- Out go the batteries and in comes a pair of walking shoes
that can power up your MP3 player, mobile phone or digital camera as you
go window-shopping in Orchard Road.
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- This is the dream of National University of Singapore
(NUS) and Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA) scientists, who
are studying how the body can be used to generate electricity.
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- One way is to fix some piezo-electric material, in this
case ceramic, on the soles of a pair of shoes, said the team's leader,
NUS Assistant Professor Adrian Cheok, at a conference on mobile technology
yesterday. When the wearer of the shoes walks, the soles press down on
the material to produce electricity, he explained.
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- Enough current can be produced to run portable gadgets
such as radio players and watches.
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- The research has been going on for two years and is nearly
complete. Making commercial products out of their work is the likely next
step.
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- The DSTA-funded project will find use in military applications
first.
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- DSTA project manager Choo Hui Wei told The Straits Times
yesterday: 'This project was an exploratory research study which aimed
to look into the feasibility of tapping the human body as a conducting
medium for transmitting data.
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- 'The results from the research have shown potential and
we're currently assessing how we can adapt the technology and apply it
in the military environment.'
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- Electricity produced in this manner can even be used
for transferring data from one person to another via the skin, said Prof
Cheok.
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- For instance, a handshake can mean an automatic exchange
of business cards electronically between the handheld computers of both
persons.
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- The human body thus becomes another device, together
with mobile phones and digital entertainment gadgets like MP3 players,
in what is called a personal area network (PAN).
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- The team at NUS works from a laboratory called Mixed
Reality. More information about the lab can be found at mixedreality.nus.edu.sg
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- Since 1996, researchers at IBM, the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology in the United States and other places have been been working
on the technology.
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- The interest now is in harnessing human power to drive
the PAN devices.
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- Yesterday's Mobility Conference, held at the Orchard
Hotel, was the first organised by Computer Human Interaction, the Singapore
Chapter of the Association of Computer Machinery Special Interest Group.
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- Other speakers at the three-day conference, which ends
tomorrow, shared their research on mobile devices and networks.
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- Today, Professor Luca Chittaro from the University of
Udine in Italy will present a paper on how to make information on mobile
devices easier to view.
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- This is a challenge because while mobile devices like
phones and personal digital assistants are getting smaller, a greater volume
of information is available on them for viewing, he told The Straits Times.
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- Another researcher, Professor Zary Segall from the University
of Maryland in the US, spoke yesterday about building devices that learn
how to work better with humans, to make computing simple.
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- He said: 'We're trying to see how to make computers more
human-literate, rather than making humans computer-literate.'
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- Copyright @ 2004 Singapore Press Holdings. All rights
reserved. http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/techscience/story/0,4386,264915,00.html
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