Jerome Rifkin - 2010 DaVinci Inventor of the Year - CEO and Founder of Tensegrity Prosthetics

Some entrepreneurs embody classic rags-to-riches tales. But the 2010 winner of the DaVinci Inventor of the Year Award, Jerome Rifkin, offers that story a new twist: Injuries to innovation.

His first injury occurred while he was cycling home from a University of Florida research lab. A personal injury attorney hit Rifkin in the chest with his Jeep, knocking him over and parking on his hand.

While Rifkin was still recovering from that injury, he fell off his mountain bike while pedaling rapidly through a flat greenway. His clipless pedals refused to let go of one of his feet, resulting in a sheared femur that left him bedridden for three months.

In terms of mobility, Rifkin was back at square one. He progressed from being bedridden to using a wheelchair, then a cane. After years of physical therapy, he finally graduated to unassisted walking.

The implications of re-learning to walk weren’t lost on him, and out of these experiences, his company, Tensegrity Prosthetics, was born.

Tensegrity Prosthetics is launching a revolution in prosthetic feet, offering comfort and stability where as previous products provided rigidity, causing an irregular walking gait. 

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