Digital Jewelry - Another dimension of wearable electronics

In today's technology world where semiconductor devices are reduced to so small a size yet offer enormous computing power; thanks to semiconductor technology which made it possible to pack millions of transistors in mm2 area, and wireless technology which is also growing with a same pace; it is possible to conceive smart electronic products in any form or size. Engineers around the globe are working to put smart electronics in all objects of our use to make life easier, so how can jewelry be an exception. Jewelry industry is a very big industry, jewelry is worn by people all across the globe to look smart & beautiful as it has aesthetic value, jewelry is worn to look important, wealthy or to express commitment etc but has very little practical purpose. Many electronic companies are trying to tap this market. They are coming up with digital jewelry that not only will look aesthetically pleasing and add to status symbol but also has embedded intelligence and thus has practical utility.

In this article we are trying to touch upon two such products or technologies.

IBM is working on making a cell phone in a form of digital jewelry. The idea is to disintegrate mobile phone into various components with each component can be worn as jewelry on the body. All these components may communicate with each other through wireless technology like Bluetooth. The various components of this mobile phone are - a) Earrings - to be embedded with mobile phone speakers for listening to the caller during calls or to listening music from them, b) Necklace - Embedded with microphone for user to talk, c)Ring - it is for showing notifications, comes with flash LEDs to indicate incoming calls, emails etc. Flashes different color lights to give different notifications like mail box is full or some important mail is received etc. d) Bracelet - it comes with graphical display unit, just like our mobile screen. It comes with voice recognition software or any other software for graphical user interface.
Lastly on our computers we have mouse, the functionality can be implemented with trackpoint embedded on a ring (Remember the trackpoint which used to be there on IBM laptops? Something similar)

Second example of digital jewelry is based on the fact that today everything is in digital lock and key! We have automatic door lock systems, we have digital attendance system, then we use online banking, or we use ecommerce website and deal in electronic money. All these applications and many more require us to remember all sorts of passwords! Dallas Semiconductor along with Java has developed a ring that features a Java Application. This Java applications is linked to a host application on networked system and will contain electronic cash, all passwords etc. The ring comes with electronic button, by pressing the button app connects to a particular host application performs the task and resume.

The prototypes of these products and many such products are made already and tested but there commercial availability is yet to be witnessed.

By Sagar Juneja - Research Associate Chitkara University and Himani Chugh - Assistant Professor, ECE, Chitkara University, H.P

Reference

Electronics.howstuffworks.com