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You and Yours - Transcript 91热爆 Radio 4 |
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TX: 27.08.09 - Brainport PRESENTER: WINIFRED ROBINSON |
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Downloaded from www.bbc.co.uk/radio4 THE ATTACHED TRANSCRIPT WAS TYPED FROM A RECORDING AND NOT COPIED FROM AN ORIGINAL SCRIPT. BECAUSE OF THE RISK OF MISHEARING AND THE DIFFICULTY IN SOME CASES OF IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS, THE 91热爆 CANNOT VOUCH FOR ITS COMPLETE ACCURACY. ROBINSON The idea of offering information in a touchable form for people who can't see isn't new - Braille's been around for almost 200 years and there are maps and diagrams that you can ready by touch, all of them rely on fingertips. Now in America they're using a device where images from a camera are sent to receptors on the tongue. So how exactly does that work? Jane O'Brien has been to the Lighthouse Organisation in New York where they're testing it. SEIPLE I'm going to ask Albert to find the buttons in the light and find the elevator itself. And by zooming in and out and moving his head up and down he can find that area where the buttons to the elevator are. O'BRIEN Albert Rizzi is totally blind but I'm watching him find his way down a corridor using a small electronic device that sends visual information to his brain by stimulating the millions of tiny receptors on his tongue. RIZZI Yeah because what happens is all this is going to be stimulation - it's stimulation and also then you'll feel it stop very, very obviously and that means it's either a frame of something or delineating between the next shape or something. O'BRIEN So what you have to learn is what the different stimulation means? RIZZI Yes absolutely. O'BRIEN The BrainPort, as it's called, consists of a pair of sunglasses with a tiny camera mounted on the frame. The camera converts the scene in front of it into a pixelated black and white image. That image is transmitted to an array of electrodes on a small flat piece of plastic that goes into Albert's mouth. White or light areas, picked up by the camera, stimulates the tongue and darker areas don't. It's being tested at one of the world's leading vision research institutions - the Lighthouse Organisation in New York - where Dr William Seiple is heading the research programme. SEIPLE Let me show you what he can do. He cannot see at all but if we put a white disc in front of him, this disc is probably four inches in diameter, and ask him to locate it he can then, by using the stimulation on his tongue and scanning his head back and forth, he can appreciate the spatial location of that and actually reach and pick it up. O'BRIEN What does it feel like - does it tingle? RIZZI Have you ever had pop rocks - in a word that's what it's like - or if you ever have had like any sort of like bromo seltzer or sort of fizzy thing in your mouth, it feels like the top of your tongue is constantly getting bombarded with little bubbles, little like just explosions on your tongue. O'BRIEN And it doesn't get - it doesn't get uncomfortable? RIZZI No, no I wouldn't call it uncomfortable, it's noticeable. There is some sort of phantom effect as I go on, I still feel my tongue tingling and I'm like okay how do we shake that. But no that's the sense that I get, I think of pop rocks popping in my mouth. O'BRIEN Albert lost his vision completely about three years ago after a meningitis infection but as well as being able to discern white objects on a dark background he can even read simple letter shapes. It was an emotional moment when he was able to identify the number seven during one of the experiments. RIZZI I cried. It's still new for me, you know, it's still trying to process the abrupt end of sight and the beginning of blindness and it was overwhelming, I didn't believe that I could do it, I didn't believe that it was possible. It just opens up so many possibilities that I thought would be closed to me forever. O'BRIEN The BrainPort is the latest development in sensory substitution. The most basic example of that of course is Braille which uses touch. It's mobile and relatively discrete so it's something that could be used in almost any setting, which is what makes it so important to Albert. RIZZI I can see it being used very adeptly around the house in order to discern where things are on your countertop or in your cabinets. Being able to discern when a door is open or when it is closed. Is it true sight in the sense of what you see? No. Is it another way to use those senses that I am left with to interpret my environment around me? Absolutely. And it totally accentuates those abilities. O'BRIEN Do you think it's - it makes a difference that you have been blind for really only three years, so you've got a huge amount of visual memory, does that help in any way or does it hinder the re-learning process? RIZZI I think it's a combination of both. Because I'm so anxious to be able to have whatever simulated sight I can I think that my want for vision complicates on some level but at the same time it assists in the sense that I'm able to understand what a sphere is shaped like, I can understand the conical shape. But then again just based upon having worked with other blind people and been in the company of other blind people simply put - just because they haven't seen it doesn't mean they can't define it or digest it. O'BRIEN The BrainPort's potential lies with the ability of the person using it to interpret the meaning of the tongue's stimulations. And Dr Seiple says it will only be successful if it can be used for practical purposes. SEIPLE If this device is only useful for finding Styrofoam objects on a black tablecloth or looking at sevens there would probably be no demand for it. But if we can show in this research that our subjects can go into a kitchen, find the refrigerator, get a jug of milk out and pour themselves a glass of milk, then there will be a use and this device will be widespread and cheap and available. O'BRIEN But he adds he's very optimistic at this early stage in the trials. SEIPLE I was sceptical at first but just watching Albert do this for six hours, eight hours he's been doing it I think the possibilities are way beyond what I thought. It's a matter of perceptual learning, we need someone who will be devoted to it, take it in their mouth, and use it and learn how to use it, it's all feedback learning and if someone is devoted to using it I think the possibilities are wide open. O'BRIEN The BrainPort manufacturers are hopefully they'll get all the regulatory approvals in the United States and Europe this year. But unless the training is available to help create demand it may remain costly and difficult to get hold of. ROBINSON Jane O'Brien reporting from New York and that report will be available as a disability podcast from our website. Back to the You and Yours homepage The 91热爆 is not responsible for external websites |
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