Imagine a pair of headphones which fit so comfortably that you barely noticed you were wearing them, designed not to overheat as well. Add to this sensors which detect your sleep state and adjust the volume of audio accordingly, lowering it while you’re asleep and slowly raising it in response to your sleep cycles and chosen wake-up time.
That’s exactly what Kokoon headphones, designed by Onkyo and financed through Kickstarter, are aiming to achieve, with the first units shipping in early 2016.
Plenty of work has gone into designing headphones which mould comfortably to the ear without overheating or becoming uncomfortable.
“Taking inspiration from high-tech pillows and sport shoe technology we developed our patented FlexMould Comfort system. By molding the headphone to the natural contours of the head and spreading pressure away from the sensitive regions we were able to dramatically increase the levels of comfort,” say the Onkyo team.
The headphone electronics live in the band rather than the headphones themselves. This is coupled with gel cushioning and a specially-designed airflow system to keep ears at a comfortable temperature.
To make Kokoon more than just comfortable headphones, the designers have gone one step further and designed miniaturised dry EEG sensors which sit in the headphones and monitor algorithms to help ascertain sleep states. The team claims this will enable Kokoon to adapt itself to people’s sleep patterns.
“This level of insight enables Kokoon to become truly intelligent. Kokoon adjusts your audio volume and equalization as you fall asleep so that it doesn’t disturb you once asleep. Also, it adapts your audio to block out external noises and disturbances which may compromise your deep sleep,” say the designers.
Coupled with the Kokoon app, the headphones will be able to act as an intelligent alarm, working with users’ sleep cycles to determine the best point at which to raise the volume and wake them.
Kokoon will be available in early 2016. Would you use Kokoon? Let us know in the comments below or by Twitter, Google+ or Facebook.
[button link=”https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1861630723/take-control-of-your-sleep-with-kokoon-eeg-headpho?ref=category_location” icon=”fa-external-link” side=”left” target=”blank” color=”285b5e” textcolor=”ffffff”]Source: KickStarter[/button]Last Updated on November 27, 2018.
