Chipmaker Races to Save Stephen Hawking's Speech as His Condition
  Deteriorates 
From: Scientific American - 01/18/2013
By: Larry Greenemeier 

As physicist Stephen Hawking's communication rate has fallen to about one
word per minute, Intel is working on technology that could process and
respond to the multiple facial expressions that Hawking controls, says
Intel's Justin Rattner. Hawking has relied on a voluntary cheek twitch to
compose words one letter at a time, which are vocalized through a
speech-generation device. However, in addition to moving his cheek muscle,
Hawking is able to make voluntary mouth and eyebrow movements that could
accelerate his communication. Giving Hawking two inputs would vastly improve
his ability to communicate using Morse code. Intel is researching smart
gadgets and assistive technologies for the elderly, and Rattner says context
awareness is the key to advancing these devices. Devices will personally
familiarize themselves with users to understand how facial expressions
indicate mood. Personal context is identified via hardware sensors such as
cameras, accelerometers, and microphones integrated with software that checks
personal calendars, social networks, and Internet browsing habits. This
information enables “pervasive assistance,” for example with Intel and
General Electric's Magic Carpet, which uses embedded sensors and
accelerometers to monitor a person’s normal routine and issue alerts when
changes occur. 

Read the entire article at:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=intel-helps-hawking-communicate

Links:
Magic Carpet
http://www.forbes.com/2010/07/01/technology-for-the-elderly-entrepreneurs-technology-mit_slide_5.html

Justin Rattner
http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/search.html?keyword=Justin+Rattner