The World’s Smallest Wearable—Developed in Conjunction with Tech Giant… L’Oréal?

Our mission here at Hackster is to show you all of the most interesting things happening in tech today. In the course of doing that, we sift through lots of press releases and announcements from tech companies like Google, Microsoft, and Apple. Among those, cosmetic company L’Oréal has been decidedly absent.

So, imagine our surprise when their name was attached to a Northwestern University research project that has yielded the world’s smallest wearable electronic device. But, considering a major part of L’Oréal’s business revolves around skincare, it actually makes sense. Avoiding excessive exposure to UV light from the sun is key to healthy skin, so this wearable is designed to unobtrusively measure the UV rays that the wearer is getting hit with.

The device itself is a tiny tab that’s small enough to be stuck onto a thumbnail, where it will measure UV exposure throughout the day. That same sunlight also powers the unit, so no charging is needed. When a user wants to take a look at the readings, they only need to tap the wearable with their phone and the data will be sent via NFC.