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Audeo "Think N' Spell" neckband allows voiceless phone calls
You know what's wrong with phone conversations? All that dang talking you have to do. Luckily for us, some scientists at Ambient Corporation are bent on fixing that with their "Audeo" wireless neckband which taps into nerve signals being sent to the vocal chords and vocalizes those "thoughts" for you -- without all that pesky implant nonsense. Users have to specifically think about voicing words for them to be picked up by the band, but it saves them from saying potentially sensitive things while on a cellphone in public. The device is also being aimed at those who have lost the ability to speak due to diseases such as Lou Gehrig's Disease. Currently the device can only recognize roughly 150 words and phrases, and has a decent delay between "speaking" with your mind and the computer vocalizing the words for you, but the upcoming version will be phenome-based and therefore allow you to speak anything -- though it will come at the cost of even slower recognition. Video is after the break.
Mind controlled motorized wheelchair demonstrated
You know that the future's here when technology arrives that allows vehicles to be controlled with nothing but a thought. Ambient, in partnership with the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, has developed a wheelchair that can be instructed to move when the driver thinks about certain words. The key component is a larynx control system called the Audeo, developed by the founders of Ambient, Michael Callahan and Thomas Coleman. The New Scientist has a video demonstration of the unit, which is surprisingly eerie without the usual subtle twitch of a hand that accompanies regular motorized wheelchairs. The next stage in the project -- externally recognizing individual words imagined in the brain -- is apparently a while off: still, we think a thought controlled anything at this stage in the game is a major feat.
