AI guide dogs assist 17 million visually impaired people in China

New research suggests that AI guide dog work in China could soon become a reality.

Inherently, people with visual impairments face many challenges in daily life, including difficulties with navigation and avoiding hazards. Therefore, there is a need for smart robot projects and projects that use AI language models to help them navigate more conveniently and safely, effectively improving their quality of life.

AI dogs promise to assist 17 million visually impaired people in China. (Photo: Dall-E).

Therefore, recently, researchers from Northwestern Polytechnic University in China, together with the China Telecommunications Artificial Intelligence Research Institute, achieved a major breakthrough in promising to support 17 million blind people of the country. Here, they have been developing a robot guide dog project using an artificial intelligence (AI) language model that promises to be of great help in providing navigation capabilities, and accompanying the blind. .

This AI guide dog goes beyond the limitations of current and past electronic navigation aids. Although in recent years there have been a number of electronic navigation aids, such as electronic navigation helmets, electronic navigation sticks, they cannot engage in conversation with humans, or fully understands human instructions, but this companion AI dog robot can do it all.

It is also capable of navigating well in environments such as streets, elevators, and indoor spaces, providing significant assistance to the visually impaired in daily activities.

Sun Zhe, Associate Professor at Northwestern Polytechnic University in China said: ' Smart guide dogs using AI language models can make navigation more convenient and safer, helping to improve effective quality of life for the blind '.

This AI guide dog project is still in the early stages of preliminary development, but new findings published in the Communications Journal of the Chinese Computer Association demonstrate the feasibility of this work.

The collaborative effort between Northwestern Polytechnic University and the China Telecommunications Artificial Intelligence Research Institute has the potential to change the future lives of 17 million visually impaired people in China. Although some challenges remain before widespread adoption, the researchers are committed to further developing this technology.