[bookshare-discuss] e: Machine Offers sight to Some Blind People (Web Article)
- From: david <davidb521@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2006 07:45:54 -0500
I wonder if it will work on totally blind people as well, or just low vision.
> ----- Original Message -----
>From: "Dilsia A. Martinez" <dilsiam@xxxxxxxxx
>To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx, bookshare-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>Date: Fri, 30 Jun 2006 17:35:52 -0700 (PDT)
>Subject: [bookshare-discuss] Machine Offers sight to Some Blind People (Web
>Article)
>Machine Offers Sight to Some Blind People
>By Bjorn Carey
>LiveScience Staff Writer
>posted: 23 May 2006
>01:09 pm ET
>With her good eye, Elizabeth Goldring can distinguish
>between light and dark and see hand movement, but not
>individual fingers. She cannot recognize faces or
>read.
>Goldring is an artist, a poet, and a senior fellow at
>the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Center for
>Advanced Visual Studies. Her vision loss doesn't make
>any of these activities easier. She started losing her
>vision about 20 years ago. Today, after several
>surgeries, she has limited vision in her right eye,
>but is blind in the left.
>Now Goldring and a team of eye doctors, fellow
>researchers, and students have produced a "seeing
>machine" that allows the visually challenged to view
>the face of a friend, access the Internet, and
>"previsit" unfamiliar buildings [example].
>Starting from scratch
>The project started 10 years ago when, to determine if
>Goldring had any healthy retina left, her doctors sent
>her to the Schepens Eye Research Institute at Harvard.
>Technicians there used a diagnostic device called a
>scanning laser opthamaloscope, or SLO, to look into
>her eyes.
>The SLO projected a simple image of a stick-figure
>turtle past the hemorrhages inside her left eye that
>contributed to her blindness and directly onto the
>retina of one eye. She could see the turtle, but
>wanted more, and asked the technicians to project the
>word "sun."
>"And I could see it," Goldring said. "That was the
>first time in several months that I'd seen a word, and
>for a poet that's an incredible feeling."
>Since then, Goldring has been working with other
>vision researchers and engineers to transform the
>$100,000 SLO into a more affordable machine. So far,
>by dumping some of the diagnostic equipment and
>replacing expensive lasers with cheaper light emitting
>diodes (LEDs), they have knocked the price down to
>$4,000.
>The once bulky SLO now fits on a desktop while still
>being able to project images, video, and more onto a
>person's retina.
>"We essentially made the new machine from scratch,"
>Goldring said.
>Real-time vision
>Although still in the early stages of development,
>there is potential the machine could deliver real-time
>images to its user. Goldring has already successfully
>experimented with hooking it up to a video camera. But
>packing the whole contraption into a wearable,
>portable device could be especially difficult.
>It's also possible that delivering real-time
>images?which are filled with complex shapes,
>movements, and colors?to a visually challenged person
>might be too much for them to handle.
>"When we tried out the machine, I could see one face
>very well, but if more than one face got in the
>picture I could see nothing," Goldring told
>LiveScience. "It was too much, it was overload. If
>you're blind it's easy to get overload on these
>things."
>Seeing is believing
>After miniaturizing the SLO and developing her own
>"visual language"?consisting of short words that
>incorporate graphics and symbols to convey meaning and
>make the image easier to see and read?the next step
>was to offer the experience to others who could
>benefit.
>"My dream, of course, is that it will get out of my
>laboratory and into the hands that people who can use
>it," Goldring said.
>The pilot clinical trial included 10 participants with
>20/70 vision or worse in their good eye. Most were
>clinically blind, meaning they can only make out the
>largest "E" on a standard eye chart, and had lost
>their vision from a variety of causes, including
>diabetes, macular degeneration, and visual field loss.
>Using the modified machine, six of the participants
>interpreted all 10 "word-images" correctly. Several
>commented that even in its early stages, it was by far
>the best visual aid they had used.
>"They responded really well to the visual language,"
>Goldring said. "One woman told me she would love to
>see recipes written that way."
>The results from the study, announced today, were
>reported earlier this year in Optometry, the Journal
>of the American Optometric Association.
>Mass appeal
>A device such as this could open doors to new,
>unfamiliar places, which the visually challenged are
>often terrified of visiting, Goldring said.
>"There's a fear of missing simple visual cues, steps,
>and not being able to decipher elevator buttons," she
>said. "Stairs are, of course, quite scary to blind
>people."
>Fewer than 10 percent of the blind read Braille,
>making it difficult to find their way in unfamiliar
>places, and directions from well-meaning bystanders
>are often inaccurate. Just a peek at the layout of the
>new building could be enough to help the blind find
>their way.
>"If you are visually challenged, if you see something
>once using the machine, you remember," Goldring said.
>The current model allows the user to travel through a
>virtual building using a joystick to move forward,
>backward, and sideways to get the lay of the land. The
>researchers are currently working on developing a
>color version of the machine for a large-scale
>clinical trial. The new version will allow the
>participants to stroll through a gallery containing
>artwork by Goldring.
> * How the Human Eye Works
> * Nanotech Restores Vision in Hamsters
> * Visual Response Restored in Blind Mice
> * Brain Power: Mind Control of External Devices
> * Nature Inspires Design of New Eyes
> * Basketball for the Blind
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