by: Sustainable Design News, 2013-10-15 13:41:44 UTC The Design Museum and PUMA will host renowned cultural and design commentator John Thackara for the fourth Annual PUMA Sustainable Design Lecture.
Basic medical tests once required a trip to a clinic. These days, anyone can measure their pulse, heart rate, and blood pressure using cheap digital equipment. That's great for people who are curious about their health and even better for people who lack access to formal healthcare.
Luis Martín's e–Health Sensor Platform shows what can be done when many kinds of health sensors are combined. The result is a miniature mobile hospital. Built with an Arduino board and Raspberry Pi computer, it contains a lot of what you would find in a formal medical facility, but at a fraction of the traditional cost.
"Most of medical devices have high prices and proprietary licenses which makes [it] impossible for a community to develop applications with them," says Martín, an electric engineer graduate from the University of Zaragoza. "I want to give people the necessary tools to develop e–health applications. That can be the basis of a new era of open–source medical products."
The e–health platform is shortlisted for the James Dyson Award, which announces a winner in November.
The device is only a prototype at the moment, and it's not too pretty. But Martín hopes it will be a platform that others can work on. "We want people to try this prototyping kit, to improve the product better with their experiences. Already, there are already several projects that use this platform."
That includes researchers, developers, artists who are using the sensor data for "fun and test purposes." Possible future applications includes "sculpture that responds to a person's biometric signals" and a remote monitoring system for testing glucose levels among the elderly.
We've covered several cheap health sensor products, notably the Scanadu Scout medical "tricorder" and all these smartphone–based tests. Martín's system could also theoretically work with a smartphone, but he is yet to build the app to go with it.
Eventually, Martín hopes the kit will be available in the developing world. "A next step would be to try to get the necessary medical certifications to sell the product as a commercial system and find ways to subsidize this product to poor people or people with modest means," he says.
A few years ago, a shiny red wheel that turns any bike into an electric bike emerged from MIT's SENSEable City Lab, promising a future of lazy two–wheeled transportation for all. But despite a number of promises, the Copenhagen Wheel has yet to actually hit the market.
No matter: A group of Slovenians have created the FlyKly Smart Wheel, which also turns any bike into an electric bike, but at a third of the weight of the Copenhagen Wheel, with an open API and the ability to incorporate crowdsourced intelligence.
Niko Klansek, one of the Smart Wheel creators, came up with the idea for a pedal assist device that fits onto a bike rim's spokes after starting the FlyKly electric bike company in 2011. "I'm a bicycle lover. The idea was that I wanted to put a motor, a battery, and electronics inside the rear wheel so you can put it in any bike you want, and say 'Today I want to ride it as an electric bike,'" says Klansek, who now lives in New York City.
And so Klansek created exactly that: a nine–pound pedal assist wheel containing a super–thin motor and lithium battery. When using the wheel, cyclists can go up to 20 mph for 30 miles without pedaling before they need to recharge. While that's not enough for a long bike trip, it leaves ample battery power for short jaunts around a city.
Installing the wheel is easy. Just remove a bike's rear wheel, replace it with the Smart Wheel, and start riding. Set the top speed via the FlyKly app (currently compatible with iPhone, Android, and the Pebble watch, but the Smart Wheel API is open source), and keep track of distance, battery, time traveled, and speed as you ride. The Smart Light comes included and features a handlebar smartphone holder and the ability to recharge an onboard LED light (and mobile electronics) while you pedal.
Klansek doesn't like when the Smart Wheel is compared to electric bikes. The Smart Wheel's feature set is so much more advanced, he says, that the comparison doesn't make sense. "The Smart Wheel collects data, learns how you use [the bike], and will suggest better routes and quicker routes," he says. Data can be shared and compared with the larger Smart Wheel community. Ultimately, Klansek imagines that cycling data could be used by cities to evaluate the best locations for new bike lanes.
While the Smart Wheel is optimized for city riding, it's also a fancy object that's ripe for the picking by bike thieves. However, the wheel can be locked by pressing a button on the app and an onboard GPS means that a stolen wheel can be tracked and recovered.
And if the wheel breaks? "We make it so it's hard to break. Because it's connected by Bluetooth to the app, if something goes wrong, before it breaks, it will notify you," says Klansek. The Smart Wheel can't be fixed by a local bike shop, though. FlyKly has opted to replace broken wheels instead of repairing them. "We believe we're shipping quality products," says Klansek.
The Smart Wheel is available on Kickstarter starting at $550.
by: Gizmag Emerging Technology Magazine, 2013-10-10 22:34:24 UTC
Determined to mimic the efficiency-boosting approach of non-plug-in hybrid cars like the Toyota Prius, Italian manufacturer ZeHus has developed a small, lightweight e-bike system that optimizes cyclists' efficiency. The hub-based unit aims to add exactly the right amount of electric propulsion to create flowing, seamless rides without the huffing, puffing and walking. ..
Continue Reading Bike+ light hybrid system unplugs the e-bike for a Prius-like ride
The first Cradle to Cradle Product Innovation Challenge, coordinated by the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute in partnership with Make It Right, was launched in November of 2012. By June of 2013, over 144 products were entered into the competition, which aims to challenge sustainable product manufacturers to “rethink and retool” building materials in order to follow the full cycle of sustainable and affordable product design, manufacturing, and consumption. After a highly selective screening process, only ten finalists out of the 144 entries are going on to compete for their share of the total cash prize of $250,000. The ten finalists are true industry leaders in sustainable building design production, offering alternatives to the traditional building materials such as drywall, insulation, paints, siding, roofing, and construction panels. Keep reading to learn more about each of them.
Flash floods are such a pain, especially to merchants and street vendors who stand to lose the most in this emergency situation. One of the more aesthetic preventive actions is the 360° Water Barrier. Essentially this is a road barrier that is seen dotting the city roads in the low-lying areas, and has expandable metal shutters that can be used to prevent or divert the flow of the water. With a couple more refinements, this could become a do-able concept. What do you think?
Designer: Nicholas Tay
- Yanko Design Timeless Designs - Explore wonderful concepts from around the world! Shop CKIE - We are more than just concepts. See what's hot at the CKIE store by Yanko Design! (Deflecting Flash Floods was originally posted on Yanko Design)
As a continuation of our explorative series of classic modern design in collaboration with Be Original, we are taking a look at the Kelvin LED task lamp from FLOS.
When I think of a task lamp, I either think of those old timey desk lamps our parents and grandparents used, or I think of the desk lamp of the future, which often times looks exactly like the Kelvin LED lamp, designed by Antonio Citterio with Toan Nguyen for FLOS. It’s very futuristic looking, like a robot arm reaching out to help you illuminate just about anything you need to see, read or do.
Antonio Citterio with the Kelvin LED lamp
I was able to get in touch with both Antonio Citterio and Piero Gandini, CEO of FLOS, to talk about the design and its innovations. Timeless design doesn’t always have to play it safe… in fact, like many of the classic mid-century modern pieces, timeless design can push the boundaries of form (as with Togo and Tip Ton), or manufacturing (as we saw with the Swan chair).
Mr. Gandini says “the Kelvin LED lamp is a very important step that can really testify how a new technology can drive to new languages. The interpretation of the possible new languages… is really what makes the difference.”
Photo: Germano Borrelli
He goes on to explain how FLOS was able to incorporate this new technology into a design that is selling well—in other words, the Kelvin is on the road to becoming a classic. Instead of designing strange and unique objects to house the LEDs or plug LEDs into their existing units, they decided to work with Antonio Citterio to sit down and take time to design the right object to best utilize this new technology. “When a new technology comes it is normal to be surprised, it is normal not to immediately have all the necessary tools to interpret what can be done. But I think that if you take time, if you really put a real effort and if you really go with strong talent, you can come to a different place.”
Photo: Germano Borrelli
Working with FLOS, Mr. Citterio says, is like working with people who share his vision and design language. As a designer, he concentrated solely on the product and not the market, but with a more broad concentration on the strategy by which he can define himself and his work.
A good designer should be able to create products that will last, that will not be discarded quickly by the user.
The design of the lamp itself is innovative, yet not over-designed—with a lot of thought behind its functionality. Beyond the flat, square design of the head, which perfectly houses the LEDs, the adjustable arm allows you to place the lamp above or below your eye level and move the head as needed. You can also touch it to control the level of light needed. But unlike other task lamps, Kelvin takes it a step further with its base options: choose from a desk clamp, a simple flat tabletop base or even a wall mount. The functional options of the lamp show the forethought that went into its design. Instead of racing to release the first LED lamp, Mr. Citterio and FLOS sat down to consider the multiple uses of the lamp and the end user’s needs. And, to top it all off, there is also a floor and miniature tabletop version.
Photo: Germano Borrelli
“With Kelvin, my intent was to start with a spring system and add an essential design. The project takes its design cue from a clamp, which becomes the base, and which explicitly evokes the image of a technical object, with an engineering matrix, inspired by bridges and tensile structures,” explained Mr. Citterio, who uses this lamp at his own desk.
“The technical-functional solutions used to control the movements of the lamp and its adjustment in a safe and easy manner, and to fix it in a specific position, required accurate study. The construction details—from springs to clamps—were left visible on purpose to communicate a mood that is technological but careful about production processes. The result is an object with a ‘smooth’ yet domestic design because of the outer wire, the use of aluminum as a structural material with a transparent liquid varnish surface treatment and the LED diffuser protection screen in polycarbonate molded by injection.”
Watch this video to see how the Kelvin LED lamp is made:
Want to get your hands on a Kelvin LED Lamp? Thanks to Be Original, you can enter to win one—visit beoriginalamericas.tumblr.com to enter! Entrants must be from the United States or Canada and the contest ends on Sunday, October 20th. Good luck!
by: Design 4 Sustainability, 2013-10-29 15:43:11 UTC
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After five years, MUJI will be holding the international competition for the MUJI AWARD 2013. Entry in October 2013.
The theme for this year’s awards ...
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Windcentrale crowd funded it's third windmill to 1700 households in just 17 hours. It sourced an existing windmill for sale and cut the capacity and ...
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Fam Mizra the head of Mizra Minds, a product and branding firm in Chicago experience both the hardships of the third world and the comfort of the first ...
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Designer David Graas hops onto the Next Big Thing bandwagon.
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