----- Original Message -----
From: "Steve Pattison" <[log in to unmask]>
To: "Access-L" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, January 15, 2003 4:37 AM
Subject: Fwd: Device lets fingers do the talking


From: Russell Schermer [log in to unmask]

Device lets fingers do the talking

A GLOVE that operates on wireless technology to allow communication
across the globe between deaf-blind people has been invented by an
Australian design engineer.

Swinburne University graduate Peter Hvala came up with the idea after
seeing a television documentary on the difficulties of communication
between people who are deaf and blind.

The Tacticom Alpha glove stores the information conveyed by deaf-blind
people, who use a method of palm communication called deafblind
fingerspelling to spell out words. It is then transmitted in much the
same way as a mobile phone text message.

"In the documentary the woman described how when she lets go of the
hand of the person she is communicating with, they could be 1000 miles
away," Mr Hvala said.

"It made sense that if they need people to be around all the time to
communicate, there was a need for a device to emulate that second
person.

"It's a basic data exchange and could be used like we use SMS messages
at the moment."

Deaf-blind people use a wide variety of communication techniques. Those
with some vision are often able to access email, while others use
Braille keypads, but these are complex and many deaf-blind people rely
on tactile communication.

Fantastic plastic gloves lend a healing hand BIONIC man =96 or more
accurately polymer person =96 has arrived. Using recently discovered
plastics that store and conduct electricity, a team from Wollongong
University and Sydney's Royal North Shore Hospital has built a glove
that stimulates muscle movement. The new technology has been woven into
the glove for use by patients with hand injuries or arthritis.

The research will move eventually to develop artificial muscles for use
within the body.

Director of the team, Dr Tim Scott from Royal North Shore's
Quadriplegic Hand Research Unit, said the glove was for use by patients
after hand surgery, spinal cord injury, arthritis, burns and stroke.
"It's designed to help patients keep the hand moving, especially for
people who've had damage," Dr Scott said. "While the healing process is
occurring sometimes you can get tendon adhesion where scar tissue
causes the tendon to adhere to the tendon sheath, preventing the
fingers from moving.

"This sort of device can move the hand in a therapeutic way to maximise
the condition of the joints as they heal."

The "intelligent" polymers, whose discovery more than 20 years ago
earned a Nobel prize for chemists Alan Heeger, Alan MacDiarmid and
Hideki Shirakawa, are stimulated by an electric current. A single-joint
prototype of the glove is in use and a full-hand unit is in
development. The team, including a hand surgeon, a physiotherapist and
engineers, is seeking further development funding from the National
Health and Medical Research Council, and there is already commercial
interest in the project.

"I'm hoping that if we are successful with the NHMRC grant within one
year we will be in a position to look for a manufacturer," Dr Scott
said.

He hoped the technology would be available within a few years.

Director of Wollongong's Intelligent Polymer Research Institute, Gordon
Wallace, said the technology had wide potential applications. The
polymers are being used in conjunction with fabric, liquids and metals.

"Most polymers are inert and very good insulators, but the structure of
these materials is such that they can conduct electricity," Professor
Wallace said.

"They have unique properties. When you inject a small amount of charge
they can expand or contract quite dramatically, and that's the basis of
the artificial muscle application.

"They're lightweight so you can get results using very small currents."

Other potential uses include energy conversion and storage, batteries
and capacitors. When constructed as a fibre the polymers can be woven
into clothing for electronic textiles that generate electricity.
Already US defence companies are funding research to develop computers
and other tools that can be powered from solar batteries charged as the
wearer walks in the sun.

Regards Steve
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