InventorSpot

Your dog may have Irish ancestry, be Irish by acquisition, or may just want to down a few with his pals at the dog park. Our 2008 Hottest St. Patrick’s Day Dog Costume winners may help you decide on appropriate attire; they will even make other dogs smile. The costumes are judged in a variety of categories, including Best 'Kiss Me I'm Irish' Dog Jacket, Hottest Irish Dog Muscle T-Shirt, Best Irish Whiskey Drinking Dog Attire, Dumbest Irish Dog Hat, the To Die For Rhinestone Irish Dog Collar, and Toughest Dog In The Irish Hood Jacket. And the winners are: read more »

Yes, I just wrote about salt and pepper grinders, and I promise to get off the subject, but I just had to share these Fukasawa-designed Salt and Pepper Maracas with you, just for quick look at a beautiful design, but impractical concept. What can you do with these? read more »

New Lunar Rover

The engineers at Johnson Space Center in Houston have designed a new kind of Vehicle. It has no windows, doors or even seats. Then again, it is made to be driven on the moon.Although this isn't something I would expect to see at a car dealship anytime soon, it is still an amazing step in specialized design. read more »

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Pepper & Salt Balls Photos ©Chef'n

I go through two or three salt and pepper grinders a year, a ridiculous number for one who cooks only three or four meals a week. Either the tops break off or the blades get dull, or the turning mechanism fails. Another kitchen tool goes to gadget hell, where nothing is recycled. read more »

The big yellow robot in the picture above has the potential to save at least some innocent animals from being poisoned, and that's a start. The big yeller' is a high-throughput robot capable of testing thousands of cell-based chemical tests at a time, enabling toxicity results in a matter of hours, as opposed to years of animal testing. read more »

The gases you breathe out may provide a mirror of what's going on inside your body. In an effort to detect the minute traces of gases that may point to diseases such as cancer and asthma, researchers have developed a laser for low-cost, highly sensitive breath analysis. read more »

Animal Toy

My recent investigations into the mysteries of the United States Patent Office, well not so mysterious as it is undiscerning and undiscriminating, has unearthed a whole host of opportunistic patents. That is, the patenting of stuff we've all been doing, independent of the patent process, for centuries. And United States patent 6360693 is perhaps the best (worst?) example of this practice. read more »

Scientists show how to cut a rubberband in two, and then put it back together again. read more »

©CatLivin

You can take a cat out of the wild, but you can't take the wild out of a cat. Unless you want to mount tree branches in your home (Ooh, let me think on that!), the next best thing to satisfy his urge to climb might be a door climber. I mean, if he's climbing the walls anyway... read more »

Comb Hair to Conceal Baldness

Today dear readers, I am turning my blog over to you. That's because I'm stumped. Is United States Patent 4022227 worthy of a patent? Do you consider this an invention? An innovation? Or did Frank and Donald Smith the "inventors" merely lay claim to something men have been doing for centuries? You decide; then let me know what you think. read more »

In a modern-day sea voyage, researchers plan to seek out the strongest winds in order to better understand the effect of weather conditions on the carbon cycle. read more »

What has inflatable lightweight mirrors and captures the same amount of energy from the sun, as traditional flat panel PV systems, while using 500 times less solar cell material? Cool Earth's cool Solar Balloons do and they're about to expand. read more »

Researchers have developed self-cleaning wool, where all that is needed to get rid of stains and dirt is sunlight. Instead of throwing your clothes in the washing machine, you'd just hang them up in the sun for a few hours. read more »

Parents looking for baby products that don’t add a “kid feel” to the house, will love Coco Plexistyle’s Baby Bloom. read more »

Cure for Hiccups?

We've all heard that a good fright is one way to cure a bout of the hiccups. Admittedly, that's never worked for me, but I'm not the kind of girl who scares easily. (The nutrition label on a bag of Cheetos notwithstanding.) Well it seems back in 2003, Philip Ehlinger, Jr., in the style of a pre-Discovery Channel MythBuster, or an obstinate inventor, you decide, felt this urban legend was worth validating, so he came up with United States patent 7062320 . read more »

Looking for a way to help little ones quench their thirst and gain independence at the same time? Look no further than the Fluid No-Spill Toddler Cupnew! read more »

Diesel has been very popular in the news for the a while now, and for a good reason. We are still beginning to realize the benefit and abilities of these potent motors and the Loremo, (Low Resistance Mobile) is just another reason for us to take a closer look. read more »

Cow Gas Meter

As many of you know, cow gas, or bovine flatulence (farts) and eructation (burps), is suspect when determining the factors that contribute to global warming. Why? The reason is simple: cow gas emits methane gas and according to environmentalists like EarthSave, methane is by far the most important non-CO2 greenhouse gas floating around the atmosphere and threatening the ozone layer. read more »