Shoes

Whether you're an athlete or someone experiencing foot pain, it's important to eliminate high-pressure areas in the soles of your shoes. An experimental insole could help, by showing where such areas are located during a variety of activities.

For a few years now, Inov-8 has been focusing in on graphene for its trail running shoes. Now it mixes a little nitrogen into the formula. The nitrogen-injected foam adds a light, soft ride and a response so reactive it almost feels like cheating.

Although there are now a number of systems that capture carbon emissions from smokestacks, many people may still wonder – what is that captured carbon used for? Well, Swiss company On is making shoes out of the stuff.

In most body-tracking VR systems, users have to wear sensors on various parts of their body, and/or they must remain within the confines of a base station. The Surplex system, however, is claimed to track body movements via a single pair of shoes.

Shoes with lots of cushioning may be nice and comfy, but they're not ideal for all situations. Wahu shoes are designed with that fact in mind, as their built-in pneumatic cushioning system can be switched between three different levels as needed.

Nike looks to make shoe recycling simpler with its new ISPA Link, a glue-less sneaker that quickly separates into three pieces to presort itself for recycling. The company hopes to scale the program to make sneaker recycling a more universal concept.

Discarded shoes are a particularly bulky form of waste, with their molded rubber soles joined to often synthetic uppers. Blueview shoes reportedly offer a greener alternative, however, as they're claimed to completely biodegrade once thrown away.

German designer Stephan Henrich has a wild, futuristic approach to form. Take these 3D-printed sneakers: little more than flexible socks up top, but their elevated, phalanged soles are designed to leave bystanders mystified when they see your tracks.

Norda's new 001 G+ Spike trail running shoe keeps feet dry and warm through snow, slush and icy puddles with a graphene membrane. Combine that with Dyneema up top and spikes down low, and you have a high-tech running shoe that thrives in winter.

The better a pro cycling shoe fits, the more efficiently its wearer's leg motion can be converted into wheel motion. That's where the carbon fiber LoreOne shoe comes in, as it's custom 3D printed to provide an exact fit for each buyer.

Graphene is featuring more and more heavily in footwear firm inov-8's catalog, this time around as part of foam cushioning in trail running shoes that is claimed to last twice as long as the industry standard.

Many people claim to get a real buzz from listening to music, but if you don a pair of EP 01 sneakers, you really will get a buzz. The "sonic-sensory footwear" feature a transducer in the midsole that coverts sounds into vibrations you can feel.