Touchpoint 1
Skin-interfacing wearable biosensors for smart health monitoring of infants and neonates
What is it?
When a baby is in intensive care, it needs to be hooked up to a bunch of machines to monitor vitals. But what if doctors could replace all this with biosensor stickers? These stickers would communicate with nearby monitors.
Potential message to students:
Do you think humans will all be wearing stickers one day and they are just starting with babies? How long do you think it will be before someone in your family wears a monitoring sticker 24 hours a day? Do you think the stickers could send messages over the internet?
Touchpoint 2
San Francisco tries tough love by tying welfare to drug rehab
What is it?
Some homeless in San Francisco will soon get welfare only if they submit to drug tests. If you go to treatment, you get welfare checks. The city does not want welfare used to pay for drugs.
Potential message to students:
Is drug abuse a crime or a disease? Do you think money for food and other needs should be tied to getting treatment? Do you think this new program will work?
Touchpoint 3
Exercising with virtual reality is potentially better for the working memory and positive mood than cycling alone
What is it?
Physical activity benefits brain health. Many also think listening to music during exercise helps, too. Now, researchers think wearing a VR headset while exercising will also benefit brain health.
Potential message to students:
Do you think music and VR just makes exercising less boring and people do more of it? Or do you think VR can connect directly to the brain through vision and sound and improve results?