SWAN System to Help Blind and Firefighters Navigate Environment
From: Georgia Institute of Technology - 08/15/2006

A team of Georgia Tech researchers is developing a wearable computing system
to help firefighters, soldiers, the visually impaired, and others navigate
unfamiliar territory, particularly when visibility is limited. The System for
Wearable Audio Navigation (SWAN), which includes a small laptop, a tracking
chip, and bone-conduction headphones that relay auditory signals to the skull
without plugging the user's ears, supplies audio clues to the wearer to help
him navigate from place to place. The Center for the Visually Impaired in
Atlanta is supplying the Georgia Tech researchers with volunteers to test the
consumer feasibility of the system through focus groups and interviews. The
idea for the project was born five years ago, when Frank Dellaert, assistant
professor in Georgia Tech's College of Computing, met Bruce Walker, assistant
professor in Georgia Tech's College of Psychology and College of Computing,
and found that their work in the respective areas of robot location-tracking
and audio interfaces could overlap to develop assistive technologies for the
visually impaired. Their work together combines GPS-based location tracking
with novel interfaces that represent data through sonification or sound. The
sensors and tracking chip worn on the user's head transmit data to the
laptop, which then determines the user's location and the direction he is
looking. It then calculates the travel route and relays directions to the
user via the bone headphones. "SWAN consists of two types of auditory
displays--navigational beacons where the SWAN user walks directly toward the
sound, and secondary sounds indicating nearby items of possible interest such
as doors, benches, and so forth," Walker said. The next step for the
researchers is to refine the computer vision system so the SWAN can work
indoors, where GPS tracking is ineffectual. 

Read the entire article at:
http://www.gatech.edu/news-room/release.php?id=1090

Links:
SWAN: System for Wearable Audio Navigation
http://sonify.psych.gatech.edu/research/swan/index.html

Bruce Walker
http://sonify.psych.gatech.edu/~walkerb/

Frank Dellaert
http://www-static.cc.gatech.edu/~dellaert/

Center for the Visually Impaired
http://www.cviatlanta.org/index.shtml