The picture above implies that the watch had a gigantic keyboard attached to it which is a little misleading. The UC-2100 keyboard is actually a pocket-sized dock that is used to control the device. There was also the option of purchasing the larger UC-2200 which included a spool-fed printer, 4K of RAM and 26K of ROM via a plug-in Application ROM pack (contained Microsoft Basic — other ROM packs included games or an English-Japanese translation app). Essentially, this keyboard turned your watch into a PC with a really, really tiny 10×4 character display.

In 1984, purchasing the Wrist Information System would have set you back $US300 — or about $US624 in today’s dollars. Makes that smartphone seem like a bargain doesn’t it? [Pocket Calculator Show]

The device’s lithium-ion battery only last two hours on a charge, so don’t expect Grandma to run a full marathon, but some time moseying around the retirement village while looking all cyberpunk will surely make her coolest geriatric in Del Boca Vista. The Walking Assist Device will be demoed this week at Intex Osaka—the press release for that is below. [Honda via New Launches]

Honda to Showcase Experimental Walking Assist Device at BARRIER FREE 2008

TOKYO, Japan, April 22, 2008- Honda Motor Co., Ltd. will showcase an experimental model of a walking assist device which could support walking for the elderly and other people with weakened leg muscles(*), at the International Trade Fair on Barrier Free Equipments & Rehabilitation for the Elderly & the Disabled (BARRIER FREE 2008) which will be held at Intex Osaka, Friday, April 25 through Sunday, April 27, 2008 (Organizers: Osaka Prefecture Council of Social Welfare and Television Osaka Inc.)

Honda began research of a walking assist device in 1999 with a goal to provide more people with the joy of mobility. Currently, the device has entered into the feasibility stage.

The cooperative control technology utilized for this device is a unique Honda innovation achieved through the cumulative study of human walking just as the research and development of technologies was conducted for Honda’s advanced humanoid robot, ASIMO. Applying cooperative control based on the information obtained from hip angle sensors, the motors provide optimal assistance based on a command from the control CPU. With this assist, the user’s stride will be lengthened compared to the user’s normal stride without the device and therefore the ease of walking is achieved.

The compact design of the device was achieved with flat brushless motors and a control system developed by Honda. In addition, a simple design to be worn with a belt around the hip and thigh was employed to help achieve overall weight as light as approximately 2.8kg. As a result, the device reduces the user’s load and can be fit to different body shapes.

The research of this device is being conducted by the Fundamental Technology Research Centre of Honda R&D Co., Ltd. in Wako, Saitama.

Honda is planning to offer interested attendees an opportunity to wear and experience this walking assist device at the Honda booth at BARRIER FREE 2008.
(*) This device is designed for people who are still capable of walking on their own.

Team leader Professor Toshiki Yoshimine says that using electrode sheets directly installed over the brain’s surface increases the sensibility in comparison to skin electrodes. This is a risky procedure in and of itself, so the team has been working with volunteers that had electrodes installed for other medical applications, like epilepsy monitoring.

The operation doesn’t require penetration into the brain itself: they put the electrode sheet in the central sulcus, also called the Rolandic fissure after Luigi Rolando, the Italian professor who devoted his life to the study of brain anatomy. This fold separates the brain’s parietal lobe from the frontal lobe, but more importantly in this case, the primary motor cortex from the primary somatosensory cortex—the key area for voluntary muscle operation in the body.

The Osaka University team’s next step is to actually connect these patients to actual robotic limbs, so they can control them using the software modelled after the data collected from their previous experiments. [Asahi via Pink Tentacle]

The RID is composed of three parts: the light source, the light scanner and the eyepiece module. The new prototype of the light scanner is roughly the size of a bulky bluetooth headset, about 1000 times smaller than a version Brother showed at EXPO 2005 in Aichi, Japan. Again, the only thing stopping regular users from calling up stats and checking documents only they can see while strolling around town is the size of the light box:

Brother said it’s planning on a public launch of the device in 2010. By that point in time, it’s hoping to have gotten the light box down to the size of a portable hard drive.

With these glasses, that crazy 3-D camera, and the news that we can make stuff hover it’s like all my science fiction fantasies are coming true this week! [Newlaunches.com]

The mothborgs are very real and part of their Hybrid Insect Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems subprogram, a project aiming to integrate surface sensors, optical systems, chemical sensing, storage and radio-frequency communications to create insect cyborgs. The system, as you can see in this rendering, would be powered by tiny piezo-electric systems using the moth’s wings.

While the pupas already have been implanted with silicon devices, Dr Lal says that they still have to realize how to convert them into practical applications, like providing with extra information for pilots and soldiers. If you ask me, I bet the government is already using this, probably to spy people and inject DNA modifiers in our body while we sleep. I’ll get my tin-foil hat now. [Ares]

When discussing the future of organised crime, Australian Federal Police (AFP) Chief Mick Keelty is clearly thinking seriously about what is in store for us in ‘the future’. So he’s not afraid to accept that criminals use serious tech faster than most of the community, and that in future this could move beyond online crime and into the realm of science-fiction. FTA:

“Our environmental scanning tells us that even with some of the cloning of human beings – not necessarily in Australia but in those countries that are going to allow it – you could have potentially a cloned part-person, part-robot,” he said.

“You could (also) have technology acting at the direction of a human being, but the human being being distanced considerably from the actual crime scene.”

Woah! When we start seeing headlines for cyborg bank heists, surely that’s going to be the same era we start hearing about masked men sweeping out of the sky to save the day. Bring on Supes! -Seamus Byrne

Top cop predicts robot crimewave. [The Age]

Not so long ago, we were all hot and bothered over Dean Kamen’s new artificial arm planned for veterans who had lost a limb. But at the time all of our information was gleaned from a crappy audience camera filming the event.

In this newly available video—shot just this week—the man himself explains his motivations behind the device before showing a brief demonstration. It’s still a tease…but this one has better lighting and we just can’t get enough.– Mark Wilson

A Closer Look at Dean Kamen’s Robotic Arm [boingboing]

Move over Dean Kamen. You might have the money you’ve made from the dozens upon dozens of Segways you’ve sold, but your budget can’t compete with DARPA’s, and they’re in the bionic arm field too.

DARPA already has their first prototype done, and they say they’re on track to “provide, by 2009, a mechanical arm that closely mimics the properties and sensory perception of a biological limb.” It sounds pretty great, and I can’t say having Dean Kamen and DARPA both working hard to create top-notch bionic arms is a bad thing. Click through to read DARPA’s whole press release and a picture of the arm in action.

An international team led by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Md., has developed a prototype of the first fully integrated prosthetic arm that can be controlled naturally, provide sensory feedback and allows for eight degrees of freedom—a level of control far beyond the current state of the art for prosthetic limbs. Proto 1, developed for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Revolutionizing Prosthetics Program, is a complete limb system that also includes a virtual environment used for patient training, clinical configuration, and to record limb movements and control signals during clinical investigations.

The DARPA prosthetics program is an ambitious effort to provide the most advanced medical and rehabilitative technologies for military personnel injured in the line of duty. Over the last year, the APL-led Revolutionizing Prosthetics 2009 (RP 2009) team has worked to develop a prosthetic arm that will restore significant function and sensory perception of the natural limb. Proto 1 and its virtual environment system were delivered to DARPA ahead of schedule, and Proto 1 was fitted for clinical evaluations conducted by team partners at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) in January and February.

“This progress represents the first major step in a very challenging program that spans four years and involves more than 30 partners, including government agencies, universities, and private firms from the United States, Europe, and Canada,” says APL’s Stuart Harshbarger, who leads the program. “The development of this first prototype within the first year of this program is a remarkable accomplishment by a highly talented and motivated team and serves as validation that we will be able to implement DARPA’s vision to provide, by 2009, a mechanical arm that closely mimics the properties and sensory perception of a biological limb.”

APL, which was responsible for much of the design and fabrication of Proto 1, and other team members are already hard at work on a second prototype, expected to be unveiled in late summer. It will have more than 25 degrees of freedom and the strength and speed of movement approaching the capabilities of the human limb, combined with more than 80 individual sensory elements for feedback of touch, temperature, and limb position.

“There is still significant work to be done to determine how best to control this number of degrees of freedom, and ultimately how to incorporate sensory feedback based on these sensory inputs within the human nervous system,” Harshbarger says. “The APL team is already driving a virtual model of Proto 2 with data recorded during the clinical evaluation of Proto 1, and the team is working to identify a robust set of grasps that can be controlled by a second patient later this year.”

Another exciting development is the functional demonstration of Injectable MyoElectric Sensor (IMES) devices–very small injectable or surgically implantable devices used to measure muscle activity at the source verses surface electrodes on the skin that were used during testing of the first prototype.

–Adam Frucci

John Hopkins University [via Medgadget]

Starting next year in Japan, you’ll be able to lease an exoskeleton (the HAL-5, to be precise) for about $590 a month. Originally designed to help the elderly and infirm walk around when they’re too weak to do so themselves, it also works great for getting respect when formerly you got none, and, I assume, doing a totally badass version of the robot on the dance floor. –Adam Frucci

Japan Times [via Medgadget]