Mips is a company where we manufacture a safety system designed for helmets. This system is developed with the intention of reducing rotational motion to the brain in the event of a crash. Research indicates that rotational motion poses a higher risk of brain damage compared to direct impacts. We refer to it as the Mips® safety system, and its purpose is to enhance safety in such accidents.
Mips Academy, Straight vs Angled Impacts
A technology, built into helmets and designed to help reduce rotational motion to the head that could occur in so-called oblique impacts.
We have over 25 years of research into rotational motion and helmet safety, and an abundance of studies and data that say the same thing: in the vast majority of accidents in which someone hits their head, the impact is oblique, and an oblique impact entails increased the risk of brain damage. The same thing goes for objects falling from above at, for instance, a building site: they cause an oblique impact – even if you are standing still.
If you ride, bike, or ski and fall and hit your head, you are likely to experience an oblique impact. The moment your head hits the ground at an angle, rotational motion can make the head rotate more or less, depending on the impacting object or surface. The energy from the impact can be directed further into the head, which can cause brain injury. Rotational motion is thus the result of oblique impacts to the head.
The brain is more sensitive to oblique impacts versus straight impacts. Oblique impacts are also much more common. But most helmets on the market today are only tested and approved for straight impacts, even though these kinds of accidents are far less common.
Everything revolves around Mips low-friction layer. It mimics the brain’s own protective system, which allows the brain to move slightly inside the head. The Mips system is designed to work on the same principle. The low-friction layer is built into the helmet and makes the energy-absorbing layers (the “padding”) mobile so that the head can move 10–15 mm inside the helmet on impact.
Mips is a technology that is based on many years of research into the brain and brain damage, and we are firmly rooted in science. Our story begins in 1995, when brain surgeon Hans von Holst from Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, began researching helmet construction. He based his research on the realization that the helmets available at the time did not offer sufficient protection against brain damage. He contacted the KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm to initiate biomechanical research on the prevention of head and neck injuries.