From Giorgia Pontetti’s Hydro Farming to RECO2‘s eco-sustainable solutions. This year’s Maker Faire Rome will once again amaze you. Take a look at these projects. They are the top ten. A small selection of the best of the best. The choice was made by the staff of the event. We tell you about them HERE.
Hydro Farming
A range of hydroponic products: new generation lamps, electrical appliances and a compact, sterile, fully computerised hydroponic vertical farm for healthy, clean, zero-kilometre crops. All this is Hydro Farming, Giorgia Pontetti‘s project. Giorgia, born in 1977, is an electronic and astronautical engineer with a great passion for nature and technology. Despite her rigorous and formal studies as an engineer, her passion for agriculture has always accompanied her life. Since 1996 he has been CEO of G & A Engineering, a private research centre for microelectronics for space and small business applications, capable of designing and producing special apparatus for military and space applications. Since 2004 he has started his own traditional and technological farm, the Ferrari Farm, where he cultivates both in open field with organic method and in sterile, sealed and computerised greenhouses. The project can be found in the LIFE area.
Vytreum
RECO2 is an innovative Cleantech startup active in the green building sector. It is the only startup to have patented a revolutionary production process for the creation of a new range of functional materials for green building. Through a virtuous model of circular economy and a revolutionary patented production process, RECO2 is able to recover and transform various types of inorganic and inert secondary raw materials (including glass, ceramic waste, steel mill waste, etc.) into a wide range of functional products for sustainable building with a green footprint. The revolutionary production process is RECO2‘s greatest strength, as it allows us to use temperatures below 100 °C for the production of our products, with a consequent reduction in production costs (in terms, above all, of water and energy consumption) of around 80% and CO2 emissions of around 90% compared to the average of conventional ceramic firing processes. Their first product is called Vytreum, a ceramic-concrete material made entirely from secondary inorganic raw materials, used for: eco-sustainable indoor and outdoor flooring, urban renewal and furnishing, and design applications. The project can be found in the LIFE area.
Nanosaur
Nanosaur is the smallest robot built on an NVIDIA Jetson Nano. The robot is designed to be easy to build at home with a 3D printer, and with a few other components you can see it in action. Nanosaur features a front-facing camera, two eye displays and a powerbank to power the robot, the overall dimensions are 10 x 12 x 6 cm with a weight of only 500g. Nanosaur’s architecture is based on ROS2 foxy, with deepstream ROS and a localisation system based on the same frontal camera. The project is still under development, but already has a community around the world with several modifications and projects underway. Its designer is Roberto Borghi. The project can be found in the EDUCATION area.
MecGeos Robot
MecGeos, an acronym for Mechatronic for Geodetic System, is a robot capable of supporting the work of geomatics technicians in the field. It was designed by Monitor the Planet, a team of experts in geomatics, the discipline that deals with the automated management of land information. The robot has been in use for many hours and its autonomy has exceeded a working day. The robotic technology is integrated with geodetic instrumentation from major manufacturers. MecGeos will be equipped with autonomous navigation using cameras and lidar sensors. It will use pre-set tracks and autonomous GNSS navigation. It will send the collected data directly to the office.
WeCare
WeCare is a project that aims to provide sustainable, ride-by-ride sanitation for shared vehicles in a fast, automated and environmentally friendly way. Manuel Favaron, Riccardo Sassetti, Vittorio Stefanini, Simone Franceschetti, Mario Villano, Gabriele Pollastrini, Francesco D’Urso, the designers, have developed a solution to reduce the spread of COVID-19 but also to improve the level of hygiene inside vehicles such as taxis, shared cars and company fleets. A fast, environmentally friendly system made of high quality components makes our product innovative and competitive on the market, as well as easily scalable to other sectors. The project can be found in the LIFE area.
Wearable & Biosensing
The world of wearable devices is booming, but much still needs to be done to make the solutions truly wearable, as they are often uncomfortable, with standard shapes and not very adaptable. In addition, there are few wearable products (such as hardware or innovative textile products) to include in the projects of makers, students and designers. The importance of wearable products increasingly being integrated into garments is of paramount importance especially in this post covid phase where remote and home monitoring of patients is becoming more common. In Wearable & Biosensing, a research project of the University of Pisa, innovative textile sensors are being created that have a low impact on the lives of users thanks to maximum wearability and the possibility of customising their design and use, with a focus on realising and disseminating wearable technologies for maker projects.
Filanda 4.0_Zagarolo
Filanda 4.0 is a project developed by Massimo Proia, Maddalena Mariani and Antonella Della Bella, which aims to bring together tradition and innovation to rethink silk as a new “Made in Italy” excellence. A set of machines with an integrated function performs all the production steps and communicates with the operator via an IoT system for remote control of the production chain. The silk thread produced in this way is handcrafted “a tombolo” to create precious lace. The project can be found in the LIFE area.
Relio: Open Source Lighting made for Science and Cinema
Relio is an ecosystem, conceived by Marco Bozzola, of professional micro-illuminators with a strong predisposition to “Open” and “Makers” philosophies. Relio products are used all over the world both by amateur photographers and by prestigious scientific research institutes. We believe that combining professional hardware with open philosophies, such as firmware on Git-Hub, free models for 3D printing and extensive hardware documentation, is the key to emerging in a market crowded with closed and quickly obsolete products. The project can be found in the FABRICATION area.
Flipper “I Quattro Cavalieri”
The pinball machine “I Quattro Cavalieri” is the first pinball machine (designed by La Bottega delle Idee) for four players at the same time, it can therefore be defined as a cooperation pinball machine where each of the players, by reaching their own goal (which I will explain in a moment), ensures that, at the end of the game, they have contributed to the achievement of the common goal. Each of the four pinball machines is anchored to the square central part and thus the pinball machine has a cross-shaped form. On the playing surface there are, in addition to the rider, two lanes into which the player will throw his own ball. The design can be found in the LIFE area.
Sapienza Technology Team
OPT-IN: optical inceptor
sources: makerfairerome.eu
Cover photo: makerfairerome.eu
Maker Faire Rome – The European Edition has been committed since eight editions to make innovation accessible and usable to all, with the aim of not leaving anyone behind. Its blog is always updated and full of opportunities and inspiration for makers, makers, startups, SMEs and all the curious ones who wish to enrich their knowledge and expand their business, in Italy and abroad.
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