Mangalyaan among Time's best inventions list

The spacecraft is among the 25 ‘Best Inventions of 2014’ listed by Time magazine that are "making the world better, smarter and-in some cases-a little more fun."

November 21, 2014 09:30 am | Updated November 16, 2021 07:05 pm IST - New York

Mangalyaan is among the 25 ‘Best Inventions of 2014’ listed by Time magazine that are “making the world better, smarter and—in some cases—a little more fun.”

Mangalyaan is among the 25 ‘Best Inventions of 2014’ listed by Time magazine that are “making the world better, smarter and—in some cases—a little more fun.”

Mangalyaan has been named among the best inventions of 2014 by Time magazine which described it as a technological feat that will allow India to flex its “interplanetary muscles.”

“Nobody gets Mars right on the first try. The U.S. didn’t, Russia didn’t, the Europeans didn’t. But on September 24, India did. That’s when the Mangalyaan ...went into orbit around the Red Planet, a technological feat no other Asian nation has yet achieved,” Time said about Mangalyaan, calling it “The Supersmart Spacecraft.”

Mangalyaan is among the 25 ‘Best Inventions of 2014’ listed by Time magazine that are “making the world better, smarter and—in some cases—a little more fun.”

Developed by the Indian Space Research Organisation, the Mars spacecraft cost India just $74 million, less than the budget for the multi—Academy Award winning science fiction thriller film ‘Gravity.’

The Blue Room The list also includes inventions by two Indians for developing an exercise space for prisoners in solitary confinement and a tablet toy for kids.

Nalini Nadkarni, forest ecologist and college professor helped develop the ‘Blue Room’ with Snake River Correctional Institution in Oregon for inmates in solitary confinement, who for 23 hours a day see nothing but a tiny, white-walled cell, an experience some research suggests heightens mental illness and makes prisoners prone to suicide attempts and violence.

Former Google engineer Pramod Sharma developed ‘Osmo’, a tablet toy that gets physical. Sharma got the inspiration when he saw his daughter playing with the iPad, but did not want her to be glued to the tablet all day long.

The toy, which debuted in October, has helped Osmo raise $14.5 million in capital and is now being sold in the Apple Store.

The other inventions are a reactor developed by aerospace company Lockheed Martin that could realize nuclear fusion, Apple’s smart watch that besides telling time, can send messages, give directions, track fitness and make wireless payments and Microsoft’s Surface Pro 3, a “hybrid” that bundles laptop into a 12—inch tablet and can run desktop apps.

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