STANFORD: Most know the white cane as a simple-but-crucial tool that assists people with visual impairments in making their way through the world.
Researchers at Stanford University have now introduced an affordable robotic cane that guides people with visual impairments safely and efficiently through their environments.
Using tools from autonomous vehicles, the research team has built the augmented cane, which helps people detect and identify obstacles, move easily around those objects, and follow routes both indoors and out.
The augmented cane is not the first smart cane. Research sensor canes can be heavy and expensive — weighing up to 50 pounds with a cost of around $6,000. Currently, available sensor canes are technologically limited, only detecting objects right in front of the user.
The augmented cane sports cutting-edge sensors, weighs only 3 pounds, can be built at home from off-the-shelf parts and free, open-source software, and costs $400.
The researchers hope their device will be an affordable and useful option for the more than 250 million people with impaired vision worldwide.
“We wanted something more user-friendly than just a white cane with sensors,” says Patrick Slade, a graduate research assistant in the Stanford Intelligent Systems Laboratory and first author of a paper published in the journal Science Robotics describing the augmented cane.
“Something that cannot only tell you there’s an object in your way, but tell you what that object is and then help you navigate around it.” The paper comes with a downloadable parts list and DIY solder-at-home instructions.
