Wearable gadgets are making clothes smarter all the time, but one of the most basic functions you’d want in a garment – the ability to warm you up or cool you down as needed – is still frustratingly elusive. Now, researchers at the University of Maryland (UMD) have developed a new material that senses how warm a person’s body is […]
Auto Cooling Fabric
Former Soviet Silk Factory Turned Coffeeshop
Russian studio Asketik has designed a cafe with bright white interiors in Moscow, offset with many indoor plants to soften the industrial space. Bloom-n-Brew occupies a former Soviet silk factory overhauled by Asketik, which also led the branding design, including a new logo and menu with a type-based graphic. The cafe’s name refers to the fragrant smell that is released when brewing a fresh […]
Making Your Phone Last Longer In Winter
Whether you love it or hate it, below-freezing temperatures are a fact of life for many, and that also means adapting to snow, freezing rain, and other conditions. But cold weather doesn’t play well with smartphone batteries, and if you’ve experienced some super-cold temperatures recently, you may have noticed your phone’s battery isn’t lasting as long. In more extreme cases, […]
World’s First Rolled Up TV
As television screen sizes continue to increase, the viewing experience may improve, but the TVs also take up more space within a room. LG has set out to address that problem, with what it claims is the world’s first production roll-up OLED TV. First shown as a prototype one year ago, the 4K TV is now known as the LG […]
PepperSpray Getting Smart Too
Anyone releasing pepper spray could likely do with some urgent assistance, and the Plegium Smart Pepper Spray is built to bring them the help they need as fast as possible. By automatically alerting emergency contacts via a companion smartphone app as its fired, the connected pepper spray informs close ones when a victim is in danger, while also triggering a […]
Standalone Retail Pod
Changes in our buying behavior have had quite a detrimental effect on High St shopping, with many brick and mortar stores now displaying a permanent closed sign in the window. Moby Mart is hoping to bring back the local store experience by combining modern technology with drop in shopping. Moby rolled out its first self-driving 24 hour mobile convenience store […]
Carbon Capture System Saves Co2
If we’re going to reach the goal of keeping Earth from warming more than 1.5° C (2.7° F) this century, it’s not enough to just reduce our carbon dioxide emissions – we need to actively clean it out of the atmosphere too. Inspired by the ocean’s role as a natural carbon sink, researchers at Ulsan National Institute of Science and […]
Two Part Ski Boots
If you’ve been downhill skiing even once, then you’ll know how hard it can be to walk around in the rigid, unyielding ski boots. Swiss company Dahu is addressing that problem, with a two-part system that consists of a flexible inner liner boot and a hinged outer shell. Known as the Dahu Swiss Boot, the idea behind it is that […]
Shoes That Can Record Your Weight?
Alphabet could be looking to seriously step up its fitness tracking game — no pun intended. According to a report from CNBC, Verily, Alphabet’s “life sciences” organization, is looking for partners to develop shoes that can track fitness by including things like the wearer’s movement and their weight. According to the report, Verily has been showing off prototypes of the design […]
Turning Waste Heat Into Cooling Air
Beginning with the principles of the Stirling engine, SoundEnergy’s THEAC thermal acoustic engine takes heat – either industrial waste heat or solar heat – and turns it into powerful cooling without requiring any other power source. This completely renewable technology could prove highly disruptive. The THEAC system uses no mechanical moving parts, no refrigerants, no CO2, no precious metals or […]