How high the moon
More clocks, faster time
Ensuring accessibility
Helping the Web go wireless
Eyes on aging
Walking tall
How high the moon
Though our senses tell us otherwise, the enormous moon that looms over a cityscape horizon and the relatively compact orb that shines from on high are exactly the same size. Possible explanations for the perceived discrepancy—the so-called moon illusion—have been debated for centuries. According to one view, known as the apparent-distance theory, the illusion occurs because the brain interprets the horizon moon as being farther away than the elevated moon; another theory argues that the horizon moon appears closer, not more distant, owing to physiological mechanisms. Now a father-son pair of scientists have provided decisive support for the first explanation.
Lloyd Kaufman, a professor emeritus of psychology and neural science at New York University and senior research scientist at Long Island University, and his son, James H. Kaufman, a physicist and manager of advanced materials at IBM's Almaden Research Center, designed two experiments to measure the perceived distance to the moon. Both tests used a "heads-up" display apparatus built at IBM Research to project stereoscopic images of artificial moons from an IBM ThinkPad computer onto a semireflective glass positioned against an actual sky.
Lloyd Kaufman—having 40 years earlier studied the illusion with his mentor, psychologist Irv Rock, and reached a conclusion that favored of an apparent-distance explanation—carried out the latest experiments on a Long Island hilltop. Subjects were first asked to position an artificial moon so it appeared to be halfway between themselves and a fixed moon at optical infinity either near the horizon or elevated in the sky. They did this by adjusting the apparent depth of the stereoscopic images. In every case, the viewers placed the halfway point to the horizon moon much farther away—on average four times more distant—than the halfway point to the elevated moon.
In the second test, the viewers used the ThinkPad to adjust the apparent distance to a moon projected either on the horizon or high in the sky. In all cases, as the subjects moved the projected moon closer, they reported that it appeared to become smaller, not larger.
The researchers conclude in a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (January 4, 2000) that the terrain near the horizon provides the brain with strong cues that the moon is a large object seen at a great distance. Higher in the sky, such cues are weaker.
More clocks, faster time
A new family of experimental high-speed computer circuits performs at test speeds up to five times faster than today's top chips—and uses far less power. The circuits, created at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Laboratory, employ an innovative design called interlocked pipelined CMOS to reach speeds of 3.3 billion to 4.5 billion cycles per second (3.3 GHz to 4.5 GHz) using conventional silicon transistors. The key to the design is a distributed clock function. In standard designs, a centralized clock synchronizes the operations of an entire chip, ensuring that all operations run at the same interval, or cycle. But this limits the speed of the entire chip to the pace of the slowest operation. In the new design, local clocks run smaller sections of circuits. As a result, faster sections of circuits can run at higher cycles without waiting for slower operations to catch up. And because the distributed clock
s generate signals only when a local operation is running, they are less power-hungry. In contrast, centralized clocks use as much as two-thirds of the total power consumed by the chip.
Helping the Web go wireless
An IBM server application called WebSphere™ Transcoding Publisher promises to make more Web sites accessible to wireless Internet appliances. The software can automatically adapt, or "transcode," the text and images of a Web page to formats that smart mobile phones, PDAs and other devices can read. The product incorporates technology developed at IBM's Almaden Research Center, Thomas J. Watson Research Center and Tokyo Research Laboratory.
WebSphere Transcoding Publisher converts data and applications written in the standard markup languages of the Web—HTML and XML—to other formats such as Wireless Markup Language (WML). It converts graphics either to a format that can be viewed on a handheld device, or to a hyperlink that can be viewed separately from text. The software is based on open industry standards and available for AIX, Linux® , Solaris™and Microsoft® Windows NT® and Windows® 2000 operating systems.
Available worldwide in 10 languages, the product will help fuel the boom in wireless Internet connections. Between 2003 and 2005, GartnerGroup predicts that the number of mobile phones deployed worldwide will exceed 1 billion. By 2004, 70 percent of new cellular phones and 80 percent of new PDAs are expected to offer some form of access to the Internet.
Ensuring accessibility
IBM has announced several new initiatives aimed at stepping up development of accessible technologies. In January, for example, IBM Research established a worldwide Accessibility Center. "The center's goal," says Kiyoji Ishida, general manager of worldwide accessibility and technical advisor to IBM Japan, "is to explore and develop new ways of enabling people with disabilities to use computers and enhance their access to information, e-business service and education, as well as to ensure the accessibility of IBM hardware, software and Web sites."
In line with this effort, the former Special Needs Systems Group, based in Austin, Texas, and the VDT/Special Needs Project Office, currently part of the Personal Systems Group, will become part of IBM Research. In addition, an Accessibility Research Institute, directed by Peter Fairweather, has been established at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center to work in partnership with the Accessibility Center.
—John Boyd
Eyes on aging
Although Japan is about to become the nation with the highest ratio of senior citizens in the world, fewer than 1 percent of the country's elderly population use the Internet. But IBM researchers are working hard to usher Japanese seniors into the Information Age. "With the right technology and user interface, we believe we can help seniors become proficient enough with computers that they can keep in touch with friends and sources of help and seek out information on the Web," says Kozo Kitamura, a researcher at the Accessibility Center at the Tokyo Research Laboratory (TRL). Some senior-friendly technologies to watch:
- Voice Recognition for the Visually Impaired (VRV): TRL has been working on a project funded by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry to help visually impaired people control computers using speech. Based on ViaVoice™ speech recognition software, Home Page Reader (a talking Web browser) and ProTALKER voice synthesis technology, it allows a user to, say, call up a Web page by simply speaking its name. The VRV software then reads the text to the user, who can navigate the site by voice commands.
- WebDigest: This prototype software, which acts as a proxy, or intermediary, between the Web server and a browser, simplifies the content of Web pages. It assigns "weights" to the HTML tags that define the page elements, allowing users to focus on, say, headings and text in bold or italics.
- Home Health Care: TRL, with funding from the Ministry of Health and Welfare, has developed a health-monitoring system that connects to a home PC. The system incorporates ViaVoice and ProTALKER, allowing users to control it with their voices and hear spoken responses. If the system detects a significant change in vital signs, it automatically connects to a medical center, where a doctor then holds a video consultation.
—John Boyd
Walking tall
In February, a young Frenchman became the first recipient of a new medical implant intended to help paraplegics regain some of their ability to walk. The system uses a chip designed at IBM's component development laboratory in Corbeil-Essonnes, France, to generate electrical pulses that are transmitted to special electrodes attached to the leg muscles, causing the muscles to contract. The chip is implanted under the skin and is controlled by buttons on a walker or a pair of crutches. The system is meant to benefit people who have become paralyzed because of a spinal injury between the fourth and eleventh vertebrae, and whose other nerves and muscles are in good condition. The technology, which also includes a signal transmission system, was produced jointly with such European partners as Thomson CSF Communications, Neuromedics, Het Roessingh, MXM and the Fraunhofer Institute for Biomedical Technology. The European Commission provided half the funding.
