Most eyewear improves vision or cuts through solar glare, but a new gadget from Japan may soon sharpen linguistic skills and cut down language barriers instead, inventors said Thursday.
High-tech company NEC has come up with a device that it says will allow users to communicate with people of different languages.
Shaped like a pair of eye-glasses, but without the lenses, the computer-assisted Tele Scouter would use an imaging device to project almost real-time translations directly onto the user's retina.
The text -- provided instantly through voice recognition and translation programmes -- would effectively provide movie-like 'subtitles' during a conversation between two people wearing the glasses.
"You can keep the conversation flowing," NEC market development official Takayuki Omino told reporters at a Tokyo exposition where the device was on display.
"This could also be used for talks involving confidential information," negating the need for a human translator, said Omino.
Each user's spoken words would be picked up by a microphone, translated, and be instantly available for the counterpart in both visual text and as audio delivered through headphones.
Users can still see their conversation partner's face because the text is projected onto only part of the retina -- the first time such technology is used in a commercial product, according to NEC.
The company plans to launch the Tele Scouter in Japan in November next year, although initially without the translation mode.
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(Agencies)
大部分眼鏡都是用來改善視力或抵禦強光，但據本周四的相關消息，日本發明的一種新型眼鏡可以迅速提升語言能力並消除語言障礙。
據發明這款眼鏡的日本高科技公司NEC（日本電氣公司）稱，這款眼鏡可以讓使用者與說不同語言的人進行交流。
這款需在計算機的輔助下工作的「Tele Scouter」外形像一幅眼鏡，但沒有鏡片，需使用一種成像設備，將幾乎是實時翻譯出來的文字投射到使用者的視網膜（顯示屏）上。
翻譯文字在經過聲音識別和翻譯軟體的處理後會立刻生成，並能像電影「字幕」一樣及時有效地呈現給正在交談的兩個人。
NEC市場研發部高管小美野孝之在展出該眼鏡的東京展覽會上告訴記者說：「（使用這款眼鏡後，）會讓整個談話保持流暢。」
小美野說：「這一設備還可用於涉及機密信息的談話，」就不需要人工翻譯了。
在使用這款智能眼鏡時，使用者的談話內容會被一個麥克風收錄，翻譯後能以可視文本的形式或通過耳機以聲音的形式即時傳送給對方。
據NEC稱，使用者在談話過程中仍可以看著對方，因為文本只投射到一部分視網膜上，這也是這一技術首次應用於商用產品。
該公司計劃於明年十一月將Tele Scouter投放市場，不過最初的產品將不具備翻譯功能。
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（英語點津陳丹妮 姍姍編輯）