News 1+1丨AI: How Can We Build a "Smart" Future for People with Disabilities?

Can an electronic guide dog replace a traditional guide dog and solve the difficulties faced by visually impaired people? Recently, a research team at Northwestern Polytechnical University has made phased progress in exploring offline embodied intelligence applications. The large model they developed has achieved functions such as intelligent human-computer interaction, intelligent elevator guidance, intelligent street-crossing guidance, and intelligent indoor guidance. How capable is such a guide dog in practical application? When can it be mass-produced? Beyond that, what other "pain points" in the lives of people with disabilities can we expect AI development to address?

"News 1+1" connects with Sun Zhe, Associate Professor at the Institute of Photonics and Intelligent Research, Northwestern Polytechnical University, and Xie Le, Vice Dean of the Institute of Medical Robotics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, to focus together on: AI: How Can We Build a "Smart" Future for People with Disabilities?

What are the innovations and unique features of the "offline embodied guide dog"?

Sun Zhe, Associate Professor at the Institute of Photonics and Intelligent Research, Northwestern Polytechnical University: We can think of it as a mobile phone. We embed an intelligent network framework into the guide dog's computing platform to achieve human-computer interaction. It enables the device to analyze and execute our commands even without a network connection. It can perceive the environment and avoid obstacles. The difference between it and a traditional guide dog lies in the fact that people with disabilities greatly lack emotional interaction, and the intelligent guide dog has done a lot of work in this regard. It will announce in the elevator which floor the user is on, whether anyone has entered the elevator, and other information, better helping people with disabilities by quickly responding to surrounding information and people's needs.

The Technological Revolution Is Changing the Work and Lives of People with Disabilities

Right now, the new technological revolution is changing the work and lives of more people with disabilities. In the city of Shanghai, a coffee shop staffed by blind people has already appeared. Technological advances can not only design cashier systems for people with disabilities, but various mini-programs can also enable them to receive orders barrier-free. At the opening ceremony of the 4th Asian Para Games in Hangzhou last year, when para swimmer Xu Jialing lit the main cauldron with a smart bionic hand using brainwave data, many people marveled while also wondering when this new technology could enter the lives of more people with disabilities.

How Can AI Better Serve People with Disabilities in the Future?

Xie Le, Vice Dean of the Institute of Medical Robotics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University: AI devices can better understand the user's intentions and assist the user in achieving their goals. There are good applications in the field of rehabilitation assistive devices. For example, our lower-limb rehabilitation robot can better understand the patient's intentions and strive to make the robot feel like part of the body. In this regard, there is still some gap between China and advanced countries internationally in terms of technology, but over the past decade the country has increased investment in this area. We are catching up relatively quickly in this field.