(Image: Thomas Schneider/Superstock)

THE taps and swipes we use to control our gadgets don’t have to be applied by our fingers: our tongues can do it too.

A team at Osaka Prefecture University in Japan has developed a device that senses tongue pressure through the cheek. Once installed in a helmet, it could allow motorcyclists and skiers to control their personal technology. “The tongue is a well-developed muscle capable of fine-grain movements – so we thought it should be good for control interactions,” says team-member Kai Kunze.

The team strapped a pad with 64 pressure-sensing elements to the cheeks of six volunteers to mimic a sensor installed in a helmet. They asked them to try five tongue gestures: swipe up, swipe down, swipe left, swipe right and a pushy “click”. In 300 attempts, recognition accuracy was 98 per cent, they told the Augmented Human conference in Kobe, Japan, last month.

“My personal motivation here was skiing,” says Kunze. “I like to check factors like my speed while on the slope, yet it’s quite cumbersome to take out a smartphone and use a touchscreen in the cold.” He is now working on putting the sensor in the face masks worn to keep out flu, so people can control phones without touching them.