Wearables

The ability of some animals, including chameleons, octopus, and squid, to change their skin colour for camouflage, temperature control, or communication is well known. While science has been able to replicate these abilities with artificial skin, the colour changes are often only visible to the naked eye when the material is put under huge mechanical strain.

At the University of California San Diego engineers have developed a low-cost electronic glove capable of understanding sign language. A user simply puts it on and can sign away, with the glove wirelessly transmitting what it’s interpreting to another device to be read out or for the words to appear on a screen. The cost of all the parts comes out to less than $100, including the printed stretchable electronic sensors that are attached to t...

Humans experience a range of emotions in response to products and experiences on a daily basis. Shoppers may get excited for certain brands and then overwhelmed by choices. Audience members may oscillate between apathy and engagement during performances. Children can become frustrated, bored, or entertained while learning a new subject.

  The addition of a round AMOLED display to its range for wearable and instrumentation applications has been announced by andersDX. It complements the circular PMOLED and touchscreen modules that it already offers. andersDX launched AMOLED (Active Matrix OLED) technology for the industrial market in October 2016.

  Dani Clode, a grad student at the Royal College of Art in London, has created what she calls the 'Third Thumb'—a system that adds a mechanical thumb to the opposite side of a natural thumb on a human hand. She showcased her invention at this year's RCA graduate exhibition.

  The U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared the expanded use of a cooling cap, DigniCap Cooling System, to reduce hair loss (alopecia) during chemotherapy. This is the first cooling cap cleared by the agency for use in cancer patients with solid tumours.

Two companies at Mobile World Congress Shanghai, Qualcomm Technologies and 360 announced that together they are working on 4G kid watches and are launching 360’s first product for this industry, 360 Kids Watch 6S, based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 2100 platform. The 360 Kids Watch 6S combines the Snapdragon Wear 2100 platform with the 360 OS for Wear operating system, both optimised to meet the evolving needs of connected families.

  Despite the potentially severe consequences of illness and even death, only about 40% of adults in the United States receive flu shots each year; however, researchers believe a new self-administered, painless vaccine skin patch containing microscopic needles could significantly increase the number of people who get vaccinated.

A new family of MEMS acceleration sensors for wearable devices has been announced by Bosch Sensortec, offering high performance and ease of integration in compact packages. The BMA456 and BMA423 are specifically designed for motion and fitness tracking in wearables. The new products will be showcased at the Bosch booth 836 at the Sensors Expo & Conference in San Jose, USA, 27th to 29th June 2017.

Researchers at the College of Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University have developed a novel design approach for exoskeletons and prosthetic limbs that incorporates direct feedback from the human body. The findings were published in Science. This technique, called human-in-the-loop optimisation, customises walking assistance for individuals and significantly improves energy economy during walking. The algorithm that enables this optim...