Design
Two-in-one-furniture: the table-chair
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We've seen some interesting dual-purpose furniture design concepts of late and the SwiTCh from Ellesco International in Belgium is another bright example. Put the two pieces together and it's a comfortable armchair, separate them and flip the back section upright and it becomes a small table with a seat.
SJ30 breaks light jet speed record from London to Dubai
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The London to Dubai route is probably going to see a lot of private business air traffic in the coming years and Emivest Aerospace has used it to showcase the high speed capabilities of its SJ30 Business Jet. The aircraft has set a speed record for its class, flying from London to Dubai in seven hours and seven minutes, including a 41-minute refueling stop in Istanbul. Read More
Micro generator produces power from movement
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A micron-scale generator that uses zinc oxide wires to produce alternating current could be woven into clothing to power wireless devices or implanted in the body to monitor vital signs. A team led by Zhong Lin Wang at the Georgia Institute of Technology’s Center for Nanostructure Characterization has developed the generator, which can produce an oscillating output voltage of up to 45 millivolts. Read More
F-35 Lightning II breaks sound barrier
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Lockheed Martin has promised that its fifth gen F-35 fighter will allow pilots to “do things that were previously considered impossible, and to think things that were previously unthinkable.” Almost two years after its maiden flight, the F-35 Lightning II has reached another development milestone – supersonic flight. Test pilot Jon Beesley accelerated the F-35 AA-1 to Mach 1.05, with a full internal load of dummy weapons. Read More
Gordon Murray's T.25 wins Idea of the Year
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November 18, 2008 Celebrated automative designer Gordon Murray was last night awarded the prestigious ‘Idea of the Year’ accolade at Autocar magazine’s annual awards ceremony for the T.25, a radical, innovative design for a new type and class of personal transport vehicle. Autocar’s editor Chas Hallett said, “Gordon Murray is looking to completely reinvent the cars that we buy and the way they are made. And from what we’ve seen it doesn’t get a much better idea than that”. Three of Murray's diminutive T.25 vehicles will fit in a single parking space. Read More
Touch Sight camera for the blind
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Capturing an image takes on a different meaning with the Touch Sight camera. The device makes it possible for the visually impaired to take digital photos by using a Braille-like screen to make a raised image on the user’s forehead of whatever the lens sees. Read More
Packaging innovation promises to reduce landfill
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Each year an estimated 20 billion cubic feet of styrofoam is used globally for the shipment of 250 million perishable packages. Once the packages have arrived safely, this quickly translates to mountains of landfill. Coldpack's eco-friendly alternative is an inflatable insulating liner that converts a corrugated box into a cooler with better insulation and cushioning properties than styrofoam, reducing supply chain costs as well landfill. Read More
Cricket portable laptop stand
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Laptop stands are a great solution for keeping your machine cool and your posture upright when spending hours at the desk, but when it comes time to pack your bags and get on the road, there just never seems to be room for these types of added extras. It's a problem that the collapsible, lightweight Cricket Laptop Stand is designed to solve. Read More
The MechRC Megatron-esque robot
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Is this Megatron's love-child? The MechRC is a programmable, remote controlled robot with 17 independently controllable servos (points of articulation), each capable of up to 180 degrees of movement. This provides the bot with an extremely wide range of actions – and the database of 100 pre-programmed motions and sound can be expanded by using the included software to create new manoeuvres. Read More
40 Signature Series: stunning Lord Norman Foster designed super-yacht
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One of the most elegant water-going creations to cross our desk in recent times is the Foster and Partners designed YachtPlus 40 ‘Signature Series'. Designed by a 7-strong architectural team led by Lord Foster himself and being built at the Rodriquez Cantieri Navali shipyard in northern Italy, the ultra-contemporary 135 foot (41m) luxury superyacht offers 5737 square feet of useable living space with extensive outer deck area including a submergible beach deck, a grand staircase at transom and seperate jet ski storage space. The innovative interior layout has four decks accommodating up to 12 guests and 7 crew while the full beam owner’s cabin on the main deck includes forward-facing windows that lead to private balconies and the glass walled main saloon features 180 degree views. Read More
Design Los Angeles asks how motor-racing will look in 2025
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After last year being asked to provide a glimpse of what automobiles will look like 50 years into the future, design studios vying for recognition in this year's LA Auto Show Design Challenge are leaving city streets behind and heading for the racetrack under the theme "Motorsports 2025". Throwing away preconceptions of what motor racing should be and incorporating the possibility of cars that never crash or need re-fueling, nine of Southern California’s big-name automotive design houses have submitted entries, and again the results are both outrageous and thought provoking - from vehicles that race over land, sea and air to 8 x 4 wheel-drive ATVs and solar sailing energy-miser's that compete on see-through tracks. Read More
The pedestrian-powered Human Water Pump concept
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According to research from the Pacific Institute, more than five million people die each year from water-related disease, primarily due to inadequate access to clean water which, if it is available, often requires trekking over long distances to reach it. Gunwook Nam from South Korea has proposed a solution that harnesses people power - literally. The Human Pump concept uses a boardwalk structure fitted with springs that captures and stores kinetic energy from foot-traffic and uses it to pump underground water to the surface. Read More
Robot swarms could help colonize Mars
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Hundreds of micro-robots will work together to carry out repairs inside machinery, explore deep-sea environments, and even colonize Mars according to predictions from the EU-funded I-SWARM project, which is developing centimeter-scale autonomous robots that co-operate like a colony of ants and therefore can compensate for the failure of individual members. Read More
NASA testing next-gen lunar rover in Arizona
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NASA’s 12-wheeled Small Pressurized Rover raced (by lunar rover standards) across the moon-like Arizona outback at 6mph this week as part of the 11th annual Desert Research and Technology Studies (RATS). While the buggies on the Apollo missions only provided a 6 mile range, the presence of two or more SPRs on a lunar landing will provide a range of over 150 miles. Read More
iBangle wearable design concept
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Apple has a well deserved reputation for churning out slick designs and is equally adept at keeping us guessing as to what's around the corner. Designer Gopinath Prasana is one aficionado who has decided not to wait and see, instead coming up with his own take on what the iPod of the future might look like. Dubbed the iBangle, the concept design turns the iPod into a wrist worn, aluminum bracelet complete with an adjustable air chamber on the inner face that can be inflated to ensure a snug fit. Read More
Sushi that you sit on
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SUSHI is a multifunctional furniture design that doubles as both a sofa and a stool from Australian University student Winaya Suwarnaga Kamaputri. The elegantly simple and ergonomic concept uses a high gloss finished fiber glass base with fine fabric upholstery and its unique pattern was created using a laser cutting technique. Read More
2008 Peugeot Design Contest: tommorrow's urban commuters
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Peugeot has announced the winners of its 2008 Design Competition with RD, a morphing three-wheeler from 25 year old Columbian designer Carlos Arturo Torres Tovar claiming the top prize in what has once again proved to be an invigorating platform for futuristic automotive design. Now in its fifth year, the theme set down for this year's contest was to "imagine the Peugeot in the worldwide megopolis of tomorrow", a challenge the winning entry meets with a small footprint that gives it the scope to navigate narrow roads combined with the ability to shorten itself by folding upwards at a central hinge point in bumper-to-bumper traffic. Along with the €10,000 prize, the designer will see his vision produced in full-scale model form for the 2009 Shanghai Motor Show. Read More
Smart fabrics and the future of healthcare
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You don’t often hear fashion mentioned in the same sentence as cutting edge medical technology (unless you watch Grey’s Anatomy), but shirts that double as health monitors are just one type of garment under consideration in the emerging smart fabrics industry, a market that is estimated to be worth over €300 million, with a growth rate of roughly 20% per year. Read More
Rainbow Glasses: fashion you can see through
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Fashionistas who are required to wear glasses will love this color-changing eyewear concept from Portuguese industrial designer, Luis Porem. Created as an entry for the Opus Award, the RbG Rainbow Glasses are hollow and allow the wearer to fill them with various colors of ink to match their outfit. Read More
Seat-less bike design promises fitter children
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October 22, 2008 The “Taurus” is a futuristic bicycle concept from Julia Meyer which promises to keep kids fit through its seat-less design. The forward-leaning configuration means you stand on the bike in the optimum position for giving your leg muscles a solid workout as well as ensuring correct posture. Read More
Turning old houses into green homes
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Building environmentally friendly houses from the ground up is all well and good, but what about the existing energy inefficient houses most of us still live in? In 1930’s England three million semi-detached houses, or duplexes, were built and are still a major part the current housing stock. Now a three-year research project is about to start at The University of Nottingham that will help people living in these properties meet the Government’s ambitions to reduce CO2 emissions from homes. The joint project with the energy firm E.ON aims to learn energy efficiency lessons for the future from the failings of houses in the past. Read More
Innovative phone design for the visually impaired
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"SENS", from Takumi Yoshida, is a mobile phone design catering for those with visual impairment including complete blindness. The phone assists visually impaired users through a special keypad design, real-time audio feedback and touch sensing technology. Read More
Bullet-proof polo shirt
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For those occasions when a bullet-proof gentleman’s square just won’t do, there is the bullet-proof polo shirt. The US$12,000 anti-ballistic shirt from Columbian designer Miguel Caballerois is made of ultra-lightweight, bullet-proof fabric and features removable ballistic panels designed to offer protection from weaponry ranging from a 9mm pistol to an Uzi. Read More
Fingerfood: hold on to your hors d’oeuvres
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This adorable idea takes the notion of “finger food” quite literally. A tiny plate attached to a ring that slips over your finger, the Fingerfood is the perfect way to balance your snack and glass of wine at a party. Read More
Finally, a bullet-proof handkerchief
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Where would any discerning gentleman be without the humble handkerchief? They provide a fashionable place to deposit one’s nasal excretions, are a convenient place to dry one’s hands when caught without a towel, and are able to deflect bullets when one is caught in the middle of a gunfight. That’s right, the invention we’ve all been waiting for has finally arrived with the release of the ‘Bullet-Proof Gentleman’s Pocket Square’. Read More
Unique navigation aid for the visually-impaired
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Another interesting entry from the Create the Future Design Contest, the Navigation aid for the Blind uses existing technology in a very clever way. It consists of a headset which has an audio transducer and a built-in microphone and uses GPS, obstacle detection technology and speech recognition to safely guide the wearer to their destination. The wearer simply states the destination address into the microphone and the technology does the rest, guiding and directing the user safely through the streets. Read More
Pterodactyl-based UAV design for urban combat scenarios
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Scientists have designed a highly-maneuverable UAV modeled on a 228-million-year-old pterodactyl. The 30-inch robotic craft would alter its wing shape to “squeeze through confined spaces, dive between buildings, travel under overpasses, land on apartment balconies, and sail along the coastline.” Read More
World's largest LED screen to be built in (where else) Dubai
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Dubai is set to be home to the world’s largest LED screen - a curved, 300ft+ tall monster that will be visible from a distance of just under 1 mile. The screen will make up the facade of the “Podium” skyscraper which will offer commercial and retail space across 35 floors of around 10,000 square feet each with over 50,000 square feet of parking space. Read More
Raytheon's KillerBee UAV tested in simulated combat
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Raytheon’s KillerBee, a 10-foot wide UAV designed for surveillance and reconnaissance, has been successfully demonstrated in a simulated combat environment. A Raytheon flight operations crew delivered the 30 pound KillerBee system to a remote location using Humvees and achieved set up and launch within 45 minutes before executing the operational scenario and retrieving the aircraft with a net-recovery system. Read More
The Innervision recyclable bicycle concept
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Industrial Designer Matt Clark is taking what is already the world's most popular mode of eco-friendly transportation a step further with his recyclable Innervision bicycle concept. The goal behind the project is to reduce costs and streamline the manufacturing process by using pre-molded plastic components rather than aluminum tubes for the bicycle frame, producing a lightweight and affordable product for the cycling masses that could be made from, or turned into, plastic products. Read More
Volvo's new high-tech wind tunnel
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Volvo has invested 20 million Euro in complete refurbishment of its in-house wind-tunnel, making it the first car manufacturer to own a facility which combines a moving road simulation system with the ability to fully reproduce the airflow around and underneath the car's body... and it's already delivering results in the quest for greater fuel efficiency and lower emissions. Read More
Run while you ride on the elliptiGO bike
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The elliptiGO glide bike offers riders all the best elements of running and cycling in one machine. Whilst running is an excellent way to improve cardiovascular health and general fitness, many runners are plagued with back and leg injuries due to the high impact nature of the sport. Similarly, bike riders often suffer from shoulder and back injuries and saddle-soreness. When you ride the elliptiGO you use the same biomechanics of running but the impact is reduced and the upright position is a much more comfortable way to ride as well as providing greater visibility in traffic. Read More
Underwater exoskeletons mimic dolphins and penguins
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The University of West Florida’s Institute of Human and Machine Cognition has released designs of biologically inspired aquatic exoskeletons – robotic suits that enhance the user’s strength and provide great advancements in speed, stealth and maneuverability, allowing the wearer them to mimic the efficient swimming styles of penguins, dolphins and turtles. Read More
The CarvX four-wheeled carving recumbent bike
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Vehicles with a carving or tilting mechanism to assist in steering through corners make a lot of sense. We can attest to the validity of the theory following our test ride of the virtually undroppable Piaggio MP3 scooter and we've seen numerous design platforms that incorporate this approach including the VenturOne plug-in hybrid , the Xnovo three-wheeler, Brudeli's Leanster and the Lumeneo Smera. Human-powered carvers have also been spotted on the drawing-board, but we've never encountered a concept design that applies this principle to a four wheeled recumbent bicycle - until now. Read More
Gresso's limited edition 192Gb USB pendant
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The latest high-end tech offering from Gresso is a cleverly designed USB Flash drive pendant that incorporates three separate 64 Gb memory sticks into a single unit made from 200-year-old African Blackwood with diamond and gold trimmings. A limited run of 99 pieces has been announced for the ENIGMA collection, but prospective buyers will have to dig deep. Read More
