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Disney has a smartwatch prototype that can identify everything you touch

The proof-of-concept watch uses electromagnetic interference to differentiate between various devices.

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Disney Research and Carnegie Melon University have been working on a smartwatch for a while, and they finally have a working prototype. Normally, it might be news enough that Disney is building a smartwatch, but the interesting thing is that the device isn't just a smartwatch. 

The device is a proof-of-concept that uses Eletromagnetic Interference(EMI), also called electromagnetic noise, to detect, in real time, what the wearer is touching. As the Disney Research project page says, "Most everyday electrical and electromechanical objects emit small amounts of electromagnetic (EM) noise during regular operation. When a user makes physical contact with such an object, this EM signal propagates through the user, owing to the conductivity of the human body. By modifying a small, low-cost, software-defined radio, we can detect and classify these signals in real-time, enabling robust on-touch object detection."

The team has called the concept, "EM-Sense", and it's mind boggling in its capacity. When you touch a device, the EMI passes through your body and, the watch can reliably identify and differentiate between different signals. The EM signals don't have to be classified beforehand and the only sensors used are inside the watch. "Discrimination between dozens of objects is feasible, independent of wearer, time, and local environment."

According to Disney the watch works on anything electrical or electromechanical or even large objects like doors and furniture. The team tested out the watch in a variety of everyday scenarios (depicted in the video below) with an average accuracy of 96.1 percent. For demonstration purposes, they built entire apps that would execute when certain object were touched. Touching the electric toothbrush starts a timer on the watch, stepping on an electronic weighing scale pulls up a list of weight measurements from the past few days, and touching the refrigerator and stove tells the watch the user is cooking breakfast, so it fetches an internet radio broadcast of the news. 



The possibilities are endless! Sure, we already have smartwatches and fitness trackers that can pinpoint our location, the kind of exercise we're doing, and how healthy we are. But what about a smartwatch that can turn on or off the lights in a room when you touch the doorknob? Or unlocks your laptop because it registers that you're the one touching it (which this watch can already do)? Of course, tracking everything we do minute to minute brings its own set of privacy issues with it. But if wearable technology is to progress, this path by far is the coolest.

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