Manufacturing Minute: A Pollution-Detecting Shirt That Changes Patterns

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In this episode, creepy, blimp-crawling robots and a shirt that can detect dangerous air pollutants. Welcome to your Manufacturing Minute.


With increasing technology, everything seems to be a “smart” product these days. While some of these products end up being more flash and sparkle than actually beneficial, some can drastically improve life by making things faster, easier and potentially even safer.
This is where three different shirts designed by Aerochromics comes in. One detects carbon monoxide, one detects particle pollution and another detects radioactivity. When dangerous levels of any of these pollutants are detected in the air, the shirts then change pattern to alert the wearer.
So how does it work? The shirts have two sensors – one on the front and one on the back – that detect the pollutants. The shirt then activates heat pads that change the colors and patterns in the shirts.
The founder said the shirts, which started out as an art project, were created to keep citizens informed about air quality in their cities, as this is something that “should be public knowledge.” With record-breaking pollution in industrial cities in India and China, this shirt is pertinent to the ubiquitous conversations on awareness and solutions. The shirts will cost $500 each.

SO, WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Is this technology a potential solution for increasing pollutant safety in a plant setting? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

One challenge known well to those of you in the airship industry (but perhaps little spoken of) is damage evaluation and repairs.
Usually, the process is done manually by a worker inspecting a blimp after it’s been deflated. The task isn’t just time-consuming but also incredibly inefficient.
Well, now Lockheed Martin’s famous Skunk Works team has created a tiny bot that literally crawls over the surface of the blimp while inflated.
Called the Self-Propelled Instrument for Damage Evaluation and Repair (or SPIDER), these robots consist of two magnetic halves (one on the inside and its counterpart on the outside of the blimp) that use LED lights and a camera to find and then patch any tiny pinhole leaks.
After the bots patch the blimp, photos are then sent to a human-operated server to double-check the work, but these creepy crawling bots save enormous amounts of time.
Even better? These so-called SPIDERs can even work together to repair a larger patch job.
Can you imagine other uses for these blimp-crawling inspection bots?
Let me know your thoughts by commenting below or tweeting to @MnetNews.