Vibrotactile Box
Lacking the sense of vision can be very limiting in a person's daily life. The most obvious limitation is probably the difficulty of navigation. A visually impaired person usually needs the aid of a long white cane or a guide dog to get around in their surroundings. The aid is not only helping the user, but is also a visual cue to the people around the visually impaired person.
Cues of direction and obstacle in surrounding
To help the visually impaired person with the navigation, we have developed a vibrotactile box. It consists of nine plastic pins attached to bimorph benders and vibrates in vertical direction giving the cues of direction and obstacle in surrounding.
The box has been constructed to fit a fingertip (because of constructional issues the pins are separated more densely in width than in height, but this shape suits the Fingertip well Fingertip sense the location of tactile stimulation because its sensitivity, spatial acuity, and discrimination abilities are superior to any other part of the body.
It is easily accessible and very convenient to carry out in real world. The frequency of the vibration can be varied from 2-300 Hz and the vibration amplitude from 0 to approximately 1 mm p-p.
