A lot of people I know hate having to go to the bathroom in public places or in homes that aren’t theirs. It’s an understandable preference, considering the fact that nobody likes to stink up someone else’s home.
But it’s a fact of life: whether you like it or not, poop is going to stink.
You can, however, contain the smell with Poo-pourri, and it doesn’t involve spraying perfumes and fresheners all over the place. The former option seems better, as the latter often results in a strange hybrid perfume-poop smell that probably will smell even worse.
Poo-pourri contains a blend of natural essential oils that its makers claim can “trap” the smell in the bowl.
Apparently, the oils in the spray create a film on the surface of the toilet water, making sure the smell stays in the bowl. Pou-pourri is offering a Best Smellers starter pack for $25(USD), which contains a 200-use Poo-Pourri Original spray and a handier 100-use Deja Poo spray.
Sometimes, a cup of coffee just doesn’t do it for you. Even if it does, there’s the dreaded crash that often comes sooner than you’d like. The alternative? Sprayable Energy. It’s a patent-pending caffeine spray that can be absorbed for “energy through your skin without the jitters, crash, chemicals, & cost of other caffeinated products.”
Most energy-boosting drinks and products out there contain loads of calories, sodium, and sugar. Others contain doses of caffeine that are masked with the addition of artificial ingredients. Sprayable Energy wins on several counts because it’s odorless, colorless, and does what it promises to do.
The best thing about it has got to be its portability. A two-week supply will easily fit into your pocket, as it’s just about the size of a penlight. Since it’s administered through a spray, you can control your dosage based on your needs and metabolism. Start with two sprays and work your way up to four if you need a bigger energy boost–the choice is yours.
You can learn more about how Sprayable Energy works and where you can get one on their Indiegogo page.
If you’ve played any of the Mass Effect games, then you’re familiar with the series’ Medi-gel. It’s a potent salve that instantly cures wounds and restores health, regardless of the source of the damage. It can even be administered remotely! It does have one crucial flaw: it’s not real. But two college students from NYU-Poly have invented something similar to this miraculous substance.
The product is called Veti-gel, a plant-based gel that can stop bleeding and hasten blood clotting, supposedly regardless of the size of the wound. It was invented by Joe Landolina and Kenny Mai, two junior college students at New York University. In fact, in 2011 Landolina and Mai were still calling their invention Medi-gel. I don’t know why they changed it though.
Tech News Daily spoke with Landolina and reports that the gel “jump-starts the clotting and healing process so quickly that even wounds to internal organs or major arteries are able to close up instantaneously.” Landolina was even quoted as saying, “One of my other colleagues … he went to a bonfire. One of his friends fell into the fire and got second-degree burns. He put the gel on, and the next day is [sic] was healed[.]“
Apparently the gel’s plant-based polymers turn themselves into a replica of an animal tissue component known as the Extracellular Matrix or ECM. The ECM has many functions, one of which is related to healing wounds. Once applied, Veti-gel forms a tight seal around the wound and helps with clotting and healing. In the short video below, Veti-gel is applied on a 3″ incision is made on a piece of raw pork loin that’s been pumped full of blood. Aside from being very gross, the video also shows how fast the gel does its job.
Because we live in an amazing world, it doesn’t surprise me that there are already substances similar to Veti-gel. One is called QuikClot and the other is called Floseal. But according to Tech News Daily QuikClot requires that you apply pressure over the wound for several minutes, whereas Veti-gel can fly solo. Floseal on the other hand is partly made from bovine gelatin. Veti-gel is made from plants, which are not as adorable as cows and oxen and thus can be harvested without remorse. Just kidding. Kind of.
But don’t be reckless when you’re assaulting the Reapers just yet because Veti-gel is still in development. Also because there are no Reapers. Landolina and Mai have started a company called Suneris to further work on and market their invention. Maybe these geniuses can make the Omni-tool real as well.
If you’re feeling overheated, you can always buy one of those “cooling mist” sprays, but they are typically just water or menthol in a spray can. This unique invention from Japan really is ice cold to the touch.
Simply spray some Cold Foam cooling gel on a flat surface, give it a second to firm up, then pick it up. The stuff comes out of the can and instantly reaches a chilly temperature of -17°C (~1.4°F). The stuff comes out of the can sort of like Silly String, but can be shaped once hardened – the example provided is to use it to make a cooling wristband, but I imagine you could make a headband or just a cold orb you hold in your hand if you want. The cooling effect wears off after about five minutes though, and then you just need to dispose of it.
Here’s some video footage from ShiftEast showing off how some of these unusual cooling Japanese products work on your skin.
Cold Foam sells for ¥639 (~$8 USD) per can over at Japan’s NigiShow. You might also want to keep an eye out on Strapya-World, their worldwide sister store to see if you can purchase these outside of Japan. I have a feeling since they’re aerosol cans filled with various nasty chemicals, that you won’t be able to.
If Jim Gordon had a thing for crafts, this is the Bat-signal that we would get. The upside is that it can still be dramatically killed by an axe, but Batman has to be really close to see it.
All you need is some thread, nails, a ton of patience and a desire to summon Batman and you too can make one. It actually does light up from behind as well, so maybe Batman can see it from a slight distance after all.
Why hasn’t anyone tried calling Spider-Man with this sort of thing? It’s basically a spider web right? Then you don’t waste this on Batman. The right tool for the right job and all that. Spider-Man would love this. And Peter Parker needs some gimmick where Police can call him anyhow, right? It’s a cool piece of art, I just really want Spidey to have his own signal.
Spray-on medical solutions packed with cells certainly seem to be catchingon. A new study published in The Lancet highlights a spray infused with skin cells and blood clotting proteins that helps leg ulcers heal quicker. Normally, the open wounds only undergo a compression bandage treatment and typically heal after six months. Patients who were also spritzed with the cell-imbued solution, however, experienced a rapid decrease in ulcer sizes soon after being treated. Three months into the regimen, 70 percent of those who had the mist applied were healed of the malady. Not only does the new remedy speed up the healing process, but it also avoids the need for a skin graft, another method used to hasten rehabilitation. Cost is a potential concern, but further tests are still needed to determine the therapy's practicality.
Spray-on solutions have found a place in green technology and even in transmitting radio waves, and they're no strangers to medical research, either. Researchers at the British Heart Foundation are working on a bioelectric spray composed of heart cells to help mend that most vital of organs. Because the cells need to be extremely thin to form a sheet of heart tissue, they are passed through a conductive needle that charges them with up to 30,000 volts. Exposing the cells to an electric field turns the solution into small droplets, which in turn form the cardiac sheet. The scientists can also add other types of cells to create "three-dimensional" tissue, which can be grafted onto injured hearts or sprayed onto scar tissue to help patients' tickers pump more strongly. As is so often the case, the next step will be testing the technology on animals, and the project's ultimate goal is to use this spray-on solution rather than making patients wait for donor hearts.
The Stone Spray robot was created as a 3D printer to produce architecture out of soil. While technically speaking, this robot wasn’t designed to create art, the results of its efforts and the research project sure look like some interesting sculptural works.
Stone Spray was created by Anna Kulik, Inder Shergill and Petr Novikov as a way to produce eco-friendly, efficient and innovative systems to “print” architecture in 3D. The device collects sand and dirt which is then sprayed from a nozzle with a binding component. This mixture solidifies and creates forms that look like they were sculpted.
The movements of the ‘bot are controlled by a computer, so it can allow designers to have a direct input in the resulting shape, unlike other 3D printers. The spray is multi directional, and can even be sprayed vertically. While the prototype only produces pretty rudimentary small structures, here’s a rendering of the sort of thing a larger version might be able to produce:
While I’m not sure of the practical applications for the Stone Spray robot, it sure produces some unique artistic output. Check it out in action in the video below:
