AUDEO: Audification of Ultrasound for the Detection of Environmental Obstacles

Abstract

Individuals with functional blindness must often use assistive aids to enable effective locomotion. To date, such devices do not provide effective information about obstacles above waist height, or are too cumbersome to have gained widespread adoption. This paper presents the development of a device that provides a user with pronounced Doppler echoes obtained by direct down-conversion of ultrasound. This system provides acoustic flow that is evident upon initiation of travel and can be used to visualise the environment and detect environmental obstacles. The prototype version was human-tested for localisation, distance estimation, and aperture passage. From this initial study, a refined, compact system has been developed that is currently undergoing testing.

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