Health tech

LAS VEGAS--A woman is pedaling leisurely on a stationary bike, her thick, dark braid draped delicately over one shoulder as she barely breaks a sweat. Someone whispers that she's Brazilian, and thus a real, live example of what you get with one of Velocomp's new workouts, Brazilian Butt. (Using a real, live Brazilian who presumably has said butt sans effort rather defeats the point, but I digress.)

Velocomp, creators of last year's iBike Dash, unveiled the iBike Powerhouse at CES this week--the Dash's bigger, badder cousin.

For $269, the handlebar-mounted cycling computer that includes a water- and shock-resistant case and syncs with the iPhone and iPod Touch is all about tailored workouts that remind you when you're slacking off.… Read more

LAS VEGAS--Fitbit, maker of a wireless clip-on activity tracker, is adding the Aria Wi-Fi scale to its lineup this April due, according to the company, to user requests.

The Aria has competition in the "smart" scale department, with the Withings booth and its very similar scales for adults and yes, even babies, just a few yards away.

But Fitbit has introduced a multiple-user feature that recognizes--out of as many as eight different users--who is standing on the scale. Think large households, dorm quads, sports teams, etc.

Priced at $129.99, Fitbit's first Wi-Fi scale can tally weight, body fat, and body mass index, and automatically uploads that info with every step on the scale to an online tool with graphs that perhaps too-handily track one's progress (or lack thereof). The online and mobile tools are free and also include weight goals and a food and exercise log.… Read more

LAS VEGAS--Long before "face unlock" on Android 4.0, Fujitsu developed an even more intimate method for secure user identification--your blood flow.

PalmSecure is a technology that's actually been around for a few years now in Japan, and in a number of business applications ranging from health care to banking, but not seen so much in consumer electronics in the U.S. It uses a biometric authentication system that reads your palm vein pattern. Fujitsu reps here at CES tell me it works only on veins with an active blood flow, so put away your "Mission: Impossible" 3D printers and molds--this tech requires the real thing.

The palm-scanning technology has already been seen built in to mice and full-size keyboards, but Fujitsu says the tech has now shrunk to the point where it can easily be integrated into laptops and other devices.

Laptops with PalmSecure are now available in Japan, and the company is currently "looking at" North America. I won't hold my breath, although if I did, it would make my veins even easier to read.… Read more

Magellan isn't afraid to get a little sweaty, as the GPS manufacturer is getting into the fitness tech game.

Known for its in-car navigation systems, today Magellan introduced its first pair of GPS fitness watches for runners, cyclers, swimmers, and triathletes. The Switch and Switch Up will be on display at CES 2012, with expected availability for spring 2012.

The Switch is designed primarily for runners, according to Magellan, and offers a 1.26-inch monochrome display, a high-sensitivity GPS receiver, and embedded ANT+ technology, so you can connect to third-party heart-rate monitors, foot pods, bike sensors, and so forth. … Read more

Body suit simulators are nothing new. Earlier this year the Kanagawa Institute of Technology in Japan unveiled Mommy Tummy 8.0, designed to help the partners of expecting moms--as well as teenagers thinking about getting it on--to understand the physical ramifications of, well, getting it on.

Now students at MIT's AgeLab are taking this empathy concept to another level with AGNES, the Age Gain Now Empathy System, a suit designed to help wearers understand the physical ramifications of neglecting our bodies for decades on end. (AGNES is meant to emulate a 75-year-old with arthritis and diabetes.)

The suit incorporates shoes that compromise one's sense of balance and shorten one's gait; knee and elbow braces that limit joint mobility; earplugs that tune out soft or high-pitched sounds; a helmet that compresses the spine; and gloves that reduce not only strength and mobility in one's hands and wrists but also tactile sensation.… Read more

TOKYO--Downed a few too many beers this holiday season? No problem. Just tuck your organ into this electronic diaper for men and you won't have to get out of bed to visit the loo.

Japan's Unicharm Humancare recently showed off its new Robo-Humany Urine Aspiration diaper at the Eco-Products 2011 trade show in Tokyo. … Read more

If researchers at the University of Illinois have their say, bandages are about to get a whole lot cooler.

A team of engineers has created a bandage that in just one week not only encourages new blood vessel growth but helps guide that growth as well.

"The ability to pattern functional blood vessels at this scale in living tissue has not been demonstrated before," co-principal investigator and electrical and computing engineering professor Rashid Bashir says in a school news release.

The team, whose findings will grace the cover of a January 2012 issue of the journal Advanced Materials, … Read more

It's often the case that a device or substance with a known benefit also comes with known risks--typically referred to as side effects and listed quickly at the ends of commercials. So it seems worth noting when a product's side effect may in fact be useful.

The Valkee, a portable headset launched in August of 2010, directs 8- to 12-minute doses of bright light through the ear canal and into the brain to improve seasonal affective disorder. It turns out that this concentration of bright light into the brain may also improve motoric reaction time, according to a study conducted by Verve Research in Finland.

The placebo-controlled study (meaning some were given the treatment and others a placebo in its place) tested the effects of the Valkee headset on Finnish national league ice hockey players and found that those exposed to 12 minutes of light via the headset sped up their already fast reaction times by 20 percent.

"The placebo-controlled study showed a significant improvement in motoric reaction times of top athletes using bright light via the ear canal," says lead researcher Mikko Tulppo in a news release.… Read more

Patches of tiny needles have already been shown to effectively deliver medications painlessly, and without a bloody mess. Now the tiny needles could also be used to monitor body chemistry in real time.

The new tech, developed by a team of biomedical engineers out of North Carolina State University, the University of California at San Diego, and Sandia National Laboratories, employs electrochemical sensors in the hollow channels of microneedles to detect certain molecules. The researchers reported their findings in the chemistry journal Talanta.

Current body chemistry monitoring involves taking samples, often before or after an event. Wearable micro-sensors, on the … Read more