Wired by a Kindred Spirit, the Disabled Gain Control
From: New York Times - April 24, 2003
By: Michel Marriott

Farleigh Dickinson University computer scientist Eamon Doherty is integrating
computers and robotics into tools that can significantly improve the everyday
lives of severely disabled people. Routine tasks that healthy people take for
granted--telephone dialing and Internet browsing, for instance - are beyond
the capacity of persons who have little mobility or have lost the use of
their hands. Dr. Doherty and his team have restored such functions to
handicapped people by disassembling toys and retooling them with computer
components and programming. One tool he designed and recently tested is a
communications system for a quadriplegic man that consists of a
computer-linked sensor attached to the man's forehead. The system enables the
man to talk via telephone, for example, by furrowing his brow to type out
words or choose words and phrases from a chart that are spoken by a voice
synthesizer.

Another project Dr. Doherty is working on involves reprogramming a
hydraulically-powered Army surplus robot arm so that it can also be
controlled with a facial electrode. His desire to use electronics for
hands-free computer manipulation stems from a teenage accident that
temporarily cost him the use of his hands, and was solidified by the
tribulations of a quadriplegic tutor and friend. "[Doherty is] getting kids
while they're in college seeing the technology and the possibilities,"
remarks Images SI research director John Iovine.  

http://www.fdu.edu/newspubs/magazine/02fa/robotic.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/24/technology/circuits/24tink.html 

http://inside.fdu.edu/pt/doherty.html