… Shipments for the global wearables market will collectively increase from 222.9 million units in 2013 to 302.3 million units in 2023, IDC said, with watches holding the greatest market share: 43.5% of all wearable devices. That means watches will grow from 91.8 million units in 2019 to 131.6 million four years from now, the firm said. … The bulk of the wearables growth involves demand for ear-worn devices and smartwatches, which combined will make up 70% of all wearable shipments by 2023. For ear-worn devices, benefits such as dealing with hearing loss will entice consumers, IDC said, while smartwatches will appeal to buyers as health and fitness tools. Wristbands, on the other hand, will see fairly flat shipment growth as North American and Western European markets expect consumers to transition to smartwatches.
Wearable fitness trackers have made it all too easy for us to make assumptions about our health. We may look to our heart rate to determine whether we really felt the stress of that presentation at work this morning, or think ourselves healthier based on the number of steps we’ve taken by the end of the day.
But to get a better reading on your overall health and wellness, you’d be better off looking at the strength and structure of your circle of friends, according to a new study in the Public Library of Science journal, PLOS One.
While previous studies have shown how beliefs, opinions and attitudes spread throughout our social networks, researchers at the University of Notre Dame were interested in what the structure of social networks says about the state of health, happiness and stress.
“We were interested in the topology of the social network — what does my position within my social network predict about my health and well-being?” said Nitesh V. Chawla,
Monitoring of food and nutrition intake is becoming more digitized every day. Wearables have potential to support people in their diet and lifestyle without having to spend an excessive amount of time in just typing all the consumed food into an app or notebook. Find out here what is the future of wearable nutrition trackers!
University of British Columbia, UBC Okangan News from
Forget the smart watch. Bring on the smart shirt.
Researchers at UBC Okanagan’s School of Engineering have developed a low-cost sensor that can be interlaced into textiles and composite materials. While the research is still new, the sensor may pave the way for smart clothing that can monitor human movement.
The embedded microscopic sensor is able to recognize local motion through the stretching of the woven yarns that are treated with graphene nanoplatelets that can read the body’s activity, explains Engineering Professor Mina Hoorfar.
“Microscopic sensors are changing the way we monitor machines and humans,” says Hoorfar, lead researcher at the Advanced Thermo-Fluidic Lab at UBC’s Okanagan campus. “Combining the shrinking of technology along with improved accuracy, the future is very bright in this area.”
The leading cause of death in Texas is heart disease, according to the National Center for Health Statistics, accounting for more than 45,000 deaths statewide in 2017. A new wearable technology made from stretchy, lightweight material could make heart health monitoring easier and more accurate than existing electrocardiograph machines — a technology that has changed little in almost a century.
Developed by engineers at The University of Texas at Austin and led by Nanshu Lu in the Cockrell School of Engineering, this is the latest incarnation of Lu’s electronic tattoo technology, a graphene-based wearable device that can be placed on the skin to measure a variety of body responses, from electrical to biomechanical signals.
Meet Duo, the earphones that offer so much more than your regular pair of earphones. These earphones are designed to boost the intriguing technology that is bone conduction while also using this technology to bring more to the user than just the enjoyment of music.
Best Buy is taking its home fitness business to the next level.
The Richfield-based retailer on Tuesday announced the launch of a collection of “connected” machines and fitness gadgets for elite athletes and daily warriors, with setup service provided by the Geek Squad staff.
The announcement signals the retailer’s intention to devote more floor space and sales resources to what is expected to be a growing market in high-end home fitness equipment.
Like any true triathlete, I violate all the rules of common sense. The most important one being to never try something new on race day. But given I have a long history of violating said rule, I figured a few weeks ago that a local triathlon was the perfect time to try out Garmin’s almost never talked about ‘Extended Display’ triathlon-focused feature. This function allows you to mirror your watch to your Garmin Edge bike computer. Thus ensuring that your data fields and total race time match exactly.
While I’d tried connecting the sensors together about a year ago, that was basically a backyard adventure. Certainly nothing I’d attempted in a workout, let alone a race. So I figured I’d tell you how to set it up, how it works, how it went, and whether its worth doing at all.
Researchers from Hiroshima University collaborated with a Japanese sportswear company Mizuno to test a new type of cooling vest. The cooling vest is filled with ice packs and features a collar that can also cool the neck. The aim of the vest is to cool the athletes’ upper-body skin which can decrease heart rate and temperature of their neck and skin.
… Starting at just over 3-pounds, the Paragon and Maven are Gregory’s premium offering in the lightweight, multi-day backpack category. Spring 2020, the packs are receiving a full update with an innovative new suspension system and feature set. The fully adjustable FreeFloat Hybrid suspension system utilizes two flex panels, located in the lower back, that flex and move with the natural movements of your body for a dynamic carry. The flex panels are integrated into a Comfort Cradle hipbelt with 3D construction for a hotspot free carry and body-hugging fit. The 3D foam backpanel is cross-cut for added breathability, and designed to minimize contact while keeping the pack weight close to the center of gravity for a stable carry.
Hydro Flask, an award-winning leader in high-performance, insulated stainless steel flasks and soft good innovations and a Helen of Troy Limited (NASDAQ, NM: HELE) company, is excited to announce the launch of its 14 Liter Down Shift™ Hydration Pack, designed to provide a lower center of gravity and increased stability. Additionally, Hydro Flask grows its Journey Series™ collection with the release of the 16 Liter Women’s Hydration Pack, tailored through the back panel, shoulder straps, and hip belt to fit more comfortably on a woman’s body. Both packs feature Hydro Flask’s innovative Cold Flow™ System technology to keep water chilled for more than 4 hours, delivering hands-free cold hydration for mountain biking and hiking.
… Every spring, an underground movement of cyclists journeys to the sublimely beautiful Going to the Sun Road in Glacier, Montana’s northern-most park. They ride the tails of plows run by an elite force of Glacier National Park employees tasked with clearing snow from the steep, narrow ribbon of pavement that, after deep winters like the one Montana just saw, can rise 80 feet above the asphalt.
… To gauge the extent of the problem, in January, BICYCLING conducted a survey about rider experiences in bike shops. Sixty percent of 718 respondents say they’ve had at least one negative experience with a bike shop employee that made them feel unwelcome. Thirty-eight percent say this has happened more than once, or “often.”
Cannondale’s aluminum Topstone gravel bike has proven to be quite popular since its debut last August, and the company is now following up with a higher-performance Topstone Carbon version. It’s hardly just the same frame made out of carbon fiber composite, though; it’s a totally different bike, with a radical pseudo-suspension design out back called Kingpin, heaps of tire clearance, and a generous array of accessory mounts.
Yuki Oka, assistant professor of biology and Chen Scholar at Caltech, was curious about why that is, and how the brain processes satiation and pleasure signals related to drinking.
In a new paper, Oka shows that thirst satiation is governed by two independent pathways in the mammalian body and brain. These pathways work together to help keep animals properly rehydrated.
Here is how it works: When you are thirsty and you start drinking a glass of water (or any other liquid), the first parts of your body to interact with that liquid are your mouth and throat. These two areas, known collectively as the oropharyngeal region, are lined with nerves that pass along a drinking signal to neurons in a brain structure called the subfornical organ (SFO). The Oka lab has previously shown that the activation of neurons in the SFO generates the sensation of being thirsty. When the SFO receives a drinking signal, it turns off these thirst neurons.
… Through our design and evaluation of a photo-based food diary — Foodprint — we demonstrate how a photo-based diary and visual summary system can be designed to help people and health experts individually and collaboratively reflect on everyday food data, identify healthy eating strategies, and develop symptom management plans. We also show how these designs can help individuals and health experts explicitly include individual goals and knowledge in discussions and in developing strategies and management plans.
It’s been established that people who spend more time in parks and other natural settings tend to report higher levels of health and happiness, but new research shows there’s actually a magic number for it.
According to a study published this week in the journal Nature Scientific Reports, spending 120 minutes a week strolling a tree-lined street or sitting by a lake can greatly enhance a person’s overall sense of well-being. Less time didn’t yield any significant benefit, the research showed.
Those who got in two to three hours in nature were about 20 percent more likely to report high overall satisfaction with their lives than those who spent no time outdoors at all. The benefits to physical health were even greater, with those who met the outdoors benchmark being 60 percent more likely to report being in good health than their cooped-in counterparts.
A few weeks ago, I drove down a back road in West Virginia and into a parallel reality. Sometime after I passed Spruce Mountain, my phone lost service — and I knew it would remain comatose for the next few days. When I spun the dial on the car radio, static roared out of every channel. I had entered the National Radio Quiet Zone, 13,000 square miles of mountainous terrain with few cell towers or other transmitters.
I was headed toward Green Bank, a town that adheres to the strictest ban on technology in the United States. The residents do without not only cellphones but also Wi-Fi, microwave ovens and any other devices that generate electromagnetic signals.
Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s Mellon College of Science and College of Engineering have developed a semiliquid lithium metal-based anode that represents a new paradigm in battery design. Lithium batteries made using this new electrode type could have a higher capacity and be much safer than typical lithium metal-based batteries that use lithium foil as anode.
… The new feature, called “optimized battery charging,” will launch for iPhones this fall in the iOS 13 update but is already available for developer testing ahead of a public preview launch next month. I found it on my iPhone under battery settings, which is running the developer preview of iOS 13. It was turned on by default, which means you may not even need to turn it on when the software is available this fall.
Apple’s iOS 13 website explains what it does: “A new option helps slow the rate of battery aging by reducing the time your iPhone spends fully charged.