As a guy who can't hear the difference between knocking on a ripe melon, knocking on an under-ripe melon and knocking on my own ass, a "ripeness" indicator sticker on fruit would be awesome. This sticker, invented by a University of Arizona professor, can display to shoppers whether a fruit or vegetable is ripe, under-ripe or over-ripe.

The RediRipe stickers change from white to blue as the fruit ripens by detecting ethelyne gas emitted during the ripening process. The color change is on a 24-48 hour delay, depending on how fast the fruit ripens and excretes the gas.

Not all fruits make enough gas, and there's still a lot of research to be done, but soon we'll all be reading stickers instead of knocking on melons. – Jason Chen

Professor invents 'ripeness' sticker [Yahoo News]

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