Lunch Seminar: From lab to mountain – how tech from KTH saves lives on the ski slopes
Meet the MIPS and RECCO
For one it started with a sense of powerlessness after a tragic avalanche accident, and for the other with the realization that many traumatic brain injuries could be prevented. Both cases resulted in research projects at KTH, and technology that has saved many people’s lives. Welcome to a lunch seminar on the topic of technology, training and security!
We’ll meet Magnus Granhed, founder of RECCO, who has developed a system for finding people buried after an avalanche; and Johan Thiel, CEO of MIPS, a helmet system that drastically reduces the risk of brain damage by imitating the brain’s own shock absorption function. The technology in both systems is based on research from KTH.
Join KTH Innovation for a lunch seminar and hear more about how they went from identifying a problem, starting a research project, finding a solution, and finally releasing their innovation on the market.
December 17th in Salongen, KTH Library, 12.00-13.30. A lunch sandwich is included.
Register here
RECCO
The RECCO system was developed at KTH during the 70’s, after the company’s founder, Magnus Granhed witnessed a tragic avalanche accident in Åre, where two people perished because the rescuers were unable to find them quickly enough in the deep snow. Today, the system is used by rescue organization globally, and is integrated in many clothing brands. Rescue operators use a RECCO detector to locate the RECCO reflector, a small antenna that’s attached to sports clothes and equipment.
MIPS
Neurosurgeon Hans von Holst tired of so little being done to prevent the numerous head injuries caused by sports accidents he saw coming through the doors of Karolinska Hospital’s emergency room. He contacted KTH researcher Peter Halldin, who at the end of the 90’s developed the new helmet technology to be known as MIPS, Multi-Directional Impact Protection System, together with Svein Kleiven. Their technology, which has proven to protect the head substantially better than traditional helmets, is based on the body’s own way of protecting our brain, by letting the brain tissue slide inside the head on impact, protected by the spinal fluid.