iPhone sleep improvement application wins
at 2009 innovation competition
Convincing people to wake up in the morning and play a game on a sandy beach with palm trees seems like a marketable idea, especially if the game helps people sleep more effectively and stay alert throughout the day.
That’s exactly what student inventors Justin Beck and Daniel Gartenberg hope is true, and the judges at the 2009 Innovation Day competition think they’re on to something. In February, the pair won the top prize and $10,000 at the 15th anniversary of the Schoofs Prize for Creativity, an annual UW-Madison undergraduate invention competition that rewards innovative and marketable ideas.
The first place winners of $10,000 in the 2009 Schoofs Prize for Creativity are (from left) Justin Beck and Daniel Gartenberg. Their winning invention, Proactive Sleep—a software application for the iPhone and the iPod touch—will help people sleep and wake up more effectively. (large image) |
Their winning idea, called Proactive Sleep, is a software application for the iPhone and the iPod touch that serves as a sophisticated alarm clock, waking users during the light sleep phase of their cycle. In the morning, users play an easy game—which currently is depicted on a beach scene—that tests alertness. The software automatically reconfigures as it learns the user’s unique sleep cycle, ultimately eliminating morning grogginess and helping users stay more alert all day. Beck and Gartenberg plan to put Proactive Sleep on the market in the next few months via the Apple application store.
Proactive Sleep was selected from eight inventions developed by 10 students participating in Innovation Day, an annual event hosted on the engineering campus. Innovation Day features two competitions, the Schoofs Prize for Creativity and the Tong Prototype Prize. Additionally, participants can win money for the best design notebook or delivering the best presentation.
Mechanical Engineering student Michael Deau won the top honor and $2,500 in the Tong Prototype Prize, as well as $1,000 for the Younkle Best Presentation Award for a new type of soft-drink vending machine. Dubbed EcoStream, the system will integrate digital technology with environmental values, allowing people to reuse plastic or steel bottles and pay for their drinks via Web-based accounts. Since the competition, he has been speaking with patent lawyers to move forward with his invention.
Richard Schoofs (BSChE ‘53), the founder and sponsor of the Schoofs Prize, thinks Proactive Sleep is an interesting idea. “The price they’ve designed is low and the number of people who don’t sleep well happens to be high,” he says. “We’ll have couple of millionaires assuming it’s approved by Apple for sale in the application store.”
Based on an algorithm designed by Beck and Gartenberg, Proactive Sleep calculates the number of sleep cycles a user will go through during the night. The user tells the application what time they will go to bed and Proactive Sleep uses the algorithm to figure out when the user will be in a light sleep stage. The application then offers a list of optimal wake-up times, and the user picks the time they want.
In the morning, the alarm goes off and the user plays a simple game of moving a colored dot onto another colored dot. This game, which is a validated vigilance task, tests the user’s alertness and then recalibrates the algorithm for the next night. “It’s not one of those things that is immediate gratification, like eating candy,” says Beck, an electrical and computer engineering senior. “It’s more like eating vegetables—it will pay off over time.”
The idea for a sleep-related mobile application came to psychology and neuroscience senior Gartenberg after he took a neuroscience class about the mechanisms of sleep and learned that sleep disorders are chronically under-diagnosed. “Sleep is a growing problem in the United States,” he says. “Every generation we’re sleeping less and less, and it’s not healthy to get a poor night’s sleep.”
Gartenberg’s next step was to find a partner. He met Beck at the 2008 UW-Madison G. Steven Burrill Business Plan Competition, which rewards student business plans. Both Gartenberg and Beck were presenting separate proposals, and after Gartenberg learned about Beck’s background in developing mobile applications, he proposed his idea about sleep and the multidisciplinary team was born.
“No one knows how to sleep. There is no class in college that teaches you how to sleep,” Beck says. “This was an opportunity to educate people about sleep and sleep disorders.”
Gartenberg says the pair, who are both Innovation Day veterans (this was Gartenberg’s second entry, while Beck has participated three years), always kept the competition in the back of their minds as they developed Proactive Sleep. They credit their past experiences in the competition for their confidence this year.
“The competition was an incentive to put in hours upon hours of work,” Gartenberg says. “It’s a great experience that builds on itself. You learn how to develop your idea and meet people who can help you and have similar interests.”
Michael Deau won first place and $2,500 in the 2009 Tong Prototype Prize for the prototype of his invention, EcoStream. His invention also won third place and $4,000 in the Schoofs Prize for Creativity and the $1,000 Younkle Best Presentation Award. (large image) |
In addition to learning how to develop an idea for Innovation Day, students also learn the process of building workable prototypes. Tong Prize winner Deau spent more than 100 hours building his EcoStream prototype, and he says the experience was very worthwhile.
“Learning to prototype from the ground up is extending what you learn in school to real-world challenges,” says Deau, who also took fourth place in the Schoofs Prize. “Prototyping combines problem solving with an element of creativity and extends your knowledge base to areas that you never knew existed.”
The three winners’ commitment to innovation and entrepreneurship is exactly the kind of spirit Schoofs hopes Innovation Day attracts.
“Creative people in any field in my opinion live an incredibly good life,” he says. “If you’re creative and enjoy what you’re doing, you don’t have to worry about finances because they seem to roll in.”
His advice to students hoping to follow in Beck’s, Gartenberg’s and Deau’s footsteps is to learn, like they did, to recognize opportunities in solving everyday problems. “Learn to be a free spirit and to at least partially abandon the follow-the-herd instinct,” he adds.
Jason Lohr—Portable Refugee Shelter (Second place/$2,500, Schoofs Prize for Creativity; and second place/ $1,250, Tong Prototype Prize) (large image) |
Benjamin Conrad—Split Key (Third place/$700, Tong Prototype Prize; and $1,000 Sorenson Design Notebook Award) (large image) |
Andrew Burton—One-handed Canoe System (Fourth place/$1,000, Schoofs Prize for Creativity) (large image) |
The college would like to thank our distinguished panel of judges: John Bollinger, professor emeritus and retired dean; Harry Engstrom, retired partner in the Foley & Lardner LLP Madison office; Jim Frater, president and partner in Bjorksten/Bit7; and Chad Sorenson, president and co-founder of Sologear. To read more about our judges, visit studentservices.engr.wisc.edu/innovation/2009judges.html
Chemical engineering alumnus Richard Schoofs sponsors the Schoofs Prize for Creativity, and electrical and computer engineering alumnus Peter P. Tong sponsors the Tong Prototype Prize through the Tong Family Foundation.
Competition alumnus Matthew Younkle, president of Y Innovation LLC and president and CTO of Laminar Technologies LLC, sponsors the Younkle Best Presentation award.
Competition alumnus, Chad Sorenson, founding principal of Sologear Corp. and founder of Fluent Systems LLC, sponsors the Sorenson Best Design Notebook Award.