14-year-old Alaina Gassler of West Grove, Pennsylvania was trying to figure out a way to prevent car crashes and came up with an invention that basically eliminates the blindspots for vehicles by using a webcam and projector.
Gassler put a tiny camera on the passenger’s side of a car, right next to the windshield. Then she linked it to a projector installed inside the car that projects live video onto the blind spot.
There’s a video that shows how it works, and it does seem helpful. The footage plays in real-time, so it’s almost like looking through the car and seeing what’s outside.
She recently entered it into an engineering contest called the Broadcom Masters, which is like a science fair for super-smart kids. And she won the grand prize of $25,000. Now car companies are looking into offering it in their cars, and it could be available relatively soon.