Category: Dailies


When someone receives a head injury in most sports, a cold pack is immediately applied to reduce brain swelling. Brain swelling is bad because your skull doesn't give the brain much room to expand, subjecting it to undue pressure which can lead to death. So it makes sense that creating a system capable of immediately cooling your brain upon impact could reduce the chances of injury or death should you land on your head. That's the thinking behind ThermaHelm, the company has created a retrofittable chemical cold pack designed to activate upon impact and capable of fitting into existing helmets.

How does it work? Simple, a very slim plastic packet contains separate
compartments for gel or water and ammonium nitrate is inserted into the
helmet lining, surrounding your head. "Triggers" or tiny spikes
calibrated to pierce the internal compartments at a given force
activate in a crash, mixing the ammonium nitrate with the gel or water
and an endothermic reaction makes the pack very cold. It can be stored
for long periods at a wide range of temperatures.

Still in prototype stage, ThermaHelm expects its cold packs to add
around $250 to the price of a helmet, a price that would likely reduce
significantly should a helmet manufacturer adopt the technology and
integrate it in production. ThermaHelm also envisions including an LED
indicator to warn of premature activation, tiny cameras capable of
recording a crash, integrated Bluetooth headphones and fog-free visors,
but that all seems to be merely icing on the cake for a new technology
that could help reduce the chances of brain injury in motorcycle


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