Israeli Student Creates Stylish, But Invasive, Jewelry That Transforms the Body Into a Renewable Energy Source (Ouch!)

Imagine being able to power your electronic devices with the energy harnessed from your eyes blinking, the blood flowing through your veins, or the electric pulses coursing down your spine.

Well, Israeli industrial design student Naomi Kizhner has developed a line of fashionable, yet invasive, jewelry called “Energy Addicts” that transforms the body into a renewable energy source.

Fabricated in karat gold and 3D-printed biopolymer, the jewelry designs are intended to be worn on three different parts of the body.

The least invasive of the three is called the Blinker, which sits on the bridge of the nose and across the eyelids. The device transforms the energy generated with every blink of the eye into electricity.

Not for the faint-hearted, the Blood Bridge requires two needles to be placed into a vein in the lower arm. The jewelry redirects blood flow past a wheel within the casing. As the wheel turns, the device converts the kinetic energy into electricity.

Another seemingly painful device is called the E-pulse Conductor. Inserted into the upper spine, the jewelry collects the electric pulses generated by the wearer’s neurological system.

So far, the Energy Addicts jewelry is not commercially viable. Kizhner designed the products for a senior project at Hadassah College in Jerusalem. Her project addresses what she believes is an impending worldwide energy crisis.

"I wanted to explore the post-humanistic approach that sees the human body as a resource," she told Dezeen.com. "It interested me to imagine what would the world be like once it has experienced a steep decline in energy resources and how we will feed our energy addiction."

Kizhner believes her concepts are not far fetched. "Technologically, we are not
too far away from these ideas becoming a reality," she said. "But practically speaking, will we be willing to sacrifice our bodies in order to produce more energy? My intention is to provoke a discussion."

(Photos: Naomi Kizhner/Shahar Tamir)