"I hope my technology can help the blind to live independently." On the afternoon of May 13, Dr. Chieko Asakawa, an IBM computer scientist, shared her life experience and her research with students in the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen). Asakawa began losing her eyesight after an accident and was totally blind by the age of 14. Since the 1980s, she has devoted herself to helping blind people to live a better life with the help of modern technology.
Asakawa was bom a normal child, but she became blind at age 14 due to a swimming accident at age 11. In the 1980s, she was a lead developer in digital books. This system allows blind people to read newspapers and books to better understand the world.
Three years ago, Dr. Asakawa began to work on cognitive assistant (认知辅助) research. NavCog is one of the applications developed by the team. It uses current sensors (电流传感器) and cognitive technologies to locate users' position, determine their facing directions and get other information about the surrounding environment by "talking" into their ears through earphones. Researchers are exploring more possibilities, such as detecting approaching people. She hopes people with disabilities like her can give a presentation on stage without any assistance.
Dr. Asakawa and her team want to develop new technology for a wide range of situations - shopping malls, airports, hospitals, etc. She hopes this technology can also be used by normal people － a Take Me Ilome app for the elderly who get lost, for example.
Dr. Asakawa studied English literature in college. After she joined IBM, she earned a Ph.D. degree from the University of Tokyo after three years' study.
One student asked Dr. Asakawa how she.dealt with the difficulties of changing from English literature to computer science. She replied that she studied from 9 p.m. to midnight every day including weekends and worked the rest of the time. Dr. Asakawa told the students that everything is possible if you don't give up.
