“长鼻子”的计算机
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4月1日恰逢愚人节，谷歌（Google）推出了一项名为“谷歌嗅觉”（Google Nose）的服务。这个还处于测试阶段的新玩意号称能“利用最新技术向用户提供最敏锐的嗅觉体验”。这或许只是愚人节玩笑，不过将来未必没有可能。 IBM去年12月曾表示，计算机在不远的将来有望获得嗅觉能力。无独有偶，据《华盛顿邮报》（the Washington Post）报道，Cyrano Sciences公司正在进行数字嗅觉方面的研究。它的最新产品电子鼻能识别炸弹和遭到污染的食物，用途非常广泛。 IBM拥有强大的科研团队，它认为让计算机拥有如人类般的感官认知能力是当前的研究重点。去年12月，IBM在公司的年度《未来5项科技预测报告》中阐述了这一想法。 化学传感器是这类技术的一部分。一旦探测到某种模式，传感器就会散发出相应的气味。IBM研究部副总裁伯尼•梅尔森曾告诉我：“可以在物体表面涂上化学传感器，当它探测到某种模式时，就会发出某种气味。人们可以涂上各种各样的传感器，尽情地模拟自己喜欢的事物。” 这些技术还能和智能手机相结合。例如它们能从你的呼吸中判断出你是否感冒了，而医生能根据这些信息对你进行远程诊断，开出处方。 所以让计算机拥有拥有嗅觉并不是什么天方夜谭。（财富中文网） 译者：项航 |
A Google April Fool’s Day post on Google Nose, a new service in beta that “leverages new and existing technologies to offer the sharpest olfactory experience available” may have been a joke, but it’s not that far from reality. Just ask IBM which last December said technologies that endow computers with a sense of smell are on the cusp of reality, if not broad adoption. Or Cyrano Sciences, which the Washington Post points out, is working to give machines a sense of smell. An electronic nose that could sniff out explosives and food contaminants, could be hugely useful. IBM, which fields a prodigious research organization, is convinced that endowing computers with human-like senses is a key focus and outlined its thoughts in its annual list of five technologies to watch last December. Such technologies include chemical sensors that emit an odor when they detect some sort of pattern. “You can paint chemical sensors on a surface and when they detect a pattern, they give off a smell — you could make a rich paint with all sorts of sensors that mimic things that you like,” IBM fellow and VP of innovation Bernie Meyerson told me at the time. If integrated with a smartphone, for example, these technologies could tell from your breath that you have or are about to get a cold and enable your doctor to diagnose you remotely based on that information and prescribe treatment. So a computing device with a nose that knows is really not all that crazy. |
