It aint over til the fat lady sings, a wiseman once said. That man may have to append that theory to “it aint over til the fat lady sings, rubs gel on her throat, then sings again.” That’s because scientists at Harvard and MIT are hard at work on a vocal cord gel that will be used to give stricken folks their voices back.
The synthetic gel, known as polyethylene glycol (PEG), is super flexible and actually acts a lot like real vocal cords. How does it work? Well, you have to, um, inject it, eek, into your damned vocal cords. Ok, that sounds like an unpleasant process but the results are very pleasant indeed. It restores the voice by mimicking the elasticity of vocal cords and helping restore vibration.
This is ..read more
Posted in: Safety, Sound
For the hearing and vision impaired, the world can be very limiting. Silent Call tries to provide a level of freedom for these people. The Silent Touch provides visual and vibration for certain events. Events such as doorbell, phone, smoke alarm, fire alarm, burglar alarm trigger the watch to activate within a 300 foot range.This watch works with the Sidekick II system from Silent Call. Silent Call has wake up alarms and mattress vibrators to alert the owner. The vibration changes with the type of alert. The Silent Touch watch sells for $150.00 and the charger for $117.65. A kit that includes the watch, charger, and bed vibrator costs $289.00.
Posted in: Display, Environmental Monitoring, Intelligent Clothes, Mobile Phone Integration, Mobile Phone Technology, Safety, Silent Call, Sound, Tactile Feedback, Watches
Textronics, a leader in textile sensor technology, is now offering a DIY kit for people interested in developing heart rate monitoring textiles. This marks the first time that Textronics is offering and official kit for purchase.
The Developers Kit offer 12 textile sensors, a variety of knit tubes, wrist cuffs and chest straps. Additionally they include conductive thread and 2 transmitters with the kit. These transmitters are compatible with most analog heart rate monitors like Polar.
The kit which sells for $100.00 is a very thorough kit to help anyone start anyone get started in the vital monitoring garment game. This can open the door to many fitness and sporting tech garments. It is always great when an industry leader can offer these kits to the general public. Making it easier for ..read more
Posted in: Components, Conductive Yarn, DIY - Corner, Do-It-Yourself Industry Leaders, Intelligent Clothes, Safety, Sports, Tech Clothing Industry, Textile Circuit, Textile Switch, Textronics, Vitals Monitoring, Wearable Tech
The ILLUM cycling jacket is the brain child of Goose Design and PDD, a creative design and product design agency respectively. This is the coolest concept cycling jacket that we have seen to date. Not only is it sharp but it uses tech clothing to bring style and safety to cycling.
The ILLUM jacket is a photovoltaic, aka solar powered, garment that uses electroluminescent ink to provide safety and sharp looks for today’s cutting edge cyclist. The design spans 360 degrees around the upper body of the cyclist and uses red lights to illuminate the back of the jacket while using white light to illuminate the front. These elements are sewn into ergo designed panels in the jacket. Also incorporated into the design are the solar charging elements located in ..read more
Posted in: Concept Design, Goose Design, Jacket, Light Emmiting Fabric, PDD, Safety, Solar Fashion, Solar Power, Sports, Sportswear
Cool Shirt is a company that make a neat refrigerated shirt. This company offers many different solutions for cooling from small scale to industrial solutions. The cooling comes from a non-flammable CFC-Free solution that flows through about 50 feet of tubing.The fluid is stored in a replaceable 12oz Port-a-cool can. This button activated system goes for a reasonable $179.90.
Posted in: Cool Shirt, Cooling, Safety, Shirt, Sports
Zenga adds to it’s tech clothing line with the Freeway Jacket. This jacket features water resistant, breathable fabric. The leather and neoprene details lend to its urban look. The LEDs are located on the collar and provide safety. Look for this item to hit stores soon.
Posted in: Jacket, LED, Lighting, Safety, Textiles, Water Resistant, Zegna
Hard-Wear Jacket from Paul Coudamy takes a small spy camera and embeds it into the back of this jacket. So now you can watch your back in style with this sweet jacket. And LCD screen located on the sleeve shows what is going on behind you. Great for people to lazy to turn around, or poorly dressed spys.
Posted in: Concept Design, Display, Intelligent Clothes, Jacket, Safety
Now a days textile sensors generally monitor heartrate. BIOTEX, a European sponsored research project which is set up to develop biochemical-sensing techniques and their integration into textiles adds a new dimension to bio-textile-sensor technology: analyzing body fluids via textile sensors.Using a combination of hydrophilic (water-loving) and hydrophobic (water-repellent) yarns. Those two yarns can be woven to direct the sweat through fabric channels to a sensor area. It is a passive system that uses no power and so reducing the power demands of the BIOTEX system.Body fluids can provide valuable data about a persons well being. There are potentially many applications for such technology.
Posted in: BIOTEX, Concept Design, Conductive Yarn, Safety, Sports, Super Smart Fabrics, Vitals Monitoring, e-Textiles
Nike is jumping into the wearable safety gear for runners. The Nike Electrolite Arm Band has an embedded soft light. Not only is this very wearable, its comfortable and affordable. It barely wieghs more then a traditional arm band, and is curved so it can be seen from many angles.Made of a flexible, lightweight, wide-angle wrap-around electroluminescent light bar that flashes on your upper arm. The small water resistant compartment houses two replaceable CR2032 batteries which provide around 20-30 hours of use and a low-profile on/off button. It is reasonably priced at $25.00. Good stuff Nike.
Posted in: Armbands, Lighting, Nike, Safety, Sports
