Lindsay moran is an exc. I. A. Operative. She was packaging that can one day replace polysterene. Rachelle oldmixon specialises in behaviours. Im phil torres, i study insects in peru. Thats our team. Lets do some science. Music ] hi, guy, welcome back to techknow. Im phil torres, with rochelle, kyle and lindsay. Kyle, the nfl paid over threequarters of a million to settle a lawsuit. What was it about. Theres a focus on the concussion problem. The nfl has thousands of place, and millions of players in youth and challenge football. I went to Virginia Tech to look at technology to test helmets and track hits on college and youth players. Lets take a look. Homecoming in the heartland. This is cornhusker county. Nebraska university, the epicentre of college football. First big win. Along with the tradition of football come the hits. Cheer cheer big hits like this one in front of our cameras. No one knows how hard the hits can be better than blake lawrence. Former lion backer for nebraska korn huhs kerrs. If korn huhs kerrs. If you had to bang your head into somebody and that was your job, thats your best weapon. If they said, go and run and smash into the wall, i would do it for the sport. Blake did it all his life. He started to question it after suffering three concussions. The third, which is the one where i realised something was wrong, was here. It was, oh, and you start to get dizzy. Dizzy, foggy. Yes. Were. Whats crazy is the coach came up and said, great job, i did my job and had to sacrifices my brain to do it. When a player gets a concussion blow, the brain moves rapidly, the brain bouncing around in the skull. The nfl reports 50 players have been sidelined by concussions. For young place, multiple it by 1,000. Each year more than 55,000 kids end up in the emergency room for footballrelated concussions. Local News Coverage of catastrophic head injuresies have ramped up. The High School Player collapsed during football practice and died. Football tragedy bringing together a small down, early. What hits will land a player in the hospital . Rather than the end zone. How do you reduce a players risk of concussion . Stefan, dumer head of Virginia Techs Biomedical Department has been much. The mission is not to end football, but understand what is better. Research . We can tell a college player, what exposure you have, if you are a quarterbacker, lion backer we can tell you what the exposure is. That impact simulated 100 gs of slartion on the acceleration on the brain. Is. Thats the kind of force you may experience in a serious car crash. So right here on this diagram you can see the impacts that players are taking. This is how professor dumer collects his detat with hits, he picks up the angle and acceleration of the head any time a player is hit. So the system is showing realtime impacts . Basically within a couple of seconds of the impact it comes into the antenna and we can see live what happens to the players. You can plot this out through a practice or on entire season. We were one of the first teams to limit exposure and practices. We had data saying we are getting really high exposure and practice. The data allowed us to see that. In 2011 Virginia Tech teamed up with youth leagues to Research Young players as well. I dont think anyone expected the exposure numbers that we found. From the first grade to seven, 78yearold teams, the average impacts is 150 per season per player, some 80 times the acceleration of gravity. Again . 10yearold ryan is a young player Virginia Tech is studying. He suffered a head injury in a running deal. Dr mark rogers, a Team Physician for the hoekies is giving a follow up exam. Eight to 10yearolds are getting a lot of hits, some pretty good gforce. Gs. Its dangerous. Its high. A lot of stuff generates changes. They are not doing a lot of head to head contacts or hitting drills during the week. The fact that he may have had a concussion does to give you reservations about football. When your children get injured it makes you think. As long as you have programs like this, where people are trying to help and making sure the kids stay as safe as approximately. I wouldnt hesitate putting the play. That would be his decision. Professor dumis is trying to make the game safer. Create safer helmets. Front, side, back, top impacts. For every test we multiply that by how many times the players sees that in a year. Everything comes together, giving you a star rating. The helmets absorb energy better, lower acceleration, lowering risk. You have what looks like a helmet canon. What is this modelling different from the other test . We are going away from the single linear drop. We know every head impact has linear rotation. You have energy input. This task the head can rotate and slide away. Three, two, one, go. Remember this 100 g hit . Professor dumis has a 5star helmet reducing it bias much as 50 , thats because the shell riskful. There are helmets that reduce your risk. Like 5star cars reduce your risk of dying in a car crash. As for blake lawrence, the risks of the game that he had, decision. Our head coach said, your concussions are happening too easily. That summer, before my junior ner at nebraska, i told myself and my family and the coaches and doctors if i had one more concussion, no matter the circumstances, id step away from the sport of football. It was easy to say, not do. Looking at that peerks watching it, i piece, just watching it, i feel that gave me a head ache. Rachelle, you have a background in neuroscience, what damage are we looking at with a big collision . Thats interesting. There are thousands of researchers across the country trying to figure it out. Some believe theres sheering happening at the ends of neuropathways so the connections between the different parts of the brain are weaker. Peopler thinking that you get tears in the tissue which would weaken the structure and function. Theres the idea of bruising and temporary damage through swelling. Theres a lot. Theres a lot. Yes. And a lot of it is temporary. But some of it, you know, could be serious. I want my kids to watch. My 8yearold want to play football. Its huge. Ive been trying to explain to him the danger involved. As a mum its hard for me to watch the shots of the impact. What will we see next . I imagine its an interesting hat that you are putting on. Next i put on what i deemed the science acto pus to look at octopus to look at my brain waves and get a look at the root of what a concussion looks like. We want to hear what you think about the stories. Join the conversation by following us on twitter and every sunday night Aljazeera America presents eye opening documentaries. They are impartial. If you wanted to be a good journalist in iraq, you have to risk your life. They observe. And report. Kidnapping is a very real problem. Journalists on the front line sometimes that means risking death getting the story, no matter what it takes thats what the forth estate is all about. Thats why im risking my life. Killing the messenger on Al Jazeera America [ music ] hi. Welcome back. Kyle, we are about to get more indepth on the concussion piece. What do you have next for us . Now well look at what happens neurologically. I put on 266 censors on my head and took a hard test to determine it. Lets take a look. Its game day at memorial stadium, the huskers are taking on illinois. This stadium house is more than 90,000 plus fans, its home to a concussion. We have cuttingedge techniques in the facility where the athletes are training. Dennis is the director of the new center for brain, biology and behaviour. Why is it hard to figure out what a cop kugs is . Now its scribed in terms of described in terms of simply torches head ache. Sleep, memory functions. We are unable to identify what the disruption is. I want to put the towel on the neck. This tap, a denser ray inselfa la gram or dee is a piece of Technology Used to unlock the mysteries. Ill call this the science acto pus. The cap has 256 electrodes in it picking up on currents going over the scalp that are generated from the brain. The brain waves have information about your memory processies, decision making, speed of processing, what different areas are engaged to do anything. A bit more wetness than i thought. Huss kerrs who volunteer to be a part of ramp undergo an eet while doing a memory test. This one i have to identify which letters in a sequence match one two shots earlier. When it matches use button number one, when it doesnt, press four. They are going fast. We think the cap is a critical way of assessing whether a concussion occurred. You are also using brain scans and other technologies. We can collect mri data, other data, mri gives us information about structure of the brain and we can look at way. The images are from a Football Player without a concussion, and show changes in brainwave activity as a player distinguishes between a match and nonmatch. Look at the player who had a concussion. Theres no change. They are virtually identifiable. Why is that . The brain hasnt figured out that this number is identical to that. At a minimum its delayed. These are people experiencing a head injury previously. They may have had this for a year. After a year. You have a lingering effect. The brain is not processing it when it should have. Luckily my test showed a regular change in brain activity. Your brain response is what individual. Thats good. We can give you a certification on this. A little form saying im not concuesed. When you see the application, is it to have Something Like a neural eeg on the sidelines that can help players in real time . Very much so. The holdup right now is getting the analysis procedures down to a point where practical, where we can tell the coach, this person clearly has a concussion, they should not go back into the game. Would a player an idea with Technology Like this, when to stop playing . Ultimately thats the hope, that we can provide the players and coaches with information that can tell them, okay, youre at a danger point, dont do this. Blake lawrence didnt have the benefit of a diagnostic tool concussion. I spent an hour on the field by myself thinking, shall i tell anyone, shall i not. Ive always been a Football Player. After practice i walked past the trainers door, like you would in a film, stopped, backpedalled and walked in and said, im done, ive suffered a concussion, my career is over. I was emotional wreck would you say that you regret your decision . I dont regret leaving football. I dont regret protecting myself. I wanted to see a long future of health and happy innocence. I couldnt risk happiness. I couldnt risk that. Blake is an entrepreneur running two businesses, something he probably wouldnt have done if he got another concussion. He educates families about the risk of playing football. Football is a game. If i could talk to every kid putting on their helmet, this is a game. This is life. This is life. This is what i experience because i stepped away from football. Sure. Imagine if i didnt why would i sacrifices my life for a game. I dont think theres going be a concussion helmet. You can think of this like a car crash. If you were the brain and the car is your skull. Doesnt matter if the car is indesinstructible you, the brain, will still fly forward and hit the windshield. Thats the concussion the brain hitting the skull. Differently. It can be applied to soldiers, i am sure a lot of them get hits as well. The labs i went to were working with darpa, the department of defense, because when you undergo a grenade blast or Something Like that theres a shock wave that moves your brain like an nfl hit would. You went upstate new york and covered a story that was different. What was it. I went and met two fun guys. Two former students who are using mushrooms to make this revolutionary packaging material. Well check out that story when we come back. The struggling midddle class we just cant get ahead. Working longer hours, for less pay. People are struggling everywhere. School loans. Morgages. Inflation. Taking its toll. We live paycheck to paycheck. Now in a continuing series, join ali velshi as we follow families, just like yours, as they try to get by. Were all struggling financially. Americas middle class rebuilding the dream only on Al Jazeera America real reporting that brings you the world. [ music ]. Hi, guys, welcome back to techknow. Im here with rochelle, kyle and lindsay, im phil torres. This story is about how mush rooms will save the world. Yes, i went to two guys who had a company and figured out a way to make an alternative packaging material out of biodegradeable materials and mushrooms. Lets check it out. Every cubic inch of the soil is teaming with millions of inches of mycilian. A walk through the woods in green island new york is pleasure. When you are with two barely 30yearold geniuses like Gavin Mcintyre and evan bair, you are sure to stumble on something scientifically complex. You see the mycilion growing into the log. Somehow it involves a mushroom. We are here at incoe baitive design, im a cofounder and scientist at this biomaterial company, where we take local farm waste, mixing it with tissue from mushrooms and growing replacements for plastic used in protective packaging. Why is it important . What is the problem with polysterene. Theres packaging, building constructive, tenses of millions of dollars worth used. They are not compatible with the earths atmosphere. We have all seen this. Every big product is packaged in this material. These are made from unsustainable petrochemicals and can take up to a hundred years maybe more to biodegrade and leave the other. We use agricultural waste, like corn husks as a resin. We combine them, we grow it in a mould to make a shape from everything from packaging. A mushroom growing out of a tree is comprise the by mycilian. If you look you you find fibres that are growing through the soil of the environment and in trees. Thats gluing the mushrooms on to the side of the tree or the forest floor. Mushrooms. We never grow mushrooms, we keep the mycilian in a vegetative stage. The concept was when i saw mysilian growing through wood ships, keeping them together. Using waste didnt happen until i teamed up with gavin. It takes seven days for a product to be grown. We are about to show you how it works in seconds. What is this. The waste is cleaned, light before adding the mycel. Um. Its ipp cubated and it becomes a solid white mass. Next it goes through a tromell, a machine that grind the waste. This is reminding me of willie wonga and the Chocolate Factory and im afraid ill be sucked up. This is mulched and stacked into moulds. The mycelian does what it does gross. All that is left is to paying it at a low temperature of 200 to growth. Freshly based funk us. So it can be sold to corporations like Dell Computers and other fortune 500 companies. Here is what is cool. I can take the material, bury it in my yard and within a couple of months it will biodegrade and add nutrients to the sail. Echo veil is about to manufacture plasticfree products. The possibilityies go behind protective packaging, and they are developing home insulation. Do you guys feel you are having an impact on humanity . We see it looking forward senturies, we want to make sure the environment is available for our grandchildren and our grandchildrens children. We are taking best use of the Natural Resources today. What else are they thinking of using it for . They have an edisonian approach and have launched the worlds first mushroom surfboards. These are going be surfboards and instead of having a core made out of petros chemical, it material. I love this piece. I had no idea that mushrooms could do so much for us. Who knew . Who knoou. Amazing stories, thank you for coming. Techknow. Dive deep into these stories and go behind the scenes at aljazeera. Com techno. Good afternoon to you. Welcome to Al Jazeera America. Coming to you live from new york city. And here are the stories we are following right now. Secretary of state john kerry meet with the ukraine option today. And new allegations against the new jersey governor in the bridgegate scandal. Elections in thailand spur violent clashes in bangkok