Wearable

Readers who follow developments in the growing field of bio-signal telemetry (perhaps we can call it "life data monitoring") will likely be familiar with the Fitbit, an activity monitor that collects and measures data about your daily movements. Hitachi's Life Microscope goes a few steps further, collecting even more data that can be used to analyze your life trends. Read More

The phenomenon of social networking allows fragmented friends and families to keep in touch and empowers users to share their lives with the world. Four female students from MIT think that such a medium could also help to alleviate something else that many members of the global community share and suffer from - stress. The SOS: stress outsourced system consists of wearable units containing wireless signaling technology. Should a wearer feel the burden of stress, sending out an SOS to fellow users around the globe generates a haptic massage from the relief signals sent in response. Read More

We all know of optical fibers, the filaments of glass that carry data in the form of light pulses and enable the high-speed global telecommunications networks we take for granted today. For the past decade, Yoel Fink has been working at MIT to develop fibers with ever more sophisticated properties which enable fabrics to interact with their environment. Fink and his collaborators have now announced a new milestone on the path to functional fibers – fibers that can detect and produce sound. Read More

As the technology to support wearable electronics advances, researchers are investigating new ways of making our clothing more "intelligent" – from smart shirts for theater ushers to the development of clothing that can respond to the wearer’s emotive state. So would it surprise you to learn that your humble underpants could one day save your life? A new study has shown that printed sensors on the elastic band of your underpants could monitor biomarkers in your sweat and tears, make autonomous diagnoses and even administer life-saving drugs. Read More

Once the realm of science fiction, implantable devices able to take on the work of the heart - pacemakers - are now commonplace, but what might the future hold for equipment that monitors our vital signs? A Finnish researcher believes tomorrow's tech-savvy generation will be more than comfortable with implantable electrocardiogram (EKG) devices that constantly monitor and provide instant feedback on their health, and can also provide instant access to medical data in emergencies. Read More

You’ve had a hard day at the office, your spouse is currently over 2,000 miles away and now your boss says he wants you to work late. It’s all you can do to contain your anger until you get into the bathroom, whereupon you let loose with a string of red-faced, high-cardio profanity. At that point, your spouse talks to you via your shirt. “Take it easy, it’s all right,” they coo from your collar, as they play your favorite song, and photos of them scroll across your chest. Hey, it could happen. No, really, it could happen, thanks to the Wearable Absence project. Researchers involved in the program are working on developing intelligent textiles, that comfort the wearer by evoking memories of absent loved ones. Read More

For most of us here in Gizland, technology and gadgetry have become central to our very existence. Given the huge advances seen in recent years, where will be ten years from now? Frog Design has been doing some serious pondering on this very subject and has recently presented a vision of what our increasingly computer-centric lives might be like in the year 2020. Read More

Efforts to capture energy from the human body usually focus on harnessing the kinetic energy of the body’s movement. However the human body is also generating energy in the form of heat that could also be used to run low power electronic devices. New energy-scavenging systems under development at MIT could generate electricity just from differences in temperature between the body (or other warm object) and the surrounding air. Read More

If engineers at the University of California have their way, "Power Dressing" could be back in vogue. However, instead of 80’s-style shoulder pads the engineers have been creating energy-scavenging nanofibers. These nano-sized generators could one day be woven into clothing and textiles to harness the energy created through normal body movements to power mobile electronic devices. Read More