Wired’s Gadget Lab tested the device and came up with one piece of critical feedback.  The strap’s cables connect directly to the batter port, meaning you cannot have a battery in place as a backup.  This isn’t a challenge when in the sun.  However, when those clouds roll out, it’s time to switch to a more reliable power source.

As film has become virtually obsolete with the digital revolution, so soon, will batteries perhaps.

Animals have developed a plethora of ways to adhere to surfaces in their environment. Scientists once believed that this “stickiness” was accomplished by natural glues composed of sugars and oils in combination with hooked claws and light body weights. However, a closer look with a high-powered imaging and microscopic force sensors revealed that the gecko foot is covered with tiny hair-like structures called setae. These hairs split even further into tips with surfaces as small as 200 nanometers in diameter. The hairs adhere independently of surface polarity using van der Waals forces. They work on hard or soft textures and on dry or wet surfaces, can hold on under water, in a vacuum,  and can  support the entire weight of the gecko with just one toe pad. The gecko manually un-sticks itself with a toe curling motion, which can happen quite quickly as it runs up walls or tree trunks.

By discovering that gecko adhesion is due to geometry and surface area, scientists at Berkeley were able to begin considering practical applications. Gecko inspired adhesive would be strong, but reusable and self cleaning and unaffected by environmental conditions like dampness or rough surfaces. The Biomimetic Lab is looking at its application to robotics, where locomotion is necessary in difficult environments. Without relying on mechanical wheels or sticky glues for adhesion, robots could become much more efficient in data collection and rescue missions.

Though gecko feet have been a topic interest and research for decades, recent work at Berkeley came to light as the greater scientific community became more aware of a concept called biomimicry. This approach looks closely at nature’s solutions and applies them to more complex design issues. It can include anything from building using thermal regulation inspired by termites to designing a garden to mimic natural ecosystems to designing new adhesives based on gecko feet. Look at many human inventions and you’ll see it’s not such a new idea to be inspired by the natural world, but many scientists think that the last few decades have been dominated by more synthetic solutions and that many of our design problems, as well as environmental issues, can be faced by taking a look at natural solutions that have had thousands of years to evolve around us. These alternatives are typically nontoxic, reuseable, and adaptable to a variety or conditions and environments. To learn more, check out Biomimicry, Janine Beynus’ popular book that helped form an entire new movement in engineering and design, as well as the Biomimicry Institute.

Your kids (or you) can put together a car powered by water (via fuel cell technology).  As you of course know, fuel cells combine a fuel like hydrogen and oxygen to create electricity.  For a more in-depth description, read this.

I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid, there was no kit that would allow me to build a car that runs on water.  Who knows, that could have made all the difference.

Read the full story here.

Ingredients:

1 Geo Metro

1 Electric forklift

1 Electric motor

a dash of spare parts

a smidge of random batteries

Bake for a few weekends of hard work, and voila!  The result is a medium speed, medium range, cheap-as-heck electric commuter car.  This one was built by 2 DIY’ers in Toronto to get them from point A to point B for little cash, no pollution, no noise.

It’s called: The Forkenswift!

Read more at their website.

The next best thing for impatient eco-conscious folks is the YoGen universal mobile charger. YoGen has introduced the first real energy-saving charger compatible for most mobile devices including iPods, iPhones, digital readers like the Kindel, cell phones, navigation units, PDA’s and more.

The best part? A few tugs on the string of this device charges your mobile unit in a few minutes and lasts as long as a charge from an energy sucking wall charger.

And if that wasn’t enough, the YoGen is mobile, so the next time you find your mobile devices are down on the juice when you’re on top of a mountain, or hiking alone in the woods, pull this light-weight baby out and charge away.

Here is one such eco-innovation: vehicle shocks that generate electricity. As is the case with some of the coolest inventions ever, one version of this gadget came from MIT’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering. Consider the possibilities: refrigeration trucks powered by the bumps in the road, headlights running off of clean(ish) energy… they’re endless!

Researchers in the UK are taking a different spin on the technology – building cogs into the roadway to generate energy from the cars bouncing on them. Some things are just better done in America.

From EcoGeek

Ecogeek reported on a program allowing Oklahoma residents to purchase one of these babies, called the COCO, for less than $900.  What a deal!  This is one eco-innovation we’re going to call a political-eco-innovation.  Although the adjusted pricetag is clearly below MSRP, it will stimulate the economy and remove polluting cars from the road.  Rock on OK.

When Apple identified that 53% of their environmental impact is in the use of their products by the consumer.  Instead of just claiming to have “made our products as efficient as possible”, they outline exactly what that means.

They break down energy usage to “milliwatts” and describe how processors stop computing between keystrokes to save minute but important amounts of energy.

Read much more at Apple’s website.