Deakin University robotics engineer James Mullins is leading a research effort to develop haptics technology with the goal of making a simulation as realistic as possible for use in medical training exercises. Haptics “is very processor intensive for developing programs, so we’re just starting to get computers fast enough to simulate stuff that makes it usable,” Mullins says. So far the researchers have developed a three-dimensional input device that enables a user to feel virtual objects for tasks such as tele-surgery. “What we have developed is a way for nurses to pick up a syringe and inject it into a virtual body and feel what it feels like as it goes through the skin and the soft tissue underneath,” Mullins says. He says the technology also can be applied to defense and policing. For example, the research team is working on a large defense project that would enable soldiers to remotely defuse bombs.
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European researchers working on the SUBTLE project have developed a class of electronics that uses noise to enhance the signal, which they say could lead to better and faster electronic devices. “With increasing miniaturization of electronic circuits, an increasing fraction of the applied power is converted into nondeterministic signals that add to the ambient noise,” says University of Wurzburg professor and SUBTLE project coordinator Lukas Worschech. “SUBTLE is a STREP project associated with nanoelectronic devices in which quantum-confined electron channels are so closely spaced to each other that tailored feedback action exists.” The devices employ two phenomena–back action, which is like feedback in an audio system, on the channel gate; and noise-induced switching. The subsequent noise can be used to switch the circuit from one channel to another. The researchers say their work will enable smaller, cheaper, more power-efficient and complex circuits, and could be used to mimic neuron action in artificial networks and serve as sensors for signals usually hidden under the noise.
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Computer and engineering students at the University of Washington have developed five accessibility applications for mobile phones. Janet Hollier and her team developed Braille Learn, a virtual pet game designed to make learning Braille fun for blind children. Players use the touch pad and vibrations in the phone to choose the correct Braille symbols, and earn tokens that can be used to feed, exercise, or play with their pet and keep it happy. Jason Behmer led a team in using Google Maps to develop an application that can help people who are blind, deaf-blind, or have low vision determine their location, the direction they are going, and what points of interest or businesses lie ahead. Other applications include a daily task trainer and scheduler that uses the phone’s camera to read characters for the blind, and the Where Am I? program, which can help blind or low-vision people find nearby people or places.
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The International Cybercrime Reporting and Cooperation Act, recently introduced by U.S. Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), would require the U.S. government to study the cybercrime policies of other nations and either aid or punish those countries according to the findings. The bill requires the president to annually report to Congress on the state of countries’ employment of information technology (IT) in critical infrastructure, the scope of cybercrime based in each nation, the sufficiency of each country’s cyberlaw enforcement systems, and countries’ safeguarding of consumers and commerce online. Furthermore, the legislation would require that programs developed to fight cybercrime be prioritized to countries with low IT penetration in order to deter the creation of future cybercrime sanctuaries in these countries. Moreover, efforts to assist in the development of critical infrastructure would be encouraged to feature anti-cybercrime programs.
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