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Category: Transportation

Blind-Drivable Vehicle

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---- PROTOTYPE --------- PURPOSE: To create a prototype of a car that can be driven independently by blind and visually impaired individuals. The National Federation of the Blind (NFB) and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, College of Engineering (Virginia Tech) has partnered to demonstrate the first-street vehicle equipped with technology allowing a blind person to drive independently. The NFB Jernigan Institute—the only research and training facility on blindness operated by the blind—has challenged universities, technology developers, and other interested innovators to establish NFB Blind Driver Challenge (BDC) teams, in collaboration with the NFB, to build interface technologies that will empower blind people to drive a car independently. The purpose of the NFB Blind Driver Challenge is to stimulate the development of non-visual interface technology. Undergraduate students at Virginia Tech’s College of Engineering, under the direction of Professor Dennis Hong, have been actively working with the NFB on the challenge. During the summer of 2009 the Virginia Tech BDC team worked with blind students in the NFB Youth Slam on the first-generation prototype of a blind-drivable vehicle, and many of the NFB students had the opportunity to drive using the first generation of the non-visual interface. Dr. Hong and his students are currently working with the NFB on the second-generation prototype vehicle, which will integrate new and improved versions of the first-generation non-visual interface technologies into a Ford Escape. TITLE: National Federation of the Blind to Debut Car That Can Be Driven Independently by the Blind at Rolex 24. WEBSITE: National Federation of the Blind (NFB). REF: http://www.nfb.org/nfb/NewsBot.asp?MODE=VIEW&ID=616.

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07/28/2010
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