Design

Lit Motors CEO Daniel Kim wants to reinvent the motorcycle as we know it today. His idea? To design and manufacture a fully enclosed, two-wheeled motorcycle that runs purely on electric....

12 | September 12, 2011 7:20am

Prefabricated homes conjure up images of uninspired architecture, but Simpatico Homes is constructing sustainable houses out of factory-built modules that are beautifully designed. SmartPlanet's...

3 | January 23, 2012 8:21am

After witnessing women in desperate conditions delivering babies in African hospitals, Dr. Laura Stachel knew she needed to help. She and Hal Aronson have designed a solar kit that is portable and...

4 | July 5, 2012 12:03pm

Lugging around a heavy, cumbersome bike lock can be a nuisance, but Kuat aims to solve that. SmartPlanet's Sumi Das tries out their new Bottle Lock.

3 | February 15, 2012 8:49am

At NASA Ames Research Park, scientist Peter Wasowski has developed an alternative exercise machine called Vasper. The user wears compression cuffs on the arms and legs and core-cooling panels on...

7 | June 13, 2011 3:41pm

Santa Cruz based Plantronics, makers of wireless headsets, is giving its aging facilities a complete design overhaul. The company's head of human resources, Pat Wadors, shows SmartPlanet how the...

5 | February 27, 2012 8:26am

Has the Star Trek Universal Translator arrived? Kristin Precoda, a speech translation researcher at SRI International demos a new translation system. Originally designed for the military to...

12 | July 20, 2009 10:06am

Looking for ways to keep your kids with short-attention spans, more engaged? You might want to try, Kiwi Crate, a subscription service designed for busy parents. Here's how it works. Sign up for a...

4 | May 31, 2012 12:59pm

Robert Full, a professor at University of California at Berkeley, believes that by studying the motion of animals, we can better design robots for search and rescue missions. SmartPlanet visits...

1 | May 3, 2012 3:00pm

Would you conserve energy if you could monitor your consumption by the hour? Lucid Design Group has developed new software that provides users with instant feedback on how much energy they're...

8 | August 24, 2010 9:02am

Solar-powered automobiles, self-driving vehicles, will these be the cars of tomorrow? Sven Beiker heads up Stanford's Automotive Research Center, where students are designing and building their...

7 | April 26, 2011 8:53am

MIT's Mediated Matter Group is developing ways to use new materials like concrete in 3D printing. See how researchers are working with biologically inspired designs in this MIT video.

6 | September 14, 2011 3:08pm

In his Silicon Valley apartment, inventor Kent Frankovich is trying to make cycling safer--with a spin on the good old-fashioned bike reflector. Frankovich has developed a design that makes it...

7 | November 30, 2011 8:43am

Students from Stanford and Finland's Aalto University have developed a prototype laptop that can be disassembled in less than three minutes without the use of any tools. Once it's taken apart, the...

14 | February 14, 2011 2:29pm

Cal student Austin Whitney, a paraplegic, walks at Saturday's commencement ceremony using an exoskeleton suit designed by professor Homayoon Kazerooni and his graduate robotics students....

3 | May 16, 2011 1:21pm

KR Sridhar, CEO of Bloom Energy touts his new Bloom Box fuel cell at a press event in Sunnyvale, California. The technology is designed to be stacked into small blocks and housed in a unit about...

5 | February 24, 2010 4:46pm

Ford has been able to cut the car manufacturing process in half, from six years to three years, using virtual reality during the design phase. SmartPlanet correspondent Sumi Das gets outfitted...

2 | March 19, 2012 8:21am

Steve Zornetzer, associate director of NASA Ames Research Center, talks about the space agency's plan to design eco-friendly buildings on earth using technologies developed for space exploration....

August 29, 2011 3:32pm

Dr. Jacob Rosen, a professor at UC Santa Cruz is designing wearable robots to assist stroke victims in physical therapy and rehabilitation. SmartPlanet visits his robotics lab to see how...

3 | August 31, 2010 12:25pm

At Nest Labs, former Apple product engineers Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers have molded their thermostat with many of the design and technology characteristics of Apple products like the iPod and...

1 | December 6, 2011 8:35am