Einstein-inspired Isobar vaccine cooling system wins UK James Dyson award

A portable cooling system for temperature-sensitive vaccines which could save millions of lives in third world countries has won its 22-year old designer a prestigious James Dyson award.

Will Broadway, an industrial design and technology graduate from Loughborough University, developed the Isobar system for his final degree project after seeing the huge waste of valuable vaccines, which lost their potency as a result of inadequate storage and transportation conditions in remote regions.

Before starting his university course, Broadway spent seven weeks travelling through Cambodia, China, Hong Kong and Vietnam, where he saw the challenges faced by medical staff in getting life-saving vaccines to the people who need them.

Current vaccine programmes in developing countries do not meet rigorous international standards for temperature-safe vaccine distribution. Ice or cold packs are generally used, which can freeze the vaccine to a temperature lower than considered thermally stable, and leads to vaccines losing potency.

In 2015, an estimated 19.4 million children worldwide failed to receive routine immunisation services, with more than 60% of these living in developing countries. Figures suggest that an additional 1.5 million deaths could be avoided if global vaccination systems improve.

Broadway’s hi-tech, rechargeable cooling system was inspired by an invention patented by Einstein in 1906, known at the time as the Icyball. The device was originally used to provide rural farmers with electricity-free refrigeration, and required only a heat source to drive a chemical process.

The Isobar is specifically designed to maintain stable temperature control between 2C (35F) and 8C (46.4F) during the “final mile” distribution of vaccine in remote regions without power. The cooling effect lasts for up to six days inside an insulated backpack, and can be recharged in just over an hour using either electricity or propane.

Broadway said he was thrilled to receive the UK James Dyson award, which includes a £2000 cash prize. Broadway plans to use the money to develop further prototypes and apply for patents.

“I am so pleased that this technology can get a bit of the limelight”, he added. “ It was such an innovative technology in 1929 that was forgotten and taken over by electric refrigeration. It gives me the confidence to pursue it with my whole heart in the knowledge that I can actually make this device and that it could have a great impact for the benefit of thousands of people”. He paid tribute to the help of his tutor at Loughborough, Dr John McCardle, and for his “constant scrutiny” over hundreds of hours of development.

It will now be entered into the international running for the final leg of the James Dyson Award – announced in October – which will award the winning entry £30,000 to fund further development.

Jack Lang, fellow at the Judge Business School at Cambridge University, co-founder and chair of Raspberry Pi and UK James Dyson Award judge 2016 said: “Isobar is a brilliant invention. It solves a real problem and is a complete, well thought-through system.”

Einstein-inspired Isobar vaccine cooling system wins UK James Dyson award

Esther Dyson Has a Program to Improve America"s Health

By Adrienne Jane Burke, Wayne Lam and Adam Ludwig

“I’m wealthy and I’m obnoxious and I’m not eating this stuff,” Esther Dyson says of the sugar-filled yogurt currently being served for breakfast in the course of the latest DLD conference in New York City.

Dyson, a venture capitalist, digital age guru, and trained cosmonaut who, in golf shirt and jeans, comes across as neither wealthy nor obnoxious, tends to make the statement in an interview with Techonomy to help illustrate the issues most Americans face in preserving a wholesome diet regime. “Imagine residing in a small town exactly where there are only a bunch of chain stores. Typical folks with standard lives are not going to ask for sugar-free yogurt. They just get the things with sugar in it.” She appears forward to a day when you will not look obnoxious if you insist on healthier alternatives wherever you go.

The Way to Wellville, an initiative of the Wellness Initiative Coordinating Council (HICCup) founded by Dyson, aims to alter that standing quo. You may, she acknowledges, consider the Way to Wellville a “cheesy contest.” It’s tough five little American communities (greatest population 100,000) to see which a single can most boost five measures of well being and financial vitality in excess of five many years. But actually, she says, the competitors is “a clinical trial of the proposition that if you want to make men and women wholesome you have to do a bunch of issues together: adjust their atmosphere, change college foods, have employer wellness, and handle diabetes. Doing all these factors collectively at vital density will bring a genuine and lasting influence.” Towns that want to be regarded as for the contest have till Friday, Might 23, to apply.

Dyson, best recognized as chairman of EDventure Holdings and an angel investor and advisor to healthcare, technology, and aerospace organizations, has focused her existence to breakthrough technologies that aims to substantially enhance the lives and well-currently being of humans. Her recent investments incorporate Omada Health, Healthloop, and IconAircraft.

But she says technologies is not the only resolution to improving health. “The issue that’s most broken about well being, as opposed to healthcare,” the straight-speaking Dyson says, “is that just about every thing is undermining people’s attempts to be healthier. You’re being undermined by marketing that sells you bad foods, you are getting undermined by vehicles and transportation, you are getting undermined by getting scared that if your little ones go outside and stroll to school they’ll be kidnapped.”

So she designed the non-revenue HICCup to inform and advertise wholesome living practices. The way it will decide the winner in the Way to Wellness contest, she says, will be by “collecting data up the wazoo.” The program will track information in each and every local community like aggregated grocery keep receipts per capita, amount of neighborhood sufferers with overall health troubles, miles walked by citizens, and the variety of men and women with bikes. “Publicizing that information is going to be huge,” she says.

Dyson hopes selecting a winner to The Way to Wellville will inspire other communities to adopt more healthy habits and life options.

Even though she says the challenge will leverage “collective action in small places” as opposed to “government intrusion,” she believes the Reasonably priced Care Act will have an affect on how individuals keep healthy, and offer you far better possibilities and experiences to people looking for health-related attention. One way the new act can assist men and women, she explains, is by educating them about how to avert their situations from worsening, so they can stay away from paying costly doctors’ bills. Dyson adds that HICCup will bolster the affect of the Reasonably priced Care Act by exhibiting “what it is that men and women should be having to pay for, like these extended-term community-wide interventions.” “The ACA incentivizes health companies to emphasis on local community overall health in general—not just educating them, but offering preventive providers and screenings, and so on,” says Dyson.

Because each communities has accessibility to different and limited resources, Dyson believes people must actively voice their opinions on what programs and assets their communities ought to offer. More effective transit techniques, a lot more nutritious school lunches, and bike sharing are just a few efforts and improvements Dyson believes would create much better healthier lives in America. She says nowadays we’re all collectively contributing to undermining our personal overall health, so we need to collectively figure out how to enhance it.

Esther Dyson Has a Program to Improve America"s Health