Displaying Braille for Mobile Use with the Micro-vibration of SMA Wires

A novel portable Braille display for mobile use is constructed by employing the micro-vibrations generated by small Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) wires. According to the characteristics of the shrinkage and expansion of a SMA wire formed into a diameter with 50 micro-meters, a vibration actuator which can be driven by several to 300 hertz pulse signals has been developed. To present Braille information for the blind, the vibration actuator is used instead of conventional Braille dots. A new method for presenting Braille information is proposed to apply the developed actuator into Braille display. The effectiveness of the proposed Braille display is verified by experimental results.