Touche: Making the World Respond to Your Touch

UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA, USA; CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY, PENNSYLVANIA, USA; WALT DISNEY RESEARCH, USA. Touche is a new touch-sensitive technology that may transform ordinary objects into touch screens. It can even make human bodies into sensors. It can absolutely revolutionize games, smart homes and even goods.

Touche was developed by a group of researchers from Walt Disney Research, Carnegie Mellon University and Pittsburgh University. It employs a tactile sensing technology that is highly used in touch screens and may run numerous devices like household appliances, chairs and even doorknobs.

It utilizes Swept Frequency Capacitive Sensing or SFCS that allows objects to interpret body position. It interprets how a body reacts to how it is being touched. To transform an object into a “touchscreen” object, transparent conductors that are programmed to respond to the body’s electronic frequencies are coated on the surface of the chosen object.

This kind of technology can be integrated in the development of smart home technology. The current smart homes strongly depend on cloud technology and smart phones. Instead of relying on these technologies, Touche can transform ordinary objects with touchscreen capacity.

For example, the current smart home system relies on the use of a smart phone in opening a door knob. If Touche is integrated in smart homes, a door knob will be programmed to respond to the touch of the human hand without having to use a smart phone. It is a lot convenient and saves time.

Aside from smart homes, Touche can certainly transform the gaming industry. The SFCS technology can transform controllers into touch-recognition ones. If it is integrated in Nintendo’s Wii or Microsoft’s Kinect (motion sensitive), the touch-recognition rate is nearly 100% better than the current body-conscious controllers. Because Touche transforms the human body into a sensor, a technological merge would certainly create the ultimate gaming experience.