8 NASA-Inspired Innovations for Your Daily Life

NASA says it directly contributes $75.6 billion in economic output to the United States’ GDP. This contribution is spread throughout all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Much of this contribution involves, obviously, skilled jobs in STEM fields: NASA and its contractors employ 304,803 people nationwide.

The impact of NASA’s innovations in engineering and science may have a more significant and often hidden impact on the economy. They call it “NASA Spinoffs”: Research and development results licensed to private organizations who can create products and services based on NASA’s research. Great Business Schools estimates that NASA Spinoffs have contributed $7 to $14 for every $1 spent by NASA.

Many of these spinoffs might be a part of the background of your everyday life without you even realizing it. Here are a few examples of NASA research integrated into products that might surprise you.

Think you could use the results of NASA’s research for a new product? Find out how to license NASA’s technology and scientific research in the below video.

More Heat-Resistant Brakes in Motor Vehicles

Your next brand-new vehicle might include a new design for disc brakes designed by NASA Marshall Space Flight Center structural materials engineer Jonathan Lee, who used his experience working with materials that must withstand extreme heat to address excessive heating in brakes’ surfaces.

Brakes generally work by creating friction that slows down the wheels. The friction generates heat, which can cause brakes to lose material that ablates off as nanoparticulates. Besides being bad for the environment, losing these nanoparticulates can cause the brakes to lose effectiveness over time. Lee’s new system makes cooling brakes more efficient and the system is about 40% lighter than already widely-used brake cooling systems.

Improved Anti-Aging Cosmetics

Tool for Detecting Survivors Under Rubble

In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, one major challenge was locating and rescuing potential survivors under the rubble from the Twin Towers. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory collaborated with the Department of Homeland Security on a device that can isolate micromovements made by a living person even if that person is unconscious or immobilized. This includes the involuntary and hard-to-detect movement caused by heartbeats.

JPL licensed this technology to a company in Sarasota, Florida, that now makes the Finding Individuals for Disaster Emergency Response (FINDER) devices to sell to public safety departments worldwide. Real life uses included helping first responders find survivors after a Magnitude 7.1 earthquake that hit the Philippines in 2019.

Other NASA-developed devices used by first responders and disaster response teams include a spherical robot that detects toxic gas and modeling software that can assist planning the response to wildfires.

Temperature-Regulating Clothing

How often have you put on your favorite sweatshirt because it was a bit cool in the morning, only to have to take it off later because it warmed up? NASA spun off a coating developed for a proposed series of spaceplanes called the Protective Coating for Ceramic Materials with a license issued to Emisshield, Inc. The Protective Coating for Ceramic Materials can absorb and emit heat to regulate the temperature of anything that needs to be temperature-controlled, such as a spaceplane re-entering the atmosphere, without having to ablate off like the heat shields used for early space programs like Mercury and Apollo did.

Emisshield worked with Artilect Systems to adapt the coating for Artilect’s line of winter clothing. It also adapted the Protective Coating for Ceramic Materials to coat industrial equipment for additional protection from extreme heat conditions like fire.

Miniature Water Filters in Water Bottles

Obtaining drinkable water can be a challenge even in places where water seems abundant, or at least present. One problem astronauts face: How do you turn wastewater back into drinkable water without any way to send it back through the city water system when you’re done with it? This issue prompted NASA to partner with Argonide Corporation to develop a positively charged aluminum oxide microfiber filter called NanoCeram. 

Argonide currently licenses NanoCeram to Finnish company Ahlstrom-Munksjö, which sells the material under the brand name Disruptor. A reusable water bottle company named nkd LIFE Ltd uses this material for its Pod+ line, which purifies water and conditions it to improve the taste. Pod+ water bottles became popular with Europeans and Americans who enjoy outdoor activities and residents in Asia and Africa who wanted more reliable access to drinkable water. On the Indian version of the Amazon website, it apparently sells for about 1,500 rupees (under $18).

Founder Piush Soni says her work as a gemologist inspired her to create the Pod+ line, since her work took her to regions in which drinkable water was difficult to obtain. She used to frequently see children get sick from drinking contaminated water while working in Africa. She had also been working on a less expensive version of the Disruptor-based water filter that could be used to produce clean water from rivers and streams.

Insulating Foam

Work on the Space Shuttle produced one possible solution for reducing your monthly electric bill: Better insulation. A type of foam developed for the Space Launch System’s iconic orange external tank, known as TEEK, proved quite good at keeping the liquid propellant at super-cold temperatures. NASA partnered with a small Floridian business named PolyuMAC to improve its chemical structure.

PolyuMAC went on to develop commercial applications for a more lightweight version of the foam, which it dubbed Polyshield. It used its experience producing insulating material for the marine industry to sell Polyshield as a relatively lightweight yet effective foam. It soon found other commercial uses for Polyshield, such as providing better insulation for commercial and residential buildings to help reduce one major contributor to their electric bills: heating and cooling costs.

Work out like an astronaut!

Have you ever seen astronauts using that exercise equipment on the International Space Station? They had to adapt that equipment to give them workouts that are nearly as good as they could get on the ground.

Inventor Paul Francis had already been working on a system that used spring-loaded mechanisms when he heard that NASA needed help designing exercise equipment that would work in space. He approached NASA and contractors like Lockheed-Martin to see if they could work together. The process of creating a usable product took 18 months.

“It enabled us to take a prototype technology and turn it into a technology that met the specifications that would be required for not only NASA hardware, but also a commercial piece of equipment.”

That equipment became known among NASA personnel as the Interim Resistive Exercise Device and could provide up to 300 pounds of resistance through stacks of elastomer spring disks called FlexPacks.

Users who were into fitness in the early 2000s may still remember the Earthbound version of the end product, Bowflex, as well as Paul Francis’ attempt to spin up a gym, Bowflex Revolution. This eventually evolved into SpiraFlex- and FlexPack-based machines.

Lightweight Alternative to Steel

NASA’s Langley Research Center developed the IsoTruss, a lightweight structure in partnership with the Brigham Young University. Initially, the IsoTruss would be used in prototype solar sails to extend the sail. This would save money by saving the amount of mass that needed to be launched from Earth’s surface.

Although NASA’s solar sail never launched, Brigham Young University professor of civil engineering David Jensen thought IsoTruss showed promise for other applications. Depending on the application, it can be up to 12 times stronger than steel and much more lightweight. 

The IsoTruss can meet demand for more lightweight bicycles by replacing the more familiar cylindrical tubes, for instance. Because it is more resistant to high wind and won’t rot or corrode, it can also replace wood poles for utility applications.

Oh, and did you remember that somebody launched a prototype solar sail not that long ago? If you did, you’re right — the Planetary Society did that.

NASA spinoffs can be more common in the background of your everyday life than you think. Everything from lighting to medical applications to those commercial airplanes you see flying overhead have benefited from NASA’s research. Every year, it publishes a NASA Spinoff report if you are ever interested in learning more about the latest NASA spinoffs.