UCLA engineers have introduced a revolutionary device that has the potential to change communication for persons recovering from laryngeal cancer procedures or struggling with damaged voice cords.
As described in the journal Nature Communications, this novel gadget, around the size of an inch square, is placed on the skin outside the throat and uses bioelectric impulses from the laryngeal muscles to produce articulate speech with exceptional precision, nearing 95%.
Led by Jun Chen, the team created a wearable device with a self-powered sensing component and an actuation component made of silicone and magnetically induced layers.
The sensing component uses magnetoelastic technology to detect laryngeal muscle movements, which are then converted into electrical impulses that are processed further by a machine-learning algorithm to produce speech signals. Meanwhile, the actuation component delivers the necessary current to the motor, converting the signals into aural output.
