Six students from the Polytechnic University of Milan and their Orpheus project are the national winners of the James Dyson Award 2026, the international design and engineering competition for students promoted by the James Dyson Foundation which challenges inventors from all over the world to propose new projects capable of tackling a real-world problem.
The winning project for Italy
Orpheus is an idea by Matteo Scarfone, Xiaoli Jiang, Giulia Coppola, Carlo Arnone, Giorgia Alberti and Aida Noemi Flecha Villamayor (all students of the Polytechnic of Milan), who focused on how to counteract the motor deficits linked to Parkinson’s, through a wearable solution that is discreet and innovative compared to existing ones.
The device comes in the form of a smart sock, equipped with eight actuators distributed between the tibia, ankle and toes. Via a mobile application, the patient’s favorite music is converted in real time into discrete vibrations on the foot, which help stimulate the brain’s motor pathways, promoting gait initiation and proactively preventing gait blockage. The system offers two modes of use: a proactive one for continuously maintaining the pace and a reactive one which activates a rescue scheme if an episode of freezing of gait occurs.
What makes Orpheus unique is the ability to combine the effectiveness of rhythmic-muscular therapy with maximum discretion: by translating music into vibrations invisible to the outside, the device restores autonomy and safety in gait without generating social embarrassment. It also switches from reactive intervention to proactive prevention, supporting walking continuously, and does so with unprecedented customization, using the patient’s favorite music as the basis for vibrations.
The team, which won a prize of 5,770 euros, now aims to develop a personalized and highly miniaturized hardware prototype, as well as to launch large-scale clinical studies with Parkinson’s patients to quantify the real impact of the system on walking and the reduction of motor blocks.
The other Italian finalists
The second best Italian project is M.io, an innovative high-volume subcutaneous infusion pump (10-25 ml) designed for home therapy and to revolutionize the perception and use of wearable infusion devices.
Finally, the third finalist is Quaì, a transradial prosthesis designed for freestyle that rethinks the concept of the prosthesis: from a medical device to an accessible product for free time.
What happens now
The 3 Italian projects will access the international phase of the competition, challenging those coming from the other participating countries. The international winners, chosen by James Dyson, will be announced on 4 November and will win the final prize of 34,600 euros.
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