New directional devices to guide drivers, blind pedestrians
By siliconindia   |   Tuesday, 28 September 2010, 19:07 IST   |    2 Comments
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Bangalore: A new University of Utah study found that navigation information can be conveyed to a driver through the fingertips as accurately as through audio instructions from a navigation system. And when drivers are distracted by talking on a cell phone, the fingertip instructions are followed more accurately than audio instructions. The touch-based devices could help improve safety for motorists and hearing-impaired drivers, and also lead to navigational canes that provide navigation information to blind pedestrians. Researchers said that they hope the study will point to new touch-based directional devices to help motorists and hearing-impaired people drive more safely. The same technology also could help blind pedestrians with a cane that provides directional cues to the person's thumb. "It has the potential of being a safer way of doing what's already being done delivering information that people are already getting with in-car GPS navigation systems," said study author William Provancher, an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Utah.

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