A new system capable of recognising gestures may be a boon to the disabled, according to its creators from the Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.

According to the researchers, the system could provide a new way for people with physical disabilities to interact with computers.

A related system for the able bodied could also be used to make virtual worlds more realistic.

Manolya Kavakli of the Virtual and Interactive Simulations of Reality Research Group, at Macquarie University, said that standard input devices - keyboard and computer mouse, do not closely mimic natural hand motions such as drawing and sketching. Also, these devices have not been developed for ergonomic use nor for people with disabilities.

Now, Kavakli and her colleagues have developed a computer system architecture that can carry out 'gesture recognition'.

In this system, the person wears "datagloves" which have illuminated LEDs that are tracked by two pairs of computer webcams working to produce an all-round binocular view.

This allows the computer to monitor the person's hand or shoulder movements. This input can then be fed to a program, a game, or simulator, or to control a character, an avatar, in a 3D virtual environment.

"We developed two gesture recognition systems: DESigning In virtual Reality (DesIRe) and DRiving for disabled (DRive). DesIRe allows any user to control dynamically in real-time simulators or other programs. DRive allows a quadriplegic person to control a car interface using input from just two LEDs on an over-shoulder garment. For more precise gestures, a DataGlove user can gesture using their fingers," the authors said.