Print
Email
Print Edition StoriesThursday, August 19, 2010
Iron Man gives $15K to MIT grad student for projector lamp
By Michelle Lang
UMass President Jack Wilson on Entrepreneurship
Earlier this summer, MIT Media Lab researcher and graduate student Natan Linder won the Tony Stark Innovation Challenge, a $15,000 grant awarded by Audi through a contest held in conjunction with the movie Iron Man 2.
Linder won for his LuminAR device – a digital LED bulb and a desk lamp that is connected to the Internet and functions as a pico projector, projecting images onto any flat surface below it. The LuminAR Bulb is a self-contained, wirelessly connected device that can be screwed into any standard desk lamp socket and work as a pico projector. The LuminAR Lamp is a robotic arm-enabled desk lamp that interfaces with the bulb and allows for the projection display to be automatically moved across a flat surface.
The LuminAR also functions as a detector for a gesture interface, according to Linder. The system equipped with the LuminAR Lamp can take gesture commands to do things such as move the lamp out of the way by a swipe of the hand. With the Bulb pico projector, a properly configured PC or laptop could be displayed on a desk surface and controlled through gestures. Linder has a demonstration of the LuminAR system in a YouTube video.
Linder’s LuminAR video was one of the highest rated videos in the Tony Stark contest, according to Audi executives, and received 132,112 views on YouTube, the most out of all the submissions.
“There is a transformation that happens from what you see in movies and how you perceive robotics. They eventually become things that we use everyday,” said Linder, in a press release. “This is the idea that really drew me to the contest because — aside from being a fan of Iron Man — it represents a vision that I feel really connected to.”
Linder is no novice in the tech world. Prior to joining the Media Lab, he was the lead UI designer at Heartland Robotics Inc., the startup launched by Rodney Brooks. Linder also worked for Sun Microsystems Inc. and was the co-founder of Samsung Electronics Israel R&D Center where he served as its mobile R&D general manager. He was also an entrepreneur in residence at Jerusalem Venture Partners.
Comments
If you are commenting using a Facebook account, your profile information may be displayed with your comment depending on your privacy settings. By leaving the 'Post to Facebook' box selected, your comment will be published to your Facebook profile in addition to the space below.
RSS Feeds
