Augmented reality powers a cognitive assistant for the blind

To restore vision for the blind several prosthetic approaches have been explored that convey raw images to the brain. So far these schemes all suffer from a lack of bandwidth. An alternate approach would restore vision at the cognitive level, bypassing the need to convey sensory data. A wearable computer captures video and other data, extracts important scene knowledge, and conveys that to the user in compact form. Here we implement an intuitive user interface for such a device using augmented reality: each object in the environment has a voice and communicates with the user on command. With minimal training this system supports many aspects of visual cognition: obstacle avoidance, scene understanding, formation and recall of spatial memories, navigation. Blind subjects can traverse an unfamiliar multi-story building on their first attempt. To spur further development in this domain we developed an open-source environment for standardized benchmarking of visual assistive devices.