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KRYSTA MORLAN
The Cast Cooler

Krysta Morlan invented a device that relieves the irritation caused by wearing a cast, and her invention helped her win the first annual Lemelson-MIT Invention Apprenticeship.

Krysta has just finished 10th grade at Vacaville High School in her home town of Vacaville, California. Her interests include reading, drawing, and Medieval fairs.

About two years ago, Krysta underwent surgery on her legs, due to diplegic cerebral palsy. The operation was successful, but as a result, Krysta had to wear a full cast on both legs for the entirety of her freshman year. Today's casts are noticeably lighter and breathe better than those of years ago; but in the heat of late summer, Krysta quickly found out how inevitably a cast irritates the wearer's skin, making it sweaty, itchy and worst of all, unreachable.

Hardly eager to spend a year in such conditions, Krysta decided to correct the problem herself. She saw that the solution lay essentially in ventilating the area covered by the cast. With some help from her father, a mechanic, she found a way to do just that. She ran a narrow, flexible plastic tube between the underside of the cast and her skin, then attached the tube to a small, light air pump powered by a 9-volt battery. The pump draws in air and channels it through the tube to the surface of the skin. Krysta then solved the final problem, anchoring the device to the cast with velcro, so that it would lie flat and go nearly unnoticed.

In its final form, Krysta's "Cast Cooler" worked perfectly, and spared her a great deal of discomfort during her recovery from surgery. Krysta is up and around again, but she is eager to share her invention with the thousands of children and adults who are currently stuck in the same spot she was in not too long ago.

In fact, Krysta wants to continue to invent products that will benefit persons suffering from disabilities or in need of physical therapy. This summer, she will have a unique opportunity to pursue that plan. Last November, Krysta won the first annual national Invention Apprenticeship for high school students, sponsored by the Lemelson-MIT Program.

Courtesy of the Program, Krysta will spend two weeks doing hands-on work with a practicing inventor who shares her interests. Krysta's Invention Mentor is Colin Twitchell, Director of the Lemelson Assistive Technology Development Center in Amherst, Massachusetts. Twitchell specializes in sports and recreational items, as well as therapeutic equipment.

For six months now, Krysta and her Mentor have been working together, mainly at long distance, on her latest idea. They have passed the planning stages and have already begun building prototypes. In July, Krysta visited Twitchell's laboratory to develop further her idea. Krysta's inventive mind and eagerness to help others has resulted in the working prototype of a water bike. The water bike can be used for physical therapy or just for fun.

[May 1999]