NASA Device Helps Blind Read
Researchers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) in Pasadena, CA, are
developing an active tactile display device that presents textual and
graphical information to a blind person. The concept for the device comes out
of research on the use of electroactive polymers that generate forces and
displacement in robotic actuators. 

The display is a planar array of small cones or "reading pins." Under
computer control, the pins are lowered individually or in groups to present
highs and lows according to the information one wants to convey to a blind
person. The pattern is read by scanning it with the fingertips, just like
reading conventional Braille print. 

The pins are lowered by use of an electroactive polymer that, in film form,
has been found to contract by as much as 30 percent when subjected to an
electric field. See the February issue of NASA Tech Briefs (page 37) for more
information on this device. 

http://www.nasatech.com/Briefs/biomed.html

Related item: Sight-to-Touch Translator
http://www.nasatech.com/Briefs//Mar98/NPO20230.html