ThumbFi

Global Nominee

ThumbFi received a Global Nomination.

People's Choice Nominee

ThumbFi received a People's Choice Nomination.

THE CHALLENGE: Rock-IT Space Fashion and Design

Space Station

Out-of-this-world fashion with function: clothing or accessories for earth or space wear!

Every space traveler – even the robotic ones – should feel? their very best during the journey, infused with the very best data and technology available. Earthlings can follow suit. Design a space data-tech-fashion wearable in the form of clothing or accessories that will collect or distribute data and technology in the following categories:

Design for Interconnectivity (staying more connected to team, community, and tools)

enhance the work/life experience of humans and/or capabilities of robots

Design for Health (biometrics, physical and emotional health, and/or environmental alerts)

maintain or improve the health and well-being of the human
provide early warning for unhealthy environmental factors (air quality, radiation, outgassing, temperature)

Design for Entertainment (sights, sounds, music, activity)

enhance the human experience whether during work or play

Explanation

What is ThumbFi?

ThumbFi is a revolutionary device that can be used to automate various tasks in space as well as on Earth by bringing control literally to your fingertips! All you have to do is touch different sections of your fingers to perform different tasks.

Even on Earth there are various applications of this technology - imagine playing games using only your fingers! The technology can be extended to allow various home automation or even running apps on your computer or mobile!

Have a look at this bionic hand:

Have a look at this game:

Currently we use remotes, gamepads, switches etc to control electronic devices. But ThumbFi brings all these controls to your fingers.

Uses of ThumbFi

ThumbFi connects to all your devices, and with the power of the IoT it can control almost anything!

Automate and control many functions of a space shuttle / space station

Control computers and other mobile phones

Control robotic arms to perform remote maintenance of the shuttle with natural gestures

Help prevent deterioration of health of astronauts injured in space

Help keep contact between space walking astronauts and shuttle in case of communication loss

On Earth : Control games, household processes, computers, wheelchairs.

The possibilities are endless......

It can be used during emergency situations during spacewalks.In case of a communication failiure, touching phalanges assigned for emergency situations light up specific lights on the space suit. For example, if the astronaut presses the part assigned for a red light, it is a signal for the astronauts inside the space shuttle/ station to pull him inside. Such security protocols can be adopted and executed using ThumbFi to help astronauts in case of communication failure.

How does it work?

The hands can be said to be divided into various sections, using biological partitions. Refer to the diagram below..

Each of these small elements of the fingers can be used as a shortcut to perform specific tasks on the shuttle/station the astronauts are on.

The device works with the power of image processing. There's a fingerprint sensor on the users thumb. When a finger is touched, an image is taken and then the command assigned to that fingerprint is executed.

Touching the thumb to different sectors would lead to these commands:

We have developed an Android interface that helps a phone connect to ThumbFi and perform various functions.

Connectivity

Bluetooth Low Energy
XBEE (Zigbee)
RF (433 Mhz)
WiFi Direct

The impact

This small invention can have a great impact in the daily routines of the lives of the astronauts in space. Time saved for usual activities of controlling the elements of the space craft can be used to perform more experiments and give astronauts more free time, also saving their energy.

If operated on earth, it has endless possibilities.

FAQs

Q: How much power does the device consume?

A: Device consumes 25mA of power in use and 6µA when in stand-by mode. It has an in-built battery of 550mAh.

Q: What if fingers are accidentally touched to the thumb?

A: To activate the device, user needs to touch his thumb to index finger. If device is inactive for 30 seconds, it would automatically go to stand-by mode. This would help prevent accidental touch and reduce power consumption by 90%.

Q: How can more devices be attached to the device?

A: ThumbFi uses the power of IoT and works on MQTT protocol. So it very easy to connect any appliance to it.

Whats Next?

To make fully functional Android Application with a good UI
Make an API so that developers can integrate their product with our's.
To make flexible PCB board for the smart thumb
Developing custom Bluetooth Low Energy Services which will help increase battery life.
Improving accuracy of fingerprint sensor

Resources Used

The project is based on the Arduino platform.

We used open source fingerprint detection algorithms to build the project.

Research Papers & Articles:

Fingerprint Image Processing for Automatic Verification: http://www3.ntu.edu.sg/home/EXDJiang/ICICS1999_1.pdf
SECURE FINGERPRINT VERIFICATION BASED ON IMAGE PROCESSING SEGMENTATION USING COMPUTATIONAL GEOMETRY ALGORITHMS: http://users.ionio.gr/~mpoulos/papers/Fingerprint%20verification.pdf
Fingerprint pattern restoration by digital image processing techniques: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14535661
Fingerprint recognition algorithm using phase: http://www.aoki.ecei.tohoku.ac.jp/research/docs/cr2114.pdf

Project Mentors:

Siddhant Bhansali

Keshav Tiwari

Vatsala Khetawat