Νοέμβριος 2013

Oldenburg. Transmission losses and background noise can considerably impair speech intelligibility when making calls on a cell phone – particularly for people who suffer from hearing loss. Hearing research scientists have now developed an app for the iPhone that improves speech intelligibility for internet phone calls made using Voice over IP technology. In addition to allowing adjustment of loudness and sound settings to meet individual preferences, the app is also able to compensate for hearing loss.

Fabric manufacturers are experiencing a revolution at present: if clothing previously offered protection against the cold, rain, and snow, the trend now is toward intelligent, proactive, high-tech textiles like self-cleaning jackets, gloves that recognize toxins, and ski anoraks with integrated navi- gational devices to make life easier for those wearing them. Most clever clothing is only at the prototype stage. It is by no means off-the-rack yet. Soon the FitnessSHIRT from the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits IIS in Erlangen, Germany, will be ready for the mass market.