Innovation

Nerd Jewelry from Japan Measures Your Level of Geek Chic

by Steve Levenstein

Geek chicks looking to flaunt some geek chic should look no further than Mass Item's “Measuring” line of math set women's jewelry from Japanese designer Kyozo Kawabe. The miniaturized and accessorized rulers, triangles and protractors come in a variety of colors and won't leak ink into your pocket protector.

Polymer Shown To Rehabilitate Soil After A Wildfire

by Myra Per-Lee

Wildfires claim hundreds of thousands of farm acres yearly, causing famines and permanent devastation to the soil that produced the farmed crops. But a graduate student at Tel Aviv University (TAU), along with his supervising professors from TAU and the University of La Coruña in Spain, has identified an anionic polymer polyacrylamide (PAM) that seems to enable reforestation more rapidly and less expensively than current methods.

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Hello Kitty's Tribute to Visionary Apple CEO, Steve Jobs

by Steve Levenstein

Sanrio, Japan's kawaii character company and home of cuteness queen Hello Kitty, teamed up with California goods retailer LoungeFly to thank Apple's inspirational CEO, the late Steve Jobs, for a lifetime of creativity. The result was a bizarrely cute "Hello Stevie" love-child that ended up pleasing nobody.

Newest Japanese Rice Field Art Sends Living Messages of Hope

by Steve Levenstein

The 2011 crop of “Tanbo” rice field art is bolder and more beautiful than ever before. This year, though, Japan's artistic rice farmers are going against the grain by growing messages of hope and perseverance meant to encourage a nation fed up with natural and unnatural disasters.

McDonald's German Chicken Sausage Burger Blitzes Hong Kong

by China.new

If you're hungry enough to raise the Teutonic, then we kindly ask you to get a grip... on the German Chicken Sausage Burger, an epicurious menu offering from McDonald's Hong Kong. What say ye, Actual German Folks™, das schmeckt or das boo?

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China's Chocolate Fashion Looks Good, Tastes Great!

by China.new

A rather “tasteful” fashion show at World Chocolate Wonderland in Shanghai, China, featured clothing and accessories made from delicately (and deliciously) carved & crafted chocolate.

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Toshiba's 'Portable Gamma Camera' Takes Snapshots of Radiation Hotspots

by Steve Levenstein

Toshiba has developed a portable radiation-sensing camera that overlays color-coded radioactivity measurements over visual images. The camera is a refined version of a similar concept tested and proven at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Sensing Microneedles Developed For Continuous Monitoring Of Body Chemicals

by T Goodman

In the future, maybe not too distant, diabetics may be able to monitor their glucose levels continuously, rather than at one point in time, thanks to the researchers from North Carolina State University, Sandia National Laboratories, and the University of California, San Diego. These researchers have incorporated sensors into multiple microneedles, each less than a millimeter long, that may make today's glucose analyzers, the annoying skin prick tests, obsolete.

Roll-Up Remote Control Speaker Keyboard for Well Rounded Types

by China.new

Roll-Up keyboards are nothing new but the DN-SKB-MF02 Roll-Up Speaker Keyboard from Shanghai Donya takes the concept to the next level. The USB-powered and remote-control operated device features a keyboard, stereo speakers and MP3 music player compatibility all wrapped up in a sleek silvery cylinder.

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Surgeons Check Out Donor Lungs 'Ex Vivo' Prior To Transplant

by T Goodman

Surgeons at the New York Presbyterian Hospital at Columbia University performed the very first 'ex vivo' lung transplants yesterday, placing a deceased donor's lungs into a test dome for four hours to get the lungs in shape for their new human recipients. Organ testing procedures have been available prior to now, but none as sophisticated as the XVIVA Perfusion System employed in these particular transplant surgeries.

Wacky Wax 'Candelier' is one Wick-edly Clever Lamp Design

by Steve Levenstein

Wax on! What's bright and white but uses no light... bulbs? The Candelier, of course, a majestic (and messy) chandelier made entirely from white wax by Japanese designer Takeshi Miyakawa. We're certain Mr. Miyagi would approve.

Giant Godzilla Christmas Tree Spruces Up Tokyo Mall

by Steve Levenstein

Pining for those classic Japanese monster movies that had you sitting on pins and needles? Well fir not, er, fear not! The giant Godzilla Christmas Tree from the Aqua City Odaiba shopping mall in Tokyo is the original nightmare before Christmas!

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Homemade 'Hummer' Lets Chinese Chef Show Some Swagger

by China.new

By night, Qu Zhibo is a chef and restaurant owner from Zigong City in China's Sichuan Province. By day, however, he's “Qu Zhibo, Hummer Driver!”... or something vaguely resembling a Hummer. Qu designed and constructed his 1-of-a-kind, 4-wheeled, 8-tired tribute to American rolling stock with GM's mighty military machine in mind.

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'Pillow Talk' Phone Headrests Enable Conversations via Cushion

by Steve Levenstein

Old and busted: phone headsets. New hotness: phone headrests! The “Dare to Demo” star-shaped plush pillow from Willcom allows users to rest their weary heads while conducting hands-free conversations.

Japanese Scientists Listen to Oysters, Pick Up Pearls of Wisdom

by Steve Levenstein

Put a shell to your ear and you can hear the ocean. Japanese scientists have taken that concept to a higher level, inventing a device called the “kai-lingual” that can “hear” oysters commenting on their environment. Well shucks!

With IPOs & Bankruptcy In The Air, Zynga Soars, American Airlines Zags & Alec Baldwin Zings

With IPOs & Bankruptcy In The Air, Zynga Soars, American Airlines Zags & Alec Balwin Zings

by Ron Callari

There's seems to be a glint of irony taking to the not-so-friendly skies, or so one popular TV-star would like the world to believe. While online gaming giant Zynga hopes to reap between $850 million and $1.15 billion with its impending IPO offering on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, the venerable American Airlines files Chapter 11 to reorganize its massive debt. So what's the connection between the two companies where one's on an uptick and the other is in dire straits financially? Well… Alec Baldwin, oddly, it seems!

Japanese Earthquake Seismogram Sculpture Created by Luke Jerram

by Steve Levenstein

Dry statistics and flat printouts do little to convey the awesome destructive power of earthquakes. British multimedia artist Luke Jerram has found a way to bring data to life, as it were, and by doing so express not only the measured progress of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake over 9 minutes terrifying but also display the pure esthetic beauty of nature's fury in action.

Colored Car Tires from China Look Wheel Strange

by China.new

Black tires too dull & gloomy for you? Double Star Tires is hoping their colorful new line of Rainbow Tires will replace basic boring black rubber road rollers wheel, er, real soon.

Nissin's Big Cheese Meat Cup Noodle Gives Cheeseburgers Stiff Competition

by Steve Levenstein

Cup Noodle can really hit the spot when you're studying, gaming or satisfying the between-meal munchies but it's not really a “meal”, is it? If you believe that, you haven't seen Big Cheese Meat Cup Noodle! Japan's newest flavor sensation is the closest thing yet to a cheeseburger in a cup.

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Innovative 'Shoe Socks' Show Off Japan's Sole

by Steve Levenstein

Like the look of wearing shoes but prefer to leave those dirty soles in the vestibule? Try Kutsu Kutsushita “Shoe Socks”, snazzy socks from Japan designed to look like your usual socks & sneakers combo!