Interface

In order for surgeons to maintain sterility in the operating room, they certainly shouldn't be using touchscreens. A new wearable, however, may allow them to navigate content such as preoperative planning diagrams, without touching the screen.

We've already seen tactile-feedback displays that convey information by applying tiny vibrations to the user's fingertips. An experimental new technology takes a different approach, however – it gets sticky in select areas.

It's not uncommon for us humans to communicate via pokes and other skin-on-skin gestures. Could the same thing work for communicating with devices? It turns out that if you give those gadgets a coating of "Skin-On" artificial skin, the answer is Yes.

IK Multimedia has announced a new practice amp with an integrated digital interface. The iRig Micro Amp allows bedroom guitarists or street performers to tap into a modeling universe of digital tone, either plugged into the mains or running on battery power.

Zoom has launched a new USB audio interface for guitarists called the GCE-3, and it's tiny. Designed to unobtrusively fit in a pocket or gig bag, the interface works with the company's amp emulation and effects simulation software so players can plug in and capture riff creations while on the move.

There are a number of devices available that allow musicians to connect a guitar to a computer. But IK Multimedia says its Axe I/O is the high-end audio interface that guitar and bass players have been waiting for.

Researchers at the University of Sussex have developed SoundBender, a technology that bends sound waves around obstacles to acoustically levitate objects above them.

Google's Magenta project has unveiled a hardware interface for an algorithm-based synthesizer that uses a deep neural network to generate completely new sounds. Musicians drag a finger around the NSynth Super's touchscreen to explore the unique sounds offered up by the machine learning algorithm.​

The Fingersound ring developed by researchers at Georgia Tech features built-in microphones and gyroscopes that allow the wearer to discreetly give commands or input data to connected devices by tracing lines and characters on their fingers with their thumb.

As many of us know from personal experience, accessing a smartphone's touchscreen can be difficult when your hands are full. That's why scientists have developed a hands-free system that lets you control a phone via facial gestures – and those gestures are detected in your ear.

​IK Multimedia has updated its all-in-one audio and MIDI interface from 2013, giving the iRig Pro I/O volume control for headphone monitoring, MIDI thru for flexible routing options and the ability to charge connected devices.​

Brooklyn-based instrument maker Landscape is bringing players closer to the action by essentially turning them into human patch cables. Instead of using a cable to patch between different modules on a rack, the AllFlesh jack is plugged in and the performer's touch bridges the gap.