Best Inventions 2006
This year Time Magazine's Best Inventions 2006 has selected an invention which I felt is very relevant to the holiday season. TruTouch technology has come up with a really bright idea (pardon the pun) of using near infrared spectroscopy to detect alcohol level transcutaneously. This non-invasive method reportedly will detect alcohol level in 60 seconds flat.
Alcohol monitoring technology that uses near-infrared (NIR) reflectance spectroscopy to noninvasively measure alcohol transcutaneously is a recent advance in optical testing method. To translate laboratory results to a system such as the one shown above that will function reliable in the field is no small feat (see OE Magazine). The TruTouch system uses NIR spectroscopy to measure unique spectral absorption signatures. A specific spectral absorption signature is determined by the molecular structure of the chemical compound of interest. As opposed to measuring a given concentration of a pure compound in the laboratory, direct measurement of alcohol level transcutaneously is not possible due to the variation in skin structure and the presence of a myriad of other compounds. To overcome such difficulty indirect multivariate calibrations such as partial-least-squares regression (PLS) is used. These and other technical details are given in an article in OE Magazine.
Looks like the unit above can be made compact and robust enough to fit into the arm rest of a car and electronically linked to the ignition system. For a person who has a restricted driving license due prior drunk driving conviction, the car is programmed not to start unless he is sober.
Happy Holiday and safe driving.
Other Best Inventions of note are:
Gardasil is a vaccine for immunizing adolescents against the sexually transmitted human papillomavirus, a major risk factor for cervical cancer.
A naturally hypoallergenic breed of cat that do not secrete protein in their saliva that can trigger an allergic reaction in humans.
A water-harvesting machine, which can pull up to 500 gal. of drinkable water per day out of thin air.
