Project name
VISCANE

Trigger
Disability

Year of development:
2018 - 2022

Problem
The main problems faced by people with vision disability/impairment, include but are not limited to: The effects of banging body parts on obstacles, time lost by the person accompanying vision disabled person, unwanted contacts faced by user of traditional canes/sticks, deaths caused by accidents that are increasing, effects caused by using non detecting/sensing sticks/canes, and expensive foreign smart canes, which can also be stolen and lost.

In addition to the above existing problems, people with vision disability/impairment were not easily identifiable by other traffic roads users to be paid special attention. The products will be of high quality to solve these problems

How its solved?
POLYSTAR Nanotech Ltd, through the project of VISCANE will develop VISCANE products where the users will experience different features of the products like electronic travel aid which fits on top/handle part of the white cane enhancing white cane's capability by detecting objects from ground to the head height in front of a person.

It uses ultrasonic waves ranging to detect obstacles, and conveys distance information to the microcontroller to alert the end user through various actuation. It also helps users to avoid collisions with over-hanging and protruding objects such as tree branches, signboards, underside of parked vehicles, open glass windows, thereby enabling them to navigate in different locations and settings with safety and confidence.

The product informs about presence of objects before actually touching the object with the cane and thus helps in preventing unwanted contact. Despite these, it also indicates whether it is at night, day or dark/bright region, by timed beeps and flashing brilliant traffic lights.

Moreover, VISCANE incorporates GPS and GSM/GPRS technology for easing tracking and tracing, just to follow-up all pathways walked, where the user is exactly located or when the cane is stolen, and to access its ID by calling it to know where it is placed when in house or hall, as Find My Device function.

Eligibility of a soft touch handle and its less weight and a replaceable dielectric roller tip rotating at 360 degrees, all assembled tight and flexibly on light weight light reflective aluminium tubes (sectioned to facilitate folding mechanism), allows this PDA device to be simple to use, since it needs only to be switched ON to start automatically detecting nearby obstacles and functioning other self-mobilities efficiently. Simply, when the user needs to travel by using other means of transport instead of walking, it requires him/her to fold the device and fits it into its hand bag for safety packaging.
Niyoyita also highlighted that the smart white cane has a lighting system with different colours that light up depending on the situation.
The product can be technically maintained by development skilled team of POLYSTAR Nanotech Ltd, once and whenever the user is facing its difficulties. This is due to that VISCANE embodies necessary features of a mobile device, which is rechargeable with any travel 5V charger (generally used for charging mobile phones) to its long-lasting battery, and on the other hand, its structure to be reprogrammed to update / upgrade its embedded governing software.