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Photos Reuters Photo

By Danielle Haas

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - An Israeli hi-tech company has produced a computer mouse that acts as the eyes of the blind and partially-sighted by helping them view computer graphics through touch.

Growing dependence on graphics and ``mice'' to navigate screens in increasingly computer-based societies have limited the ability of the partially-sighted to use new technology.

Manufacturers tout the VirTouch system (VTS), which lets the blind ``see'' the delicate strokes of a sketch by the artist Pablo Picasso or the outline of countries on a map, as a ''quantum leap'' toward their integration into the world of the sighted.

``It breaks with the past by adding graphics to the universe of the blind person,'' said Art Braunstein, corporate relations director at VirTouch Ltd.

The company has integrated existing computer products for the blind and partially-sighted that are based on text-to-speech software and the Braille alphabet, with a device that acts both as a mouse and a tactile display.

VTS allows the blind to recognize graphic shapes, pictures, play tactile computer games and read text in normal letters or Braille by placing fingers on three pads that respond when a cursor on the computer screen touches a graphic or letter.

``The system is not only based on touch, but the user can listen to the representation with an audio device and see the image if they have sight. It's really the first multi-sensual device for the blind,'' said company founder Roman Gouzman.

Pins On The Pad

Thirty-two pins on each pad move up in a black area, down in a white area and somewhere in the middle for gray zones.

The different heights enable the blind person to feel the curvature of lines and shading of computer graphics, or Braille symbols or standard alphabet letters when reading text.

Users can pretend to be racing drivers by steering a car along a winding road using the sense of the raised pins to keep to the right path, or practice archery by aiming for a bulls-eye target using the same technique.

Photos Reuters Photo

``We sighted people use symbolic representation to be more efficient,'' Gouzman said.

``This special software teaches the blind to use the same symbols as we do to study geography, maths, biology, for example which was thought to be virtually impossible before,'' he said.

A Russian immigrant to Israel, Gouzman was inspired to develop the mouse after a skiing accident in the former Soviet Union left his daughter with permanent eye damage, and said he does not believe VTS faces a significant market competitor.

Gouzman and his partner Igor Karasin began work from their kitchen table on the four-year project to create the special mouse, using blind people to test the device as they went.

The VirTouch system, which hit the markets in September 2000 and retails for just under $5,000, has found a receptive audience with institutions in Israel and abroad.

Among those interested is Israel's Ministry of Education, which has bought 30 systems and agreed to study the introduction of the technology in schools throughout the country.

In January, VirTouch signed an agreement with a Dutch social venture fund to secure $1.25 million in equity financing and has signed up distributors in several European countries.

The VirTouch system may yet prove effective in giving the blind a collective voice as well as helping them to ``see.''

``As the technology catches on and becomes more prominent, the blind are going to demand more Web sites giving them parallel graphic images of pictures,'' Braunstein predicted. ``It may even help advance legislation for the disabled as they demand the right to have the same technology as the sighted.''

The Jerusalem-based company anticipates the estimated 20 million blind and partially sighted people in the Western world alone are part of an even larger potential market.

The audio component could help the dyslexic as they hear the text at the same time as they read, while the use of the palm and the motoric system to move and manipulate the mouse may assist those suffering motor coordination difficulties.

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