Category: Gadgets

The new app for the head mounted wearable tech can make detections in real time.

Researchers, from Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, have created a first of its kind application for Google Glass that has the ability to measure human emotions and can also determine a person’s gender and gauge their age.

The SHORE real time analysis and face detection software was adapted to work with Glass.

The Sophisticated High-speed Object Recognition Engine (SHORE) can detect a human face with the help of the integrated camera in Glass and gauge a person’s emotions, determining if they are happy, sad, surprised, or angry through a facial expression analysis. At the same time, the app can estimate their age or determine their gender, as well as other aspects about them.

According to the specifications of the product on the official site, the gender detection rate of the face that is being viewed is 94.3 percent. To help the software identify real faces it utilizes a database of over 10,000 annotated faces as a point of reference. All calculations that the technology makes is done in real time by the eye-wear’s integrated CPU.

That being said, the researchers have noted that the app cannot verify a person’s identity and prohibits users from being able to discover a person’s identity through it. In fact, to ensure privacy, the app developers have promised that no data or images that are collected are sent to the cloud. The image data never leaves the device.

The Google Glass app could benefit individuals with sensory processing disorders.

This application is much more than just a gimmick. It has real potential for acting as a communication aid. For instance, a person who has a sensory processing disorder, such as autism, may benefit from the application because it can help them detect a person’s emotions. Interpreting emotions via facial expressions is something many autistics finds difficult.

Furthermore, the technology can be advantageous for those who are visually impaired, as it can provide them with supplementary audio information about the individuals who are within their surroundings. In addition, aside from Google Glass, the software could also be used in other apps like market research or interactive games.

Medical experts are now reporting that smartphones are leading to physical changes in the human body.

Although many cellular operators have been citing studies that have suggested that the use of mobile devices such as cell phones are safe for human health, medical experts are indicating that changes are occurring in the human body among people who use these gadgets.

Among the changes that medical experts have pointed out are those made to the metabolism.

According to Maulana Azad Medical College radiation oncology professor, Manoj Sharma, “Cancer is not the only health issue linked to mobile phones. Fatigue, sleep disorder, lack of concentration and poor digestion have been found to be linked with mobile phone usage.” Sharma spoke at the India International Center, where there was a discussion on “Mobile Phone Radiation and Health”.

Sharma pointed out that there had not been any solid research on the long term health impacts of mobile devices.

Sharma discussed the idea that the close proximity of a cellular phone to the brain while it is being used could increase the risk of the development of a brain tumor. “There doesn’t seem to be any worry about the looming disaster. If we don’t take care now it will be too late like in the case of tobacco,” he said.

He went on to say that he feels that mobile operators in India should use technology similar to that being used in the United States, which reduces radiation exposure of the human body by smartphones.

At the event, another Maulana Azad College professor, Naresh Gupta, added that “It is true that the metabolism in the body is affected by using mobile phones.” He explained that these gadgets are an evolving technology and that the majority of the research that has been conducted with respect to their health impacts was conducted through the funding of the private companies that manufacture those devices in the first place. “We don’t have any independent research.”

That said, it was also pointed out by All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) plastic surgeon, S.B. Gogia, that mobile devices could also have a positive impact on health, if the indirect benefits of these gadgets are considered. He said that there have many situations in which “lives have been saved in case of accidents and other medical emergencies due to mobile phones.”