This Overview contains a selection of emerging information and communications technologies (ICT) intended to provide a sense of how future ICT could impact disability access research, development, and policy. Advances such as those included can provide both new opportunities and new challenges for people with disabilities, including many elders.
The Overview was posted Jan. 2, 2007 and includes information gathered from 2003 to 2006. Some of the technologies included were still in research and development, some that had been demonstrated in the laboratory as prototypes, and some were already commercially available products.
This was never intended to be a collection of all the latest advances in technology. Items in the Overview were selected because they illustrated significant changes in technology that disability consumer groups, researchers, product developers, standards bodies, and government regulators needed to be aware of. Note that the Trace Center currently has no plans to update this information.
To view the complete overview, use the large START button. You may also jump into the overview at any point by using one of the links below.
The Emerging Technology Overview was developed under grants H133E030012 and H133E040013 from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR), U.S. Department of Education.