By Ben Coxworth — GizMag
As any serious bicycle commuter will tell you, it’s important to let drivers know what you’re doing by signaling your intention to turn. Needless to say, the more visible your hand signals are, the safer you should be. That’s why a group of doctoral students at Switzerland’s EPFL research institute created the Intelligent Blinker. It’s a wrist bracelet that automatically starts flashing when the wearer raises their arm to signal.
The device (which would presumably be worn as a set of two) contains an accelerometer and a magnetometer, to detect changes in the orientation of the bracelet. When the arm moves out laterally, those sensors trigger a set of integrated LEDs to begin blinking. Depending on how enthusiastic of a signaler they are, the user can adjust the Intelligent Blinker to kick in at more or less of an angle, as desired.