My brain needed a short break from routing, so I started digging through my ‘datasheet’ folder (a haphazardly organized collection of oddities) and came across some old papers I filed away from different researchers I found interesting at some point.  I was quite interested in wearables and home automation a while back, and Matthai Philipose (currently Microsoft Research, formerly Intel) had some really interesting papers on this (ex.: Wireless Wearables for Detecting Use of Objects).  It had me wondering what other people in the research community get people thinking and inspired to come up with creative solutions to existing problems.  Anyone that inspires you?   Publish some links to their research below, and maybe everyone else can gets some balls rolling in their head!