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Greetings!
Welcome to our fourth newsletter at IoT Works. IoT Works is an Internet of Things (IoT) focused investment company that brings together the best ideas, people, resources and financing to help build the Internet of Things.
Today's newsletter edition focuses on IoT applications for your health. As Kickstarter does not include healthcare projects, we've focused on research and existing products for this edition (plus a cool Kickstarter project on lucid dreaming). Read on!
Yours in all things IoT,
Amanda amanda@iotworks.com |
The IoT and Healthcare
The starting point for the Internet Of Things is represented by our smartphones which are not only connected to the net, but are also going to be ever more enriched with applications and sensors, and used by people as valuable tools for our Health.
The tipping point, represented by this cultural shift, together with the explosion of a new generation of GPS based mobile device - and - with the raising relevance of complex information visualization, was the natural reason why many companies tried to intercept this trend, with new products and services. The early and rapid adoption by sport and fitness oriented products - starting in 2008 up to now - we saw the concept of "monitoring yourself" take off and away from the classic tech or health way to "remote monitoring".
Continue reading about IoT and Healthcare...
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Helping the blind
Ducere Technologies, Bangalore, has created a haptic shoe for the visually impaired. One of the user's shoes will provide haptic feedback, guiding the user toward their destination by vibrating in the front, back, or on either side. A vibration on the front indicates that they should keep going straight, a vibration on the left side means that they should turn left, and so on. The user begins by speaking their destination on Google Maps, using their Le Chal-apprunning Android smart phone.
Check out the Ducere Tech...
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Improving how you sit
Stand taller and feel better using the LUMOback posture sensor and mobile app. The sensor provides a gentle vibration when you slouch to remind you to sit or stand straight. It is worn on your lower back and designed to be slim, sleek and so comfortable that you barely feel it when you have it on. The sensor connects wirelessly to an iPhone 4S or new iPad app which tracks all of your movement data.
Check out Lumo Back...
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Kickstarter Success: Remee
Remee targets the long chunks of REM sleep towards the end of the sleep period. Before bed, turn Remee on, fine tune the brightness of the lights (if needed) and then go to sleep. Remee will wait for an initial long delay, usually 4-5 hours, until you're in the heart of the heavy REM stages, before initializing light patterns. After the initial long delay Remee will display light patterns for 15-20 seconds with a second shorter delay, default at 15 minutes, between each signal. During non-REM sleep the lights are unlikely to effect you, but if you're in REM sleep the lights will bleed into your dreams, presenting a perfect chance to become lucid.
Check out Remee on Kickstarter...
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SENSEable shoes
SENSEable Shoes is a hands-free and eyes-free foot-computer interface that supports on-the-go interaction with surrounding environments. It recognizes different low-level activities by measuring the user's continuous weight distribution over the feet with twelve Force Sensing Resistor (FSR) sensors embedded in the insoles of shoes.
Using the sensor data as inputs, a Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier identifies up to eighteen mobile activities and a four-directional foot control gesture at approximately 98% accuracy. By understanding user's present activities and foot gestures, this system offers a nonintrusive and always-available input method.
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Empowering children with diabetes
Patients will comply with a doctor's orders when it is easy for them to do so and when they understand why they should. In a two week design program at the MIT Media Lab, a group of innovators focused on empowering children suffering from diabetes. They created tube from a 3D printer & used electronics to react to a child's breath to send when a problem was beginning. The tube would light up if a child missed a medication dose. And to reward a youngster for a week of successful medicating? Noises and the antics of a cartoon chameleon.
Not bad for a two week development cycle. Check out the Chameleon... |
Smart sutures that detect infections
The sutures can precisely measure temperature-elevated temperatures indicate infection-and deliver heat to a wound site, which is known to aid healing. And John Rogers, professor of materials science and engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and inventor of the smart sutures, imagines that they could also be laden with devices that provide electrical stimulation to heal wounds. "Ultimately, the most value would be when you can release drugs from them in a programmed way," he says. The researchers could do that by coating the electronic threads with drug-infused polymers, which would release the chemicals when triggered by heat or an electrical pulse.
Check out Smart sutures...
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