2024 Contest Now Accepting Entries!

Submit your best new product ideas for a chance at $25,000, other great prizes, and global recognition. If you already are registered, log in to access the entry form. Otherwise, click here to get started.

Help build a better tomorrow

Since Tech Briefs magazine launched the Create the Future Design contest in 2002 to recognize and reward engineering innovation, over 15,000 design ideas have been submitted by engineers, students, and entrepreneurs across six continents. You can also join the innovators who dared to dream big and build a better tomorrow by entering this year’s contest.

Read About Past Winners’ Success Stories

Over the past 20 years, many innovators have used the recognition afforded by the contest to advance the development and marketing of their technologies. We highlight some success stories of past winners who have brought their inventions to the marketplace.

Click here to read more

A ‘Create the Future’ Winner Featured on ‘Here’s an Idea’

Spinal cord injury affects 17,000 Americans and 700,000 people worldwide each year. A research team at NeuroPair, Inc. won the Grand Prize in the 2023 Create the Future Design Contest for a revolutionary approach to spinal cord repair. In this Here’s an Idea podcast episode, Dr. Johannes Dapprich, NeuroPair’s CEO and founder, discusses their groundbreaking approach that addresses a critical need in the medical field, offering a fast and minimally invasive solution to a long-standing problem.

Listen now

Thank you from our Sponsors

“At COMSOL, we are very excited to recognize innovators and their important work this year. We are grateful for the opportunity to support the Create the Future Design Contest, which is an excellent platform for designers to showcase their ideas and products in front of a worldwide audience. Best of luck to all participants!”

— Bernt Nilsson, Senior Vice President of Marketing, COMSOL, Inc.

“From our beginnings, Mouser has supported engineers, innovators and students. We are proud of our longstanding support for the Create the Future Design Contest and the many innovations it has inspired.”

— Kevin Hess, Senior Vice President of Marketing, Mouser Electronics

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2011 Winners

GRAND PRIZE WINNER

αScreen Fast and Cheap Bacteria Detection
Monika Weber, New Haven, CT
αScreen is the needed MEMS rapid pathogen screener for food-borne illnesses. It has a potential to improve health standards at the consumer level by increasing sensitivity, keeping the cost down and testing time short.

CONSUMER PRODUCTS CATEGORY

UVA+B Sunfreinds
Karin Edgett, Capitol Edge, Shahid Aslam, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Washington, DC
The UVA+B SunFriend© featuring NASA UV sensor technology will provide health conscious individuals with an effective and inexpensive UVA and UVB monitoring aid to receiving healthier sun exposure

ELECTRONICS CATEGORY

iPecs Tech
Michael Leydet, College Park Industries, Fraser, Michigan
The College Park Industries iPecs® (Intelligent Prosthetic Endo-Skeletal Component System) is a medical research device which will provide researchers a tool to accurately measure human locomotion or gait parameters on users of lower limb prostheses.

MACHINERY & EQUIPMENT CATEGORY

Hybrid Rotor Compressor for Natural Gas Extraction
Jeremy Pits, Pedro Santos, OsComp Systems, Boston, Massachusetts
By combining a novel rotary geometry with an innovative method for extracting heat from the system, OsComp's compressor 10% of the size of conventional machines and over 30% more efficient.

MEDICAL CATEGORY

XVIVO Organ Perfusion System
Chris Jaynes, Tom Taccini, Tim Klug, XVIVO Perfusion, Englewood, Colorado
The XVIVO Perfusion System (XPS) is a movile intensive care unit can repair damaged organs ex vivo (out of the donor's body) for successful transplantation into a waiting recipient.

SAFETY & SECURITY CATEGORY

AquaSonus Passive-Sonar Pool Alarm
William C. Roberts, Bob Hoenig, Paula Bailey, AquaSonus.com, Merrimack, New Hampshire
The AquaSonus Passive-Sonar System based on state-of-the-art digital signal processing; the use of low power and embedded microprocessors results in enhanced functionality, accuracy, reliability, and ease of installation and use.

SUSTAINABLE TECHNOLOGY CATEGORY

TO:CMA Spherical Generator
Angel Francisco Martinez, Delia Beatriz Martinez, Trupti Bulbule, Cornell University, Laredo, Texas
The TO:CMA Spherical Generator creates copious amounts of clean electricity out of ocean waves at costs below all major existing renewable energy sources.

TRANSPORTATION CATEGORY

Dynamic Aero-Shroud Oscillating Jen
Rebecca Farr, Endwell Daso, Victor Pritchett, Ten-See Wang, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Alabama
This technology will enable new flight vehicle concepts and applications of supersonic and hypersonic flight.