Xie Zhixin, Kim Jinsung, Peng Zihang, Qiu Yu, Pei Qibing
Soft Materials Research Lab, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of California, at Los Angeles, 420 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA, USA 90095.
Proc SPIE Int Soc Opt Eng. 2021 Mar;11587. doi: 10.1117/12.2584039. Epub 2021 Mar 22.
Visual impairments limit a person's ability to process information such as obstacles, environments, reading and especially multimedia content (e.g., photographs and videos). In this work, we present the design and operating mechanism of Braille PolyPad, a prototype 2D refreshable braille display featuring 4×10 braille cells, enabling the transformation of images to 2D braille information. The Braille Polypad is based on a miniature pump enabled pneumatic actuation of Braille pins. The encoder transformed the pattern information to a heating circuits to trigger the softening of a stiffness variable polymer, allowing for large pneumatic actuation in the softened pin area. The braille pattern can switch on and off in 0.5s each regardless of the number of braille cells and pins, with low operation voltage and low power consumption. The technical features in this work could enable low-cost, large-size matrix refreshable braille displays in compact form factor. Full development of the prototype device is still ongoing, including materials optimization, actuation uniformity, and improvement of user-friendly control interface.
视力障碍限制了人们处理诸如障碍物、环境、阅读尤其是多媒体内容（如照片和视频）等信息的能力。在这项工作中，我们展示了盲文PolyPad的设计和运行机制，这是一种具有4×10个盲文单元的二维可刷新盲文显示器原型，能够将图像转换为二维盲文信息。盲文PolyPad基于一个微型泵，通过气动驱动盲文针。编码器将图案信息转换为加热电路，以触发刚度可变聚合物的软化，从而在软化的针区域实现较大的气动驱动。无论盲文单元和针的数量如何，盲文图案均可在0.5秒内实现切换，且工作电压低、功耗低。这项工作中的技术特点能够实现低成本、紧凑型的大尺寸矩阵可刷新盲文显示器。该原型设备仍在全面开发中，包括材料优化、驱动均匀性以及用户友好控制界面的改进。
