Body-braille system for disabled people

Abstract

This paper introduces the Body-Braille system which has been developed as a new communication channel for deaf-blind people using 6 micro vibration motors to present a Braille character and describes the support system using the Japanese mobile communication system combined with Body-Braille. Body-Braille has several advantages compared to other Braille systems. The control device of Body-Braille is named "B-brll" and has several interfaces including RS-232C and DTMF. Some basic experiments to measure the speed of reading Braille were performed and the mean reading time for one Braille cell was 0.5-1.4 seconds, which is fast enough for some useful applications. Using Body-Braille, a Tele-support system was developed as an application and good results were obtained. Furthermore, a newly developed idea which presents Braille character using only 2 points instead of 6 points and new equipment corresponding to this idea which has significant possibility for a very practical products, are described. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.