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By   Kaushik  Friday, October 26, 2012 Some years ago, a British engineering firm  Atkins  proposed an extravagant design for a five-star hotel located deep within a 100-meter, abandoned and half flooded pit near the base of Tianmashan Mountain in the Songjiang District of Shanghai. Construction on the 19-story, 380-room Shimao Intercontinental Hotel finally is already underway. Initially the hotel was expected to be completed by May, 2009, but construction commenced only in March early this year. The innovative design of the luxury resort hotel stands two levels higher than the rock face of the 100 meter deep quarry and includes underwater public areas and guestrooms. Instead of draining what water there is in the quarry, it will be flooded to become a sunken artificial lake. Two of the hotels floors housing guest rooms and a restaurant are to be situated underwater. An artificial waterfall will plunge down in front of the hotel's facade and into the quarry, at...

by   Julie M. Rodriguez , 01/17/14 filed under:   biomimicry ,  gallery ,  Wearable Technology 7428   Share on Tumblr Email South Korean designer  Jeabyun Yeon  just unveiled a conceptual scuba mask that would allow divers to  breathe underwater  without oxygen tanks. The mask, called the Triton, consists of two branching arms designed to serve as “gills” that extract oxygen from the water and deliver breathable air directly into their wearer’s lungs. Instead of hauling around heavy  scuba equipment , swimmers could simply bite down on a plastic mouth piece. The device is  covered in plastic “scales”  which allow water to enter through small holes, where it enters a chamber that separates the oxygen from the liquid. The Triton’s internal filter utilizes fine threads with holes smaller than  water molecules , so that only air is able to pass through. The ox...