These earbuds can be controlled with a smile
Everyone knows that a true smile involves not only the
mouth but also the eyes, but did you know that your ear canals also get
in on the action, contorting along with the rest of your face? This bit
of information seems trivial, but it’s what allowed computer interaction
researcher Denys Matthies to create prototype earbuds that can detect
the wearer’s facial expressions — and turn those into commands for your
phone.
The earbuds come with special electrodes that recognize
the shape of the user’s ear canal using an electrical field. This bends
and flexes in a consistent fashion when people pull certain faces,
allowing the earbuds to detect specific expressions. So far, they can
pick up on five separate movements with 90 percent accuracy: smiling,
winking, making a “shh” sound, opening your mouth, and turning your head
to the side. With these hooked up to your phone, you could open texts,
play and pause your music, and so on, all without using your hands.
Matthies is presenting his research at a human-computer interaction conference in Colorado this May, but spoke to the New Scientist about
his work. He said the aim was not to replace current input technology,
but to supplement it. If the earbuds were commercialized, they could
also be very useful for people with limited mobility. “It’s currently
still just a research project, but something as simple as answering a
call with a facial expression could be possible soon,” Matthies told New Scientist.
The article was published on : theverge
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