James Dyson Foundation confirms Ireland’s winner of James Dyson Award
The winner of this year’s James Dyson Award for Ireland has officially been announced!
The James Dyson Foundation has confirmed that 24-year-old Olivia Humphreys from Limerick has won this year’s regional award.
Olivia, who is a Product Design and Technology graduate from the University of Limerick, scooped the top prize in Ireland with her invention ‘Athena’, winning €5,800 from the James Dyson Foundation.
Athena is a portable, thermoelectric battery-operated scalp cooling device. It has been designed for people undergoing chemotherapy treatment to help reduce hair loss, and is more cost effective and timesaving than current hospital models – without compromising on the quality.
Athena consists of a carry case and a cooling helmet and aims to provide a more accessible and effective option for scalp cooling. It also enables patients to spend less time in the hospital on a chemotherapy infusion day.
Current scalp cooling devices require the patient to arrive 30 minutes early and stay for 90 minutes after their chemotherapy infusion for pre and post scalp cooling. However, with Athena, patients can seamlessly integrate scalp cooling into an infusion appointment with no extra time needed, and they can also use it from the comfort of their own homes.
Olivia’s inspiration for Athena came from her mother, as she was diagnosed with cancer in 2019 and subsequently underwent chemotherapy. At the time, Olivia noticed the shortage of scalp-cooling machines available at her mother’s hospital, as well as how limited the existing solutions were.
According to Olivia, the estimated cost for Athena would be around €1,000, compared to industry machines which come in at around €40,000 or more. Athena is also more portable than the leading machines on the market – weighing around 3kg – and can run for 3.5 hours at full battery power.
Speaking about the future of Athena, Olivia stated: “To elevate Athena to the next level, extensive research and development is required. While working on this project, I have been fortunate to network with Luminate Medical, a company in Galway, Ireland, dedicated to building a better future for cancer care.”
She added: “They have extended an internship offer to me as a research and development engineer. I have accepted and am very eager to apply the insights gained from my own research and development to contribute to their mission.”
Athena will now progress to the international stage of the James Dyson Award, where the overall winner will be announced on November 13. Olivia is also aiming to bring Athena to the scalp cooling market by producing a fully functional, technologically integrated prototype.
