Comment by theshrike79
4 months ago
I was studying an advanced degree at a school ~10 years ago and one of the teachers was "a bit" into graphene and they had done all kinds of cool stuff with it.
One example was a floor material for care homes that could detect pressure in a 2D sense, so the floor itself could detect "fall events" and track movement + gait etc.
And I think they had a prototype of a similar thing in Australia that weighed all trucks coming and going from a mine just under the road they drove, no need to stop on weighing stations.
No idea where that went.
Nowadays we'd do the fall detection with either a wrist device (any Apple Watch can do this) or cameras + "AI" detection. The floor is a lot more privacy preserving though, it only detected shapes and pressure.
All the funding went to an AI assistant startup focused on making Anime avatars to replace friendships in preteens.
Difference between concept and implementation I'd assume. Floor material would have to be cheap and/or very durable to be practical in the real world, and installation, replacement/upgrades would cost a lot in time, labour and inconvenience.
Camera on the wall is quick, easy, doesn't have to deal with the wear and tear usage of a floor, and gives a good enough solution for the problem.