The ionic hand has been recognized as one of the top inventions in 2008. This hand “The i-limb” was created by Livingston Company Touch Bionics and took them around 20 years to develop. The hand has five separately working fingers; also it has a credit-card grip, for taking hold of narrow objects and a power hold for larger objects such as mugs. This new type of hand it different than previously known bionic hands, it has a much wider range of capabilities.

A major advantage of this hand is that the fingers can easily be unscrewed from the hand for service, while other known prosthetics hand have to be removed entirely if they break, which means amputees are sometimes left for weeks without a hand.

More than 400 patients have now been fitted with the i-limb hand since its launch.

Touch Bionics chief executive Stuart Mead hailed the recognition as a “tremendous achievement”.

He said: “We are delighted to have been identified by Time as one of the inventions of the year, a real honor for any innovative company.”