PTI

A smart safety jacket for BSF personnel that senses imminent attacks on the wearer and communicates the enemy's location in real time has won first prize at a two-day hackathon for product start-ups developing smart solutions for everyday problems. The prototype safety jacket was developed by Ajay Sangwan, Rohit T and Vivek Jose from Kochi s Maker Village electronics incubator under their 'Quick response eco-systems for Border Security Forces' project.

Besides the jacket, the team also developed an IT-enabled hardware device which can be installed along the borders to detect human presence and alert the control room. According to the developers, the device has passive infrared sensors to measure thermal radiations, which help distinguish between human and other presence. The two-day 'Hack2help' event was jointly hosted by the US Consulate General Chennai and Learning Links Foundation, with support of Kerala Start up Mission, Maker Village and Science Society of India, a release said here today.

The hackathon, held at the Kerala Technology Innovation Zone, drew participation from 120 students (30 teams) from colleges across Kerala. A group of students from School of Engineering, Cochin University of Science and Technology won the second prize for coming up with technology solution to address the problem of dirty public toilets in India. Samir Dayal Singh, Mayank Raj, Abhinav Gautam and Shantanu Garg were the team members.

Jithin M S, Govindan Nampoothiri, Jobin Joseph and Clinz Stephen of Saintgits College of Engineering bagged third prize for developing a web portal that helps farmers sell their products direct to the end customer. Sivaprasad K, Arshad M P,Manikandan Vijayan and Gokuladas V R of College of Engineering, Cherthala won fourth prize for their 'Augmented Reality-based' dissection tool for learning that eliminates the need for lab dissection of animals.