Helping the Blind "See"

Reported February 2007

ATLANTA (Ivanhoe Broadcast News) -- Nearly 10 million Americans are either blind or visually impaired. Mobility training teaches them to use canes and Seeing Eye dogs, but just exploring a new street or a different area of town can be daunting.

Now, a new research tool could help these people broaden their adventures. A simple series of beeps may one day do the job of a Seeing Eye dog.

"SWAN, or the System for Wearable Audio Navigation, is a system that we have developed here at Georgia Tech to help people -- often blind people, but any person who can't see -- get from point A to point B and know what's around them as they go," Bruce Walker, Ph.D., an assistant professor at Georgia Tech's School of Psychology and College of Computing in Atlanta, tells Ivanhoe.

Developed by Walker, a human factors psychologist and computing expert, and his computer science colleague Frank Dellaert, Ph.D., SWAN uses a global positioning system (GPS) to locate the person. An iCube detects the direction they're facing. Both feed into a computer that merges the information with the software and sends out a series of sounds.

"Imagine there's a ring around your head, about a meter away. Using headphones, we can make a sound seem to come from any point on that circle," Dr. Walker says.

A series of beeps leads them on the path to their destination. A beep points out a park bench, a different beep combined with a ring might signal an information booth. Fast beeps warn of a fire hydrant in the path.

Dr. Dellaert tells Ivanhoe, "What would make me happy is that, that, this is truly in the hands of, of, of blind people and visually impaired and they come to me and say, 'This changed my life.'"

Since GPS only works outside right now, Drs. Walker and Dellaert are looking at another way, using cameras, to make SWAN work inside.

SWAN is still about five years away from hitting the market. One day it may also help firefighters in smoky buildings and soldiers in dark terrain. The professors are currently developing a universal set of audio cues. For example, a knocking noise might represent passing an office door or a series of chords could signal a skyscraper.

The Human Factors and Ergonomics Society contributed to the information contained in the TV portion of this report.

Click here to Go Inside This Science or contact:

Elizabeth Campell
Public Information Officer
Georgia Institute of Technology
elizabeth.campell@icpa.gatech.edu

Human Factors and Ergonomics Society
Santa Monica, CA 90406
(310) 394-1811

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