Dean Kamen

Mobility engineering. Kamen's research firm DEKA developed the iBOT, a wheelchair that uses gyroscopic balancing to climb stairs and raise its user to eye level, approved in the United States in 2003, and the Luke prosthetic arm for amputees under a military research programme. The iBOT was withdrawn in 2009 because few could afford it, then revived, a reminder that brilliant engineering still depends on price and insurers.