Today, it would be hard to name even a couple people that are inventing the world of the 21^st century.

So is innovation dead?  Absolutely not.  Actually we’ve seen more innovation in the past fifty years than in the entire previous thousands of years of human history combined. Huge achievements in medicine, communications, space travel, and computers have happened on our watch. So maybe we don’t have that iconic inventor to point to outside of high tech innovators such as Bill Gates and Steve Wozniak, but we can tell you that brilliant ideas and innovations in almost every field of human endeavor are very much alive and well.  In fact, just in the past year we have seen some amazing inventions.

Here are a few of the best and brightest ideas of 2012.

Flexible Solar Panels – Solar panels are great – if you can afford both the panels and the huge cost of installation – regular solar panels are rigid and need to be mounted on angled arrays. But if you had flexible thin-film solar panels which could be unrolled like wrapping paper, now that would be cool. Well, a company called Ascent Solar Technologies has invented a thin-film panel that can be integrated directly into a roof, a wall, even on a tent and deliver solar-based energy.

Life-logging Cameras – Capturing your entire life on camera is now possible, assuming you’re egotistical enough to think anyone else would want to watch every moment of your life.  Two prototype cameras came out in 2012; from Memoto and OMG Life. Both cameras attach to your clothes at chest level and automatically snap pictures for you; the Memoto takes a pic every 30 seconds and the other whenever it detects sudden changes that indicate significant actions.

3D printers – Yes, the concept of 3D printers has been around for many years now and expensive 3D printers have been used by industry, but now, in 2012, Formlabs has developed an ultra-precise 3D laser-based printer at a friendlier consumer price point.  Now we can all print three-dimensional things for our home.  Out of forks or plates? Save yourself a trip to Target and just print them at home – you’ll be setting the table in no time.

The Built-in Breathalyzer – Imagine that your car could automatically breathalyse you every time you get in to drive. Well, QinetiQ North America is working on just such a device.  Working with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the auto industry, QinetiQ is developing a sensor in your car that would instantly measure the blood-alcohol concentration in your exhaled breath. If the blood-alcohol level is above the legal limit, the car can’t be driven.

The Inkling pen – Ever think you might have a pen that would remember every stroke it ever took?  Welcome to the Inkling pen – it’s a digital sketch pen that captures a digital likeness of your work while you sketch with its ballpoint tip on any sketchbook or standard piece of paper and stores it on a receiver you place on the paper. When you connect the receiver to a computer via a USB cable, it transfers those images and saves them as files.

Focused UltraSound – What if you combined the detection power of magnetic-resonance-imaging (MRI) with the power of ultrasound waves – you would get something pretty remarkable. Using MRI for guidance, the ultrasound applies high-intensity focused sonic energy to locally heat and destroy diseased or damaged tissue such as tumors or other growths like uterine fibroids.

So, while there are many other examples we could highlight, we think it’s pretty clear that innovation is alive and well!

You may have noticed that we didn’t tell you who invented all of these incredible inventions of 2012. That’s because we seem to have traded the lone genius inventor working in his lab for more of a committee-based approach. But that’s not bad; it’s just different. This cooperative spirit of invention, born in the space age, is now part of the American spirit, and that will always be something to admire.

SOURCES:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2099708-4,00.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/28/best-inventions-2012_n_2271732.html
http://blog.sherweb.com/top-10-tech-inventions-shaping-2012/
http://www.wacom.com/en/creative/products/mobile/inkling
http://www.zdnet.com/autographer-wearable-camera-will-save-your-life-or-track-your-staff-7000004775/
http://www.mnn.com/green-tech/gadgets-electronics/stories/lifelogging-camera-takes-a-photo-every-30-seconds
http://www.ascentsolar.com/

The post Best Inventions of 2012 appeared first on Davison.

So has been the cliché of the perfect home, since the dawn of suburbia. But the days of simple comforts are quickly becoming obsolete. Families have rapidly become tired of robotic appliances, gas fireplaces are old news, and the dreams of owning a flat panel TV have been replaced by dreams of 3D. Times they are a-changing. And so is the landscape of modern home technology. Here are five exciting technologies that might be the future of must-have home goods.

A new place for fire

Don’t have a fireplace? Don’t have a chimney? You don’t have a problem. The Bio-Blaze Black Qube Liquid Fuel Fireplace is a free-standing floor model which can be located anywhere in any room — indoors or out — and can be viewed from front as well as the back. The Bloc 2.5 liter ethanol burner creates the perfect flames to warm and enhance any space. Because this fireplace burns clean bio-ethanol, it does not require a flue and releases mainly H2O and very little CO2. There is no smoke or smell while the fuel burns, and it can be installed in a ventilated room (living room, sitting room, dining room, veranda).

Lean, mean laser-cleaning machine

It seems like only yesterday our minds were blown by the Roomba, a vacuum-cleaning robot that wandered around our houses without instruction or complaint, tirelessly picking up potato chip crumbs, pet hair and any other human leavings. But Roomba cleans at random, vacuuming chaotically until it bumps into an obstacle. The Neato XV-11 All Floor Robotic Vacuum System came up with a better way. Neato’s laser-based Room Positioning System gives the robot vacuum a full 360-degree view of a room so it can create a map of the room, detecting walls, doorways, furniture and other obstacles. Using its map, the Neato XV-11 avoids most obstacles that other robots can only detect by impact. Just press the start button and your Neato determines the best cleaning path to clean the floors using its unique, methodical straight-line pattern.

Gray skies are gonna clear up

Even rainy skies are blue with the Sky Factory Luminous SkyCeilings. — virtual skylights with photographic illusions of real sky views that trigger beneficial “relaxation responses” for the mind and body. They are modular and can be designed to any rectangular shape, or arrangement of shapes, defined by the suspended ceiling grid. Luminous SkyCeilings are scalable – from a single 2-by-2 square to as large as you want – easy to install, and work with existing grid systems.

Lighting efficiency – You must have a plan

When you have a panel full of light switches, it can be challenging to remember which is which. The Floor Plan Light Switch offers an easy solution. The switches are modified according to the floor plan of the room and operate accordingly. So, at a single glance, you know which switch controls what.

Ever-changing wall

This is a free–standing 20-by-20 wall with a prism system that will allow for millions of color and text options. The designer notes it’ll be in production soon, and hopes it will arrive in the U.S. as a rental in the coming years. This is a very fun and practical concept that would be a welcome addition to any house (See below for the various designs).

Davison products are similar to those listed above. We might not have television ceilings or laser vacuum cleaners (yet), but our products are created to help our clients and customers lead better lives through finding better ways to accomplish tasks.

The post Hands-free, Automated, Vacuum-cleaning Robots are so Passé appeared first on Davison.