When you watch a shuttle launch from Cape Canaveral, it’s always a little exciting to think that we live in an age when people can be sent into space, but you may not think that the space program directly benefits you.

However, you might be surprised how often you come into contact with NASA technology.

Baby formula, sunglasses, tennis rackets, and the golf balls are just a few of the commercial products that have been improved because of NASA research and technology.

These inventions and technologies are called spinoffs.

In fact, NASA publishes an annual report called "Spinoff" in which some of these items are listed.

“We primarily focus on commercialized benefits from the space program," says "Spinoff" Editor Dan Lockney. "Things you could buy in the store, items that industry uses, high-tech solutions."

One spinoff that’s very appropriate for Wisconsin’s climate is called “Ice Free”.

Ice Free was developed by engineers at NASA'S Ames Research Center to keep ice from building up on airplane wings, but is now being marketed for use on car windows to eliminate window-scraping.

To top it off, it’s environmentally friendly.

A few spinoffs have actually flown in space, like an algae that's used to make a key ingredient in most baby formula, but many of them have taken off without ever leaving the ground.

The cochlear implant, for example, was developed by Adam Kissiah, formerly an engineer at the Kennedy Space Center.

He did research and used concepts he learned working at NASA in an attempt to fix his hearing after three failed surgeries.

But Lockney says that when it comes to the benefits of NASA’s space program, spinoffs are just the icing on the cake.

"We get to understand more about who we are, where we come from, and get to understand more about the world and, and our place in it," says Lockney. "And we get these cool products as a result of it."

And as NASA expands farther into the solar system, we can only imagine the amazing spinoffs that will be developed in the future.

To read articles from issues of "Spinoff," visit NASA's "Spinoff" Web site by clicking the link below.