Fingertips 'Read' Text Messages
From: BBC News - 04/22/2004
By: Lakshmi Sandhana

Researchers at Germany's Bonn University have developed a system that enables
a person to discern a text message as a "tactile melody" using a mobile
equipped with arrays of pins, whose movements are directed to produce
specific patterns under the user's fingertips. Circles, lines, squares, and
simple letters can be perceived by the system, but Rolf Eckmiller of Bonn
University's Division of Neural Computation insists that communicating
letters is not the researchers' intention. "What interests us is the rapid
transmission of sensory units, such as I, you, in an hour or to Bonn," he
explains. The scientists are developing software that will allow the mobile
to become owner-adaptive, and permit users to build their own individual
tactile vocabulary. The system's advantages include enabling people to
perceive messages when illumination is poor or in complete privacy. The
researchers claim that the system can be rapidly taught to recognize the
melody the person wants to correspond with an event, object, or word, which
the person can recall with as much ease as remembering sounds or pictures.
The scientists expect the device will eventually lead to exclusively tactile
SMS messages, but the technology could also be applied to automotive systems
that alert motorists to problematic situations and correct routes, for
instance. Other potential applications include medical engineering to
recreate sounds for hearing impaired people or enhance blind people's
perceptions, while still another possibility is fully tactile artwork. 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3649093.stm