. absorbs heat) reaction that would cool the head. Like putting ice on a swollen knee or ankle injury, the Thermahelm could not only reduce swelling, but also keep potentially fatal temperatures within the helmet from rising.
Even before paramedics are notified of an accident, the wearer could be receiving valuable life-saving medical attention by Thermahelm.
Check out their website for a more in-depth look at the technology, and try to look past the hokey animations and flash videos at a technology that could become an industry standard one day.
Stay innovative.
-Nick (www.nickselman.com)
Heated Roadways
From: University of Houston
While the concept of heated roads may not be new, a new technology and implementation, developed by Christiana Chang and her colleagues at the University of Houston, may be the most practical and feasible yet. Rather than embedding traditional heating elements in concrete, the team instead ran current through sheets of paper embedded with carbon nanofibers to heat the roadways. The results: heated roads that require a fraction of the energy (and cost) of traditional approaches.
Because plowing roads is costly, and salting them damages the environment and infrastructure (salt erodes metal bridges), the team estimates that this approach to keeping roads safe from snow and ice makes economic (and ecological) sense. Full study found here.
Stay innovative.
-Nick (www.nickselman.com)