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Today we’re announcing our new open-source wearable electronics platform and series of accessories. We rarely announce something until it’s shipping to customers, but you’ll see a lot of these out in the world from our testers as they show off some projects – so we wanted to post about this now.

For the last few years Ladyada has been thinking about everything she wanted in a wearable electronics platform for Adafruit’s community of makers, hackers, crafters, artists, designers and engineers. After months of planning, designing and working with partners around the world for the best materials and accessories, we can share what we’re up to. The hardware is now in the hands of our staff and testers!

We call it the FLORA.

NEC has launched a wearable computer, the NEC TeleScouter, intended to allow fieldworkers to consult a virtual 16-inch transparent display projected in front of them while they go about their business. Consisting of a Brother AirScouter wearable display and a compact 500MHz ARM-based computer packing WiFi a/b/g and Bluetooth, the system currently targets industrial augmented reality (AR) applications, but NEC sees the future being far broader.

In fact, the target is AR that can remind you of the identity of acquaintances when you bump into them at parties, pull up information on products you’ve bought but haven’t kept the user guide to hand, and other more personal applications. NEC is also working on the potential input and control methods, such as sensors which would allow you to tap your arm in different ways to trigger functionality.

Wearable computing becomes the next mobile frontier.

We’ll remotely connect to our smart homes.

A jump in wireless home broadband adoption.

Researchers Sean Gustafson, Christian Holz and Patrick Baudisch of the Hasso-Plattner Institute have created a working prototype of a touch interface

A wearable depth camera tracks the user's movements on the surface of the palm of his or hand, corresponding to specific commands for an iPhone or other touchscreen phone, such as sliding to unlock and time settings.

Imaginary Phone allows users to control their mobile devices without taking it out of their pocket. Instead, users mimic the interaction on the palm of their hand. The interaction is tracked by a wearable depth camera which sends input events to the actual physical device. By mimicking the layout of the physical device, here an iPhone, users can operate the device based on spatial memory built up while using the physical device.

Near-field communication (NFC) has been trashed by critics, who say it adds no value to consumers or is a technology in search of a need. But as we’ve pointed out, NFC is just a technology that can applied in a lot of different ways, apart from the digital wallet framework through which many people understand it.

Increasingly, we’re seeing more and more interesting projects and applications being built that show how NFC will be deployed outside of mobile payment situations. This not only indicates how flexible the technology is but also could help propel the overall technology in adoption, as consumers become aware of NFC and learn to use it for a variety of reasons.

Right now, NFC is still below the radar for most U.S. consumers, and the slow roll out of Google Wallet or the pending launch of Isis next year are, by themselves, only going to accelerate NFC adoption by so much. But having a host of uses for the technology could open people’s eyes and push them past any usability or safety concerns.

Near-field communication (NFC) has been trashed by critics, who say it adds no value to consumers or is a technology in search of a need. But as we’ve pointed out, NFC is just a technology that can applied in a lot of different ways, apart from the digital wallet framework through which many people understand it.

Increasingly, we’re seeing more and more interesting projects and applications being built that show how NFC will be deployed outside of mobile payment situations. This not only indicates how flexible the technology is but also could help propel the overall technology in adoption, as consumers become aware of NFC and learn to use it for a variety of reasons.

Right now, NFC is still below the radar for most U.S. consumers, and the slow roll out of Google Wallet or the pending launch of Isis next year are, by themselves, only going to accelerate NFC adoption by so much. But having a host of uses for the technology could open people’s eyes and push them past any usability or safety concerns.

The event, held on 27 June, showcased the latest research on next-generation body-centric communications – wireless networks worn on the human body. Future communication systems will be worn on clothing rather than held in the hand as smart phones are nowadays, and will be made possible due to cutting-edge advancements in wearable electronics. Dr Paul, from the Centre for Communications Research (CCR), specialises in the design of antennas that can be integrated into textiles through electromagnetic numerical simulation. Applications range from smart clothing for sportswear, to soldiers’ and emergency workers’ outfits, and to monitoring devices for healthcare and telemedicine. Professor Joe McGeehan, Director of CCR, said: ‘We are delighted that Dr Paul has had the opportunity to present an invited paper on her novel research is this key area. Wireless networks worn on the human body will become more pervasive, particularly in applications such as medical sensor networks for an ageing population and healthcare.’