Handling a galaxy or wearing a Back to the Future 2 jacket, building your own tablet and teaching it how to operate a mechanized arm is all possible thanks to startups, enthusiastic developers and the community you can be a part of.
Milky Way in the palm of your hand
Who among us has not admired the stars? But weather conditions do not always allow you to enjoy the beauties of space. The Steffin brothers from Berlin found a way out – they came up with the idea of ”putting the universe” in a glass sphere with a diameter of only 8 cm, which will always be at your fingertips. This sphere contains 380,000 laser-etched dots, each of which represents a galaxy from the Laniakea supercluster, whose diameter is nothing less than 520 million light-years. At the center of the sphere is our Milky Way galaxy.
The Universe Sphere project quickly gained popularity among the community and raised over $300,000. After such a stunning success, the second version of the sphere was not long in coming – it became a model of the Milky Way. This sphere contains 200,000 stars, whose arrangement exactly repeats the shape of our spiral galaxy, whose diameter is 100,000 light years.
The project fees exceeded the originally planned amount by 6000% and amounted to more than 230 thousand dollars. If you are a student, minor, or retired, you can purchase the Milky Way Orb for $60, otherwise you will have to pay about $72 on Kickstarter (retail price will be about $97).
Contributions close on May 4, 2018.
Enthusiast based tablet Raspberry Pi
Who as a child 
did not collect the constructor? The RasPad project is designed to remember youth or teach your child to do interesting and creative things. This is a tablet computer based on Raspberry Pi, which differs from ordinary tablets in the possibility of customization and allows you to create your own digital project. The kit comes with software for visual programming and a set of additional hardware: a set of sensors, a Robot Arm, an object recognition camera, a remote control, etc.
The project has already been supported by more than 2,500 thousand people, and the amount of fees amounted to almost half a million dollars, which exceeded the initial expectations of the developers by more than 4,000%.
The RasPad is available on Kickstarter for over 50% off, with prices ranging from $129 (basic kit without Raspberry Pi) to $735 (full kit including sensor kit, mouse, camera and more).
Contributions close on April 4, 2018. The first deliveries are expected in May this year.
Clever jacket With heated
The designers of the smart Mercury heated jacket practically brought to life the idea of director Robert Zemeckis, who in 1989 showed his vision of a 2015 jacket in the movie Back to the Future 2. “Mercury” is equipped with an intelligent thermostat for automatic control of the built-in heating system, voice control and is connected to a smartphone.
The jacket is activated automatically when the temperature changes or when you start moving. You can also “turn on” the jacket with your voice – with the help of a smart assistant, such as Amazon Alexa.
Carbon fibers act as heating elements, which can heat up to a temperature of 57 ° C almost instantly. Mercury learns your preferences and automatically changes the temperature to maintain the most comfortable thermal regime, which can be monitored and changed using a mobile application.
The jacket took about 5 years to develop and the first deliveries are expected in November 2018. You can buy this miracle of modern design and technology on the project page for $295 (the jacket will retail for $495). The project has already been supported by more than 1,800 participants who contributed more than half a million dollars.
Hurry, donations close on March 24, 2018.
Hi—Res-acoustics with surround sound
The UPstage 360 portable 3-way HRA (Hi-Res Audio) speaker system is designed to fill your room with crystal clear and spacious sound. To do this, the developers equipped it with five speakers, four passive radiators and a patented system for even distribution of medium and high frequencies.
Low frequencies are handled by two 3-inch woofers and natural rubber passive radiators that enhance the bass. A single two-inch speaker is responsible for mids, and a one-inch tweeter for high frequencies. The frequency range in this case is from 40 Hz to 40 kHz, and the total power is 120 watts.
Thanks to its portable design, the UPstage 360 can be placed anywhere in the room, and it can be connected to an audio source via Bluetooth or via the AUX jack.
The acoustics have passed many tests, and according to the roadmap, the first deliveries should already begin in June.
You can buy UPstage 360 for $329 until 04/19/2018.
Feel the weightlessness
We are used to the fact that water pours or drips, but certainly does not hang in the air. LeviZen breaks the laws of physics by making water droplets levitate.
The developers offer us to meditate, watching a drop hanging in the air, and if it is illuminated, it seems that the light itself is floating in the air.
How it works? The device consists of two parts – the main unit with emitters of high-frequency waves, with the help of which the drop is kept in the air, as well as a control unit that allows you to adjust the power for different volumes of liquid.
When a drop falls between the sound waves emitted by the lower and upper emitters, it seems to fall into a trap and “freeze”. But easier said than done. Therefore, we propose to look at the work of an acoustic levitator.
You can buy LeviZen for $249 on the project page, and deliveries are expected in July this year.
Read also:
- Gadgets of the future: already today
- Unusually useful winter gadgets
- Named the best gadgets of 2017
Author: Anton Mokretsov; A photo: Kickstarter.com
