THE US army is testing a navigation device that allows soldiers to feel their way, literally, through the fog of war. The device, a haptic belt, feeds information to the wearer through coded vibrations and can also relay orders given as hand signals via a glove that recognises gestures.
Navigation can be extremely difficult for soldiers, especially at night, says Elmar Schmeisser, who has been leading the work at the Army Research Office in North Carolina. GPS devices are not ideal as they require soldiers to take their eyes off their surroundings and their hand off their weapon. The illuminated displays can give away their position at night, too.
So Schmeisser has spent the last few years working with different companies and research groups to find an alternative. He and his colleagues have now developed a range of vibrating mini electric motors known as tactile actuators, or “tactors”, and tested them in various configurations. “What’s best is a belt around the torso with eight tactors signifying the eight cardinal directions,” says Linda Elliott, a psychologist who has been testing the systems on soldiers during training exercises at the Army Research Laboratory at Fort Benning in Georgia....
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Comments: 16
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