Unless you have the luxury of being able to sleep in as long as you like every day, waking up can be a slightly traumatic experience. The blaring of the alarm clock is not a peaceful way to transition from dreamland to the waking world. Designer Aakanksha Rajhans’s answer to that jarring experience is the Acuwake Sock.

Rather than using loud audio to blast you awake, the Acuwake Sock uses gentle acupressure and micro-massage to gently transition you into your day. The sock straps onto your foot just before you go to bed; you can then program it using a mini console built into the device or using its accompanying app. If you’re really brave, you can give someone else control of your Acuwake via the app, letting them decide when you’ll roll out of bed for the day.

The Acuwake uses acupressure points to stimulate the areas on your foot that correspond to a healthy heart, spine, and digestive tract. In this way it can keep you healthy as well as improving your wake-up experience. An added bonus is that, because it is silent, the sock can wake you without disturbing your bedmate who might appreciate getting a bit more sleep. The electronic portion of the sock is removable so you can wash the sock, but we have to wonder: why would the designer intend for only one foot to get the benefits of the Acuwake? We would definitely want both of our feet tickled awake at the same time.

The post Acupressure Sock Gently Tickles + Massages You Awake first appeared on Gajitz.

Dental hygiene has evolved one step further. Contemporary society requires tooth cleaning to be time efficient. Manual toothbrushes therefore become obsolete, replaced by mechanical ones that are themselves becoming more and more cheap and disposable. One new toothbrush will last you much longer and is about as time efficient as possible.

The Blizzident toothbrush promises to clean your teeth in six seconds – a large departure from the minute or so you waste with your electronic toothbrush. Resembling an athletic mouth guard, it’s 3D printed after the mouth impression you get from your dentist is digitized and sent to Blizzident. The substantial price of $300 may deter some, but if it can get your kids to brush their teeth twice a day, it might be worth it.

The post Gone in Six Seconds: New Toothbrush Erases Plaque + Time first appeared on Gajitz.

The scientists at Kitakyushu National College of Technology and robot makers “Crazy Lab” really want you to know when you stink. They created two robots that can detect bad breath and foot odor, then tell you in some of the most embarrassing ways possible when you don’t smell of roses.

The disembodied female head, called Kaori-chan, smells your breath as you exhale into her face. She then gives you an honest (if not super polite) opinion. If your breath is fresh and lovely, she says “Like citrus!” If it’s not so great, she blurts out “Yuck! You have bad breath!” But if it’s awful, she tells you “No way! I can’t stand it!” which might mean that you aren’t welcome to kiss her robotic lips. The worst breath gets the funniest response: “Emergency taking place!”

The dog, Shuntaro-kun, is thankfully not endowed with the gift of speech. He will sniff your feet to let you know just how bad the odor is. His reactions range from cuddling up to you (if you happen to have nice-smelling feet), barking (if they’re a bit smelly), falling down and growling (if they’re pretty stinky) or passing out if they’re totally intolerable. Imagine how much nicer the world would smell if everyone had access to brutally honest robots (or humans) who would tell it like it is when it comes to stinkiness.

The post Odor Detecting Robots Tell You Honestly If You Smell Bad first appeared on Gajitz.

There’s no shortage of fitness bracelets and other wearable gadgets to help you get in shape, and now a new one is throwing its hat in the ring. The Larklife goes a step or two further than most other bracelets by telling you when and what you should eat, giving you insights about your sleeping patterns, and helping you feel much more energized all day.

The system includes a wristband that you wear day and night. It tracks your calories burned, of course, but it also tracks your energy levels and recommends when to exercise and when to take a break based on that info.

At night, the wristband keeps track of how long and how well you’re sleeping. You get daily reminders to go to bed when it’s your optimal bedtime. When it’s time to get up, the wristband vibrates gently to wake you without disturbing your partner.

Of course, like every other gadget of its kind, the LarkLife system requires you to log your food intake manually. But it makes that relatively easy by linking to your iPhone via Bluetooth and enabling one-button logging of foods. The LarkLife is available for pre-order for $150, a price that’s pretty comparable to other gizmos of its kind.

The post Wristband Tracks Body Stats for Round-the-Clock Fitness first appeared on Gajitz.

If you live in a particularly rainy place where umbrellas are a constant accessory, the frustration of the dripping folded umbrella is nothing new. Umbrellas may keep the rain off of you when you’re outside, but the second you fold them up they splatter and drip all over your clothes and everything else.

Clever designers Ahn Il-Mo, Kim Tae-Han and Seo Dong-Han saw this problem that humanity has been ignoring since the invention of the umbrella and decided to fix it. They came up with an umbrella that folds up inside out – with the wet part safely folded inside.

You might expect the Inverted Umbrella to blow inside-out more easily in heavy winds, but the designers insist that their design is strong enough to prevent that particular annoying problem. The idea is compelling, but it remains to be seen whether the wet inside of the folded umbrella would harbor bad smells and mildew.

The post Backward Brolly: Smart Design Turns Umbrella Inside Out first appeared on Gajitz.