Yusuf Muhammad is a British inventor and engineer. He is the founding director of '' Plumis'', a start-up which develops innovative systems to protect people from fires. He won the

Red Dot The Red Dot Design Award is a German international design prize awarded by Red Dot GmbH & Co. KG. There are prize categories for product design, brands and communication design, and design concept. Since 1955, designers and producers can apply ...

Award in 2016. He has appeared on the

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream an ...

show Big Life Fix.

Early life and education

Muhammad was born in

Sidcup Sidcup is an area of south-east London, England, primarily in the London Borough of Bexley. It is south-east of Charing Cross, bordering the London Boroughs of London Borough of Bromley, Bromley and Royal Borough of Greenwich, Greenwich. Before ...

. He studied Mechanical Design, Materials and Manufacture at the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public university, public research university in Nottingham, United Kingdom. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. The University of Nottingham belongs t ...

, earning a Masters in 2006. He completed the Industrial Design Engineering Masters at

Imperial College London Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, who developed his vision for a cu ...

in 2008. In his second year he won £25,000 from the New Business Challenge to develop a fire extinguishing system.

Career

Plumis was established whilst Muhammad was the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It offe ...

. Working with Paul Thomas and Jeung Woo Choi, he designed a series of solutions to suppress fire. He joined the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design, redesigning the modern ambulance. He won the transport award in Designs of the Year. In 2009 the Automist, a fire extinguishing system, won the

James Dyson Award The James Dyson Award is an international student design award that challenges young people to, "design something that solves a problem". The contest is open to university level students (or recent graduates) in the fields of product design, ind ...

. Automist uses mist to control fires and can be more effective than sprinklers for chip pan fires. The Automist was selected as one of the

British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...

's Top 15 Inventions of the last decade. He appeared on the

show ''You Too Can Be an Absolute Genius''’. Automist went on to win Innovation of the Year. He went on to design the Automist Smartscan, which won the 2016

and a Silver award from the

Industrial Designers Society of America The Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) is a membership-based not-for-profit organization that promotes the practice and education of industrial design. The organization was formally established in 1965 by the collaborative merger of t ...

. He is a popular public speaking, discussing design and fire safety.

Big Life Fix

Muhammad has appeared on the

show Big Life Fix. In Series one he made a boy with

Möbius syndrome Möbius syndrome is a rare congenital neurological disorder which is characterized by facial paralysis and the inability to move the eyes from side to side. Most people with Möbius syndrome are born with complete facial paralysis and cannot clos ...

a bicycle that he could ride without needing his hands or feet. He also worked on a device to allow a 56-year-old man with locked-in syndrome communicate with his family. In Series Two he developed a snowboard that allowed a man with Post

Anoxic The term anoxia means a total depletion in the level of oxygen, an extreme form of hypoxia or "low oxygen". The terms anoxia and hypoxia are used in various contexts: * Anoxic waters, sea water, fresh water or groundwater that are depleted of diss ...

Myoclonus to snowboard. Muhammad enjoys playing basketball.

Awards

2009

for the ''Automist'' fire extinguisher 2012

Design Museum The Design Museum in Kensington, London exhibits product, industrial, graphic, fashion, and architectural design. In 2018, the museum won the European Museum of the Year Award. The museum operates as a registered charity, and all funds generat ...

's Designs of the Year for the ''Redesign for the Emergency Ambulance'' 2016

for the ''Automist'' fire extinguisher{{Cite news, url=https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/171615/automist-wins-red-dot-best-best/, title=Automist wins Red Dot - Best of the Best {{! Imperial News {{! Imperial College London, work=Imperial News, access-date=2018-08-01, language=en-GB

References

English inventors British inventors Alumni of Imperial College London