Joe Doucet Sotera Advanced Helmet blends safety and design

A motorcycle helmet is designed with one main purpose: to protect a human head during the event of a crash. New York City-based designer Joe Doucet thinks we can do better and has created a helmet with a secondary purpose: to prevent crashes from happening in the first place. The Sotera Advanced Helmet incorporates functional design with a smart LED light panel that increases visibility and alerts surrounding drivers of a motorcyclist’s status.

As cars are now driving around with several preventative active safety measures such as automatic emergency braking and lane-keep assist, motorcycle minds are looking for ways to incorporate similar smart safety features. This helmet will not automatically avoid hazards, but it can help avoid becoming one.

Highlighted on Gear Patrol, the Sotera has a minimalistic beauty to its design. In addition to a stationary half-face windscreen, each side has an oversized ear muff that helps cover up seams and provides a very space-like look. The bottom portion of the helmet is a bright LED light panel that can be recharged with a USB connection. In normal conditions, this light will be white and helps make the motorcyclist more visible to surrounding vehicles, especially at night. When the rider brakes, built-in accelerometers in the helmet tell the light to turn red, notifying everybody of what’s happening.

There is an odd inherent flaw to the Sotera, however. If its focus is truly on safety, then it should be a full-faced helmet. This design leaves the chin and face exposed to potential danger.

For now, the Sotera is just a concept, but Doucet hopes the forward-thinking idea will inspire major manufacturers to consider similar tech. He specifically did not patent the design, so that others could use it.