Singing Alarms Could Save the Blind If you cannot see, you may not be able to1 find your way out of a burning buildingand that could be fatal. A company in Leeds could change all that2____1____ directional sound alarms capable of guiding you to the exit. Sound Alert, a company____2____ the University of Leeds, is installing the alarms in a residential home for____3____ people in Sommerset and a resource centre for the blind in Cumbria.____4____ produce a wide range of frequencies that enable the brain to determine where the____5____ is coining from. Deborah Withington of Sound Alert says that the alarms use most of the frequencies that can be____6____ by humans. It is a burst of white noise____7____ people say sounds like static on the radio, she says. Its life-saving potential is great. She conducted an experiment in which people were filmed by thermal-imaging cameras trying to find their way out of3 a large____8____ room. It____9____ them nearly four minutes to find the door____10____ a sound alarm, but only 15 seconds with one. Withington studies how the brain____11____ sounds at the university. She says that the____12____ of a wide band of frequencies can be pinpointed more easily than the source of a narrow band. Alarms____13____ the same concept have already been installed on emergency vehicles. The alarms will also include rising or falling frequencies to indicate whether people should go up____14____ down stairs. They were____15____ with the aid of a large grant from British Nuclear Fuels. |