CHS: Small: RUI: Creation of Assistive Technology for the Blind Through Largescale Co-Design

盲人面临着巨大的挑战，包括抑郁症的风险增加，以及劳动力参与率不到普通人口的一半。在其他因素中，定向和行动困难(O&amp；M)在这个社区成员面临的挑战中发挥着关键作用。长期以来，工程师们一直试图利用技术来辅助运维，但尽管进行了多次尝试，但这些努力的影响一直不大。这种喜忧参半的记录既是由于技术上的缺陷(例如，昂贵但不可靠的硬件)，也是由于方法上的缺陷(例如，对广大用户样本没有用处)。虽然这些缺点中的每一个都可以单独解决，但它们可以一起最有效地解决。为此，该项目将创建一个基础设施，以支持两种新的能力：与世界各地的人一起设计O&A；M技术；以及创建具有最先进的灵活性和准确性的O&A；M技术。这些功能将基于智能手机，智能手机最近更新了3D传感算法，以支持增强现实；尽管这些功能主要是为了支持视力正常的人的体验，但它们有可能被重新用于O&amp；M技术的强大平台。项目成果将为800万失明美国人的独立和就业准备提供更多支持。教育和推广活动将产生其他广泛的影响，包括为18名本科生提供暑期研究体验，其中至少有3人将是盲人，以及一门关于辅助技术和以用户为中心的设计课程，本科生将直接与社区中的人合作，以提高可访问性。为了实现其目标，该项目将创建一个数据驱动的设计流程，允许一个大型、分散的团队合作构建O&M技术，最终招募数十名联合设计师(包括盲人和盲人)，以实现创建系统在健壮性和可用性方面处于最先进水平的目标。为了招募一支庞大的联合设计师团队，该项目将利用面向O&amp；M的Clew智能手机应用的用户基础，该应用每月有1000名独立用户使用。将对O&amp；M辅助技术的基于智能手机的功能进行评估，利用智能手机的传感器提供叙事反馈和丰富的数据流。收集的传感器数据将使用新的机器学习和众包算法进行处理，以提取信息(例如，用户的位置和附近对象的位置)，从而创建首个此类数据集。该项目将在此数据集上训练机器学习算法，以在智能手机的AR功能之上创建功能层，以实现高级功能，如运动跟踪错误的诊断和修复。该项目团队将与盲人合作，将这些新能力纳入CLEW，推动室内导航和探索技术的最先进水平。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

People who are blind face significant challenges, including a heightened risk of depression and a rate of participation in the labor force less than half that of the general population. Among other factors, difficulties with orientation and mobility (O&M) play a key role in the challenges faced by members of this community. Engineers have long tried to use technology to assist with O&M, but despite many attempts the impact of these efforts has been modest. This mixed track record is due to both shortcomings in technology (e.g., expensive yet unreliable hardware) as well as in methodology (e.g., not useful to a broad sample of users). While each of these shortcomings could be addressed in isolation, they can be most effectively addressed together. To this end, this project will create an infrastructure to enable two novel capabilities: designing O&M technology with people all around the world; and creating O&M technology with state-of-the-art flexibility and accuracy. These capabilities will be based on smartphones, which have recently been updated with 3D-sensing algorithms to support augmented reality; while these features were primarily designed to support experiences for sighted people, they have the potential to be repurposed as a robust platform for O&M technology. Project outcomes will provide enhanced support for independence and job-readiness for the eight million Americans who are blind. Additional broad impacts will derive from educational and outreach activities, including a summer research experience for 18 undergraduates at least 3 of whom will be blind, and a course on assistive technology and user-centered design where undergraduates will work directly with people in the community to improve accessibility.To achieve its objectives, the project will create a data-driven design process to allow a large, distributed team to work together to build O&M technology, ultimately recruiting dozens of co-designers (both blind and sighted) towards the goal of creating systems that are state-of-the-art in their robustness and usability. To recruit a large team of co-designers, the project will leverage the user base of the Clew smartphone app for O&M, which is used by 1,000 unique users per month. Smartphone-based features for O&M assistive technology will be evaluated, providing narrative feedback coupled with rich data streams utilizing a smartphone's sensors. The collected sensor data will be processed using novel machine learning and crowdsourcing algorithms to extract information (e.g., the user's location and the location of nearby objects), creating a first-of-its-kind dataset. The project will train machine learning algorithms on this dataset to create layers of functionality on top of the AR features of smartphones, to enable advanced capabilities such as the diagnosis and repair of motion-tracking errors. The project team will collaborate with people who are blind to incorporate these new capabilities into Clew, advancing the state-of-the-art in indoor navigation and exploration technology.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.