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Life in 2020: Frog Design's vision

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

Researchers identify new low-cost catalyst for hydrogen production

To make sunlight practical as a dominant source of energy a viable storage technology needs to be developed. One promising area of research is imitating the process of photosynthesis to separate the hydrogen and oxygen atoms in water to create hydrogen fuel. An MIT team led by Daniel Nocera is now reporting that nickel borate can efficiently and sustainably function as the oxygen-producing electrode in such a process bringing the dream of energy storage systems that would allow buildings to be completely independent and self-sustaining in terms of energy. Read More

Evoluce brings gesture control to 47-inch touchscreen display

Last October, Evoluce showed off its 47-inch multi-touch LCD HD display monster which can register an unlimited number of simultaneous contact points from both stylus and human touch. Not content with mere touchscreen technology, the company has now unveiled geo-spatial gesture functionality which allows users to control actions on the screen at up to a meter away. Read More

Happy Birthday to Formula One

The world's premier television sport had a major birthday this week. On May 13, 1950, the first ever Formula One World Championship race was held at the UK’s Silverstone motor racing circuit with Alfa Romeo storming to an historic 1-2-3 podium lockout. Italian Giuseppe Farina, nephew of the founder of the influential automotive stylist Pininfarina, dominated proceedings in his 300 bhp Alfa Romeo 158 ('15' for 1,500cc and '8' for 8 cylinders), with the three Alfas two laps clear of the 21-strong field. F1's influence has grown over the last 60 years to the point where more than 600 million people watch each race - that is, one in every eleven human beings watches each F1 race. Read More

The dissolvable wedding dress

Aiming to address the issue of “throwaway fashion” and its impact on the environment as landfill, students at Sheffield Hallam University have combined fashion design with engineering to create a dissolvable wedding dress. This truly "wear once" garment can be converted into five different fashion pieces before being dissolved in water leaving no environmental footprint. Read More

MusicLites WiFi-enabled LED bulb fuses light and sound

The outlook for piping music into office space or the shop floor is about to get a lot brighter. Lighting solutions company Osram Sylvania and audio innovator Artisan have teamed up to produce the MusicLites system - a 10W LED light bulb with a 70mm full range hi-fi audio speaker built in. The inclusion of a 2.4GHz wireless transceiver means that compatible audio devices can send music sound signals to the unit, which then pumps out both sound and light. Read More

D-Drive redux: about that holy grail thing...

Every now and again, astute Gizmag readers come to the fore to keep us on our toes - and never has this been better demonstrated than with last Friday's D-Drive Infinitely Variable Transmission article. More than 40 comments and e-mails have flooded in over the weekend questioning the D-Drive's capabilities as a true IVT, and its potential efficiencies. Furthermore, an engineering report was made available on the D-Drive website that flat-out negates some of the key claims that were made in our interview video. So let's take another look at this device in the harsh light of engineering scrutiny. Read More

Flexible Snake Scope camera shows you the unreachable

Perhaps you’re wondering if that earring you dropped really did go down the furnace vent. Or maybe you want to check if there’s a mouse’s nest beyond that suspicious-looking hole in your baseboards. Or hey, maybe you just think it would be neat to see what it looks like inside that mountain tunnel on your model railroad. Whatever the case, a nifty new product called the Flexible Snake Scope USB Camera will allow you to peek into areas way too small to accommodate your giant head. Read More

Microsoft's cloud-based Office 2010 packs a raft of new features

Microsoft has commanded the attention of business folk around the globe by announcing the world-wide release of its new productivity suite, Office 2010. As well as introducing more new features than you can shake a stick at, the company's cloud computing aspirations are given form with the introduction of browser-based versions of the likes of Word and Excel. Read More

TweakTown's week in review - Gateway's ZX4800-06, Sony Bravia 3D LCD TV and much more

There's been a good bundle of componentry pass through the TweakTown labs this week including QNAP's new 4-bay NAS, Gateway's ZX4800-06 all-in-one desktop and NETGEAR's Powerline AV 200 XAVB2001 home networking solution. The TweakTown team also gives us the low-down on the Cooler Master CM 690 II Advanced mid-tower chassis and Sony's Bravia 3D LCD TV. Read More

BokashiPetCycle puts your pet poop to use

What do you do with your dog or cat poop? Toss it in the garbage? Put it in your compost heap? Hurl it at your noisy neighbors? Well, according to Seattle researcher Lawrence Green, you shouldn’t be doing any of those things. Feces can contain wonderful things like toxoplasma parasites, E. coli, and salmonella bacteria, which can get into the groundwater. In plastic bags in landfills, it generates methane gas and attracts vermin. To that end, Green developed a product called the BokashiPetCycle Fermenting System. It allows you to pickle your pet’s poop, turning it into a harmless plant fertilizer. Read More

Sony working on HD video camera with interchangeable lenses

Sony is developing a new type of AVCHD high definition camcorder with an interchangeable lens similar to DSLR cameras. Still at prototype stage, the camcorder will be equipped with the same Exmor APS HD CMOS sensor used in the new NEX-5 and NEX-3 cameras and will be able to share E-mount interchangeable lenses. Read More

Honda's Bodyweight Support Assist selected for NY innovation exhibition

Some of you may recall our piece on Honda's Body Support Assist prototype last year. As a quick update to that story, those of you in the New York area will get a chance to see it in person as a part of the "Why Design Now?" exhibition at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution. Read More