It goes without saying that touch screen devices are in style these days. From cellphones to tablets and now even computers, the tactile pleasure users feel while cruising around on a touch screen has opened the market and effectively flooded it with these aesthetic and usually user-friendly devices.
However, as with all new technologies, consumers crave advancement, which has propelled multiple research teams from around the world to develop revolutionary additions to the pre-existing concept of the touch screen.
At the Kajimoto Laboratory of the University of Electro-Communications near Tokyo, researchers have developed a new prototype touch screen, which its creators claim has the ability to transmit sensations back to the user.
On the lab's website, researchers explain that "the back is an electrical tactile display, and when you touch the touch panel, it conveys an electrical touch at the same spot on the back. This means that while you are actually touching the front screen, you have the feeling that the touch is going through the screen and being traced on your palm. If there are icons or graphics on the screen, they can also be felt on your palm."
Texas A&M University's Interface Ecology Lab has also jumped into the touch screen game, announcing at the 2011 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Services that they have successfully developed what they call ZeroTouch, which could potentially make the Kajimoto lab's prototypes already obsolete.
ZeroTouch utilizes a matrix of infrared light beams to allow users to navigate a computer's operating system simply by moving their hands in the air. The device in an open-frame apparatus which the user actually reaches inside of to operate the system. On the Interface Ecology Lab's website, researchers explain that the frame can either be mounted on a desktop, placed over a computer screen, or simply be hung in the air.
And at the Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland (FIMM), developers have created what researcher Dr. Johan Lundin calls "an iPad on steroids." Their whopping 46-inch multi-touch display is already being utilized in conjunction with a microscope to work as an interactive teaching and learning device, and allows users to zoom in and out up to 1000x magnification with simply a two-handed stretch or pinch gesture.
The research being done to advance the concept of the touch screen display is staggering. With only a little more than five years in the mainstream (thank you, original iPhone), the development of newer and better touch screens have inspired multiple research teams and already led to these revolutionary inventions.
To put the ramifications of these advancements into perspective, just imagine holding a touch screen phone whose icons you can actually feel, or playing on an iPad that you merely have to wiggle your fingers inside of its frame to operate.
The Xbox Kinect and Playstation Move are already proving to be beneficial additions to the gaming industry, and with new products looming on the horizon thanks to the current research being done, it doesn't seem like it will be much longer before turning on your computer will be a snap of the fingers and sending an email will be as simple as waving your hand.
