Sensorial System for Visually Impaired Individuals (original) (raw)

Cane Mounted Knee-Above Obstacle Detection and Warning System for the Visually Impaired

Volume 4: ASME/IEEE International Conference on Mechatronic and Embedded Systems and Applications and the 19th Reliability, Stress Analysis, and Failure Prevention Conference, 2007

There are numerous constraints that visually challenged people face in independent mobility and navigation. They primarily use the white cane as a mobility aid allowing them to detect close by obstacles on the ground. The detection of objects above knee height is almost impossible and is a major hindrance for them.

Smart cane for visually impaired people

International Journal of Advance Research, Ideas and Innovations in Technology, 2018

Visually impaired people find difficulties detecting obstacles in front of them, during walking in the street, which makes it dangerous. Smart cane for visually impaired comes as a proposed solution to enable them to identify the world around. It is used for the smart navigation for visually impaired people in indoor and outdoor environment respectively. In this, we propose a solution, represented in a smart cane with the ultrasonic sensor to detect any other obstacles in front of the user, which is close enough. Moreover, another sensor i.e. water sensor is placed at the bottom of the stick for the sake of avoiding puddles. This proposed system uses the ATMEGA16 328 micro-controller embedded system and buzzer.

Smart Walking Stick for Visually Impaired People Using Ultrasonic Sensors and Arduino

—This paper presents the smart walking stick based on ultrasonic sensors and Arduino for visually impaired people. There are approximately 37 million people across the globe who are blind according to the World Health Organization. People with visual disabilities are often dependent on external assistance which can be provided by humans, trained dogs, or special electronic devices as support systems for decision making. Thus, we were motivated to develop a smart white cane to overcome these limitations. We accomplished this goal by adding ultrasonic sensors at specific positions to the cane that provided information about the environment to the user by activating the buzzer sound. We proposed low cost and light weight system designed with microcontroller that processes signal and alerts the visually impaired person over any obstacle, water or dark areas through beeping sounds. The system consists of obstacle and moisture detection sensors for receiving, processing and sending signals to the alarm system which finally alerts the user for prompt action. The system was designed, programmed using C language and tested for accuracy and checked by the visually impaired person. Our device can detect obstacles within the distance of about 2m from the user. Keyword-Ultrasonic sensor, Arduino ATmega328 Microcontroller, Mobility aid, Visually Impaired Person, Alarm system I. INTRODUCTION Visually impaired people are the people who finds it difficult to recognize the smallest detail with healthy eyes. Those who have the visual acuteness of 6/60 or the horizontal range of the visual field with both eyes open have less than or equal to 20 degrees. These people are regarded as blind. A survey by WHO (World Health Organization) carried out in 2011 estimates that in the world, about 1% of the human population is visually impaired (about 70 million people) and amongst them, about 10% are fully blind (about 7 million people) and 90% (about 63 million people) with low vision according to [1]. The main problem with blind people is how to navigate their way to wherever they want to go. Such people need assistance from others with good eyesight. As described by WHO, 10% of the visually impaired have no functional eyesight at all to help them move around without assistance and safely. The figure 1 below is a chart showing the percent of blind people across the globe. This study proposes a new technique for designing a smart stick to help visually impaired people that will provide them navigation. The conventional and archaic navigation aids for persons with visual impairments are the walking cane (also called white cane or stick) and guide dogs which are characterized by a many imperfections. The most critical shortcomings of these aids include: essential skills and training phase, range of motion, and very insignificant information communicated been communicated. Our approach modified this cane with some electronics components and sensors, the electronic aiding devices are designed to solve such issues. The ultrasonic sensors, water sensor, buzzer, and RF transmitter/Receiver are used to record information about the presence of obstacles on the road. Ultrasonic sensor have the capacity to detect any obstacle within the distance range of 2cm-450cm. Therefore whenever there is an obstacle in this range it will alert the user. Water sensor is used to detect if there is water in path of the user. Most blind guidance systems use ultrasound because of its immunity to the environmental noise. With the rapid advances of modern technology both in hardware and software it has become easier to provide intelligent navigation system to the visually impaired.

Design of Smart Cane with Integrated Camera Module for Visually Impaired People

International Journal for Research in Applied Science & Engineering Technology (IJRASET), 2022

In the world, millions of visually impaired or blind people are living. They are always dependent on other people or trained pets to move through an unknown environment. A typical walking stick cannot meet the safety monitoring and guidance requirement of blind people. This paper focuses on designing and developing a smart cane capable of sensing and signaling the environmental features around visually impaired people. The proposed smart cane has two ultrasonic sensors for measuring the distance between the smart cane to the stationary and hanging objects found to be an obstacle. Alert signal is provided by the actuator when the obstacle is falling inside a threshold level of 2 meters. The design integrates a camera module ESP-32 to capture the moving object/people's image in addition to the obstacle detection. The camera module gets enable signal from the PIR sensor to capture the image of the moving object/person and save processor time. It also provides information about the situation around the blind person and their relatives in case of an emergency. It provides the implementation cost and power requirement of the smart cane to develop a camera-enabled stick .

Smart Cane for Blind and Visually Impaired Persons

2020

Blindness is a state of lack of visual perception, which leads to the inability to see anything, including light. Complete blindness is the total absence of light, but partial blindness represents the lack of integration in the growth of the optic nerve or visual center of the eye. In some cases lens, occupied glasses will help to improve partial blindness. Low vision cannot be corrected by visual aids such as glasses and contacts. In those situations, it is too difficult to find or detect obstacles in front of them, which makes it dangerous. They need some aid to feel safe while navigating. Conventional Blind canes are widely used for assistance, but it has too many limitations. Thus the current scenario needs a technologically developed cane. Thus, Smart cane comes as a proposed solution for visually impaired people. In this experimental work, we implanted a simple, economical, and user-friendly smart blind guidance system. This system is designed to improve the mobility of both visually impaired and blind people, and to remove the curse of blindness, to make them selfdependent to do their daily routines. The proposed work includes the design of a lightweight adaptable cane with multiple sensors connected to an Arduino board, along with a handle head and sticks elongator. A conventional white cane forms the main base frame of the device, ultrasonic and infrared sensors are mounted at appropriate locations to detect obstacles and it can scan a predetermined area, both known and unknown locations around blind by emitting-reflecting waves with the help of that blind stick. The equipped sensors send signals to an Arduino programmed board, which communicates with the alarm unit that comprises a buzzer and vibrator and gives some recorded audio clips to navigate the blind people safely. An audio jack is also available in the blind cane whose presence is not found in other conventional canes. The system can also control the peripheral components that alert the user about the obstacle's shape, material, and direction. The device is lightweight and is been powered by a battery. Thus the system is easy to use and is an innovative reasonably priced solution to blind and visually impaired people. The power consumption is too low, and the stick is economic over the conventional one.

Guidance device for visually impaired people based on ultrasonic signals and open hardware

Visual impairment is a complex challenge that affects people of all ages, and it is estimated that around 2.2 billion people worldwide lack adequate access to medical treatment and support. In Latin America, there is a lack of attention to people with visual disabilities, evidenced by poor urban infrastructure and lack of compliance with inclusion laws. Some projects stand out for the use of prototypes with artificial vision technology, global positioning system (GPS) and smart canes. Therefore, the objective of the project is to use ultrasonic sensors and a low-cost electronic device coupled to canes, for obstacle detection and mobility using an open hardware embedded system. The results confirmed the efficiency in the detection and operation of the ultrasonic sensor by activating the light emitting diode (LED), the buzzer and the vibrating motor according to the programmed distances. Challenges were identified, such as adapting the sensor to the tilt of the cane and the importance of accurate calibration of the ultrasonic sensor. The system met its objectives by detecting objects in a range of 2 to 50 cm and providing sound alerts to improve the perception of blind people.

Development of an ultrasonic cane as a navigation aid for the blind people

2014 International Conference on Control, Instrumentation, Communication and Computational Technologies (ICCICCT), 2014

The current study deals with the development of an ultrasonic based cane for the navigation of the blind persons. The developed cane is able to detect both aerial and ground obstacles and potholes (drop-off). The ultrasonic signals are acquired in the Arduino microcontroller, classified and control signals are generated. The control signals are transmitted wirelessly to the receiving device, kept in the shoulder pocket. The receiving device consists of another Arduino microcontroller which triggers 3 speaker panel (worn around the chest) and 3 LED panel. The device works in the range of 5-150 cm and may be used as a navigational aid for the blind persons.

IRJET- Smart Cane for Visually Impaired People

IRJET, 2021

According to WHO (World Health Organization) statistics, around 285 billion people worldwide are visually impaired. Despite the enormous technological progress in digital management systems in the last ten years, the topic of assimilation of people with disabilities in the fashionable society is still topical due to the lack of the technology in this area. One of the examples is the movement of visually impaired people who nowadays use a white cane as their main tool for interacting with the environment. The thing about this ancient technology is that the white stick doesn't give enough data about nearby objects. They become aware of the problem during their daily chores and recognize objects in front of them that could be harmful to them. In response to the current problem, we have the trend to introduce a white stick system (smart stick) that helps the visually impaired. The white walking stick is presented as a solution that should help visually impaired people to discover obstacles while walking and to invent dangers in the world. The system is designed as an image processing and alarm unit. It consists of an ultrasonic sensor, water sensors and the microcontroller (Arduino) to receive and short-circuit the signals from the sensors to the Arduino pins wherever the buzzer and vibration motor are connected. A GPS-GSM module is used to send SMS location messages to an extension phone when someone is lost.

Development of Guiding Cane with Voice Notification for Visually Impaired individuals

International Journal of Electrical and Computer Engineering (IJECE), 2018

Navigation in the physical environment is a challenge for those people who have very limited sense of sight or no vision at all. Assistive technologies for blind mobilization is not new and always have a room for improvement. Moreover, these assistive devices are limited in terms of its sensing and feedback abilities. This paper presents a microcontroller-based guiding stick capable of detecting several conditions of the environment such as obstacles in front, left and right positions of the user and detects ascending and descending staircases. The feedback is delivered by an audio output which dictates the direction to go or what condition the sensor detects in front of the user. Technical evaluation proves that the device was functional in terms of its accuracy, responsiveness and correctness. On the other hand, in the actual evaluation of the device with the visually impaired individuals, the device did not perform efficiently. It was also found that the device has the potential to be used effectively by the visually impaired who acquired their blindness in later stage of their life provided that they will have a proper training in using the device while navigating in the physical environment. Keyword: Audio notifications Gizduino Microcontroller Ultrasonic sensors Voice kit II

Smart-Cane for The Blind with A Sensor Detection Approach

Telematika, 2020

Not all humans are created with normal eyes. Blindness is not only interfered with daily activities but also has socio-economic impacts on the environment, society, and the country. Those who have visual impairment usually have difficulty when walking and doing activities, while they still generally use traditional and manual walking sticks to help them. This research aims to help blind people carry out activities and improve facilities to use more sophisticated technology. The method used in this study is to use the prototype method. It is a process where simple modeling allows visually impaired people to have a primary picture of the program and conduct initial testing on tools, and facilitate the blind to interact with each other during the manufacturing process so that developers can easily model the software to be made. The results of this study constructed an automatic stick that can detect obstructions in front and top and detect puddles using a buzzer as a notification if th...