Until now, touchscreens could only determine contact, a kind of binary on-or-off signal, and anyone or anything that met the criteria for identification was the same.  Disney Research has made a touchscreen that can not only detect touch but recognize different users.

The device, dubbed Touche, sends a current through the user’s body and identifies them through differences in the body’s impedance of that current.  Every person’s body has differences that change how it will affect the current, thus creating a unique impedance signature for that individual.  

Touche is not limited to touch screens, either.  The team sees it being used in the future in items like doorknobs and automobile controls.  Like most of the most amazing new technology, Touche is still in development but promises to turn a lot more of our world interactive.

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