Prototypes for Humanity: 100 ideas to change the world

A chair that transforms into a life raft, a leftover banana crop repurposed into reusable bags; 100 of the world’s best brains come together with ideas that could save the world.

The brightest and youngest academic minds have descended on Dubai for the first Prototypes Against Humanity event. 100 original, impactful, and innovative prototypes and technologies created by students and recent graduates across more than 100 countries have come together hoping to change the world with their creations.

Plastic pollution is a critical challenge globally. Germany had one answer on display that would help our Oceans; a low-cost river barrier known as ‘Trashboom’. The company behind it, Plastic Fischer says 80% of ocean plastic starts out as river pollution. The barrier targets it at its source as it is 300 times more cost-efficient to collect plastic before it reaches the ocean.

Moritz Schulz, Co-Founder & Design Advisor bei Plastic Fischer GmbH told Euronews, “We started in Southeast Asia, in Indonesia. We've been there for eight months to develop the thing in the field because we had no prior knowledge about it. Now we are scaling up, especially in India. We are active in six different locations and we have around 30 that are active, 60 full-time employees to take care of the waste management, and have collected 340 tons of plastic waste already.”

Also at the event was Filipino innovator Aleksander Wieneke who has developed a chair that can turn into a life-saving flotation device, after he experienced a typhoon at 9 years old. Like a piece of origami, it transforms in less than a minute into a life raft.

Aleksander Wieneke, Designer of NOAH says, “Decades later, you'd expect us to be able to better manage flooding. But it remains