Congratulations to Our 2025 Grand Prize and First Place Winners!
Imersiv, a breakthrough technology that improves audio performance by 100X compared to today’s very best audio equipment for applications ranging from sound engineering to space missions to medical imaging, was named the $25,000 grand prize winner at a live finalist round held November 7 in New York. Click here for the full list of winners. Also see the Top 100 highest scoring entries. Special thanks to our esteemed panel of judges.
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 16,000 design ideas have been submitted by engineers, students, and entrepreneurs in more than 100 countries. Join the innovators who dared to dream big by entering your ideas in our 2026 contest opening March 1.
Read About All the 2024 Winning Inventions
Special Report spotlights the eight amazing winners in 2024 as well as honorable mentions in each category, plus the top ten most popular entries as voted by our community.
Click here to read moreA ‘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 nowThank 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
contest
Contest
The SST is a simple, but highly accurate, tracking system to keep photovoltaic panels or other sun energy receivers oriented accurately to obtain highest possible receiver efficiency.
Description:
The SST simply consists of small photovoltaic panels, a shadow board, and small double pole-single throw relays to drive the receiver’s aiming motors.
1.Elevator Pitch
The pull tab of most beverage or food containers is difficult to open. I have invented several concepts to make the pull tab “more user friendly”.
2.Key New Features
The most important improvements are simple changes in the shape of the pull tab and/or the containers lids,
Construction zones are rarely regarded in a positive light, and for good reasons:
• Commuters languish in construction zones when roads need renovation or find finding alternate routes in an effort to avoid losing precious time to traffic jams.
• Local retail business suffer, losing significant amounts of business in an already challenging economic climate,
Current implementations of MICROPHONE mute switches use either a momentary or a maintained connection push-button foot switch, an in-line shorting switch at or in the microphone connector, or a switch within the microphone body itself.
Current implementations of INSTRUMENT mute switches use either an A-B type maintained connection push-button foot switch,
Smart Windows & Doors
Windows and doors (including their frames), that have switches, sensors and control circuitry built into them at the factory at the time of manufacture. These windows and doors would be pre-wired with switches and or sensors to facilitate their incorporation into home security and smart home monitoring systems.
Infectious agents, like bacteria and viruses, tend to be both really nasty and really inventive. No sooner do we invest millions in research to find successful vaccine, than we learn that the bug we are trying to kill has successfully developed a new defense against our work. Given this never ending war,
A highly successful innovation to increase highway safety was the introduction of water-filled crash barriers at various high-danger locations. Many of these barriers are cylindrical is shape with a detachable cover. They are made of an easily crushable/deformable material and are filled with ordinary water.
Meet PEET (Personal Education/Entertainment Tool)
PEET is a new take on the future of computer form factors. We loved the idea of projected surface computing wherein computers of the future can recognize and change accordingly based on their surroundings. However we were unimpressed with the obvious and often blogged about idea of wearing a projector on the body.
There are three problems surrounding traditional agriculture:
1) It’s a direct contributor to obesity epidemic; children’s resistance to eating greens is a normal body response to flavorless produce.
2) Transportation from hundreds of miles away.
3) Low yields per unit of water and energy add to global starvation and wars.
Modern fabrication techniques permit manufacture of economical personnel and package security scanners integrating traditional metal detection with high-resolution ultrasound imaging of dense materials, such as explosives, hidden in clothing or small packages. currently deployed systems for security imaging are large, expensive, fixed installations with large power requirements, providing whole-body images susceptible to abuse,
Page 960 of 1029
