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That’s cold: Japan tech blasts snoozing workers with AC
TOKYO, July 26, 2018 (AFP) – Japanese office workers hoping to nod off on
the job may need to sleep with one eye open thanks to a new system that can
detect snoozers and blast them with cold air.
Air conditioning manufacturer Daikin and electronics giant NEC said
Thursday they have begun trialling the system, which monitors the movement of
the employee’s eyelids with a camera attached to a computer.
The computer can automatically lower the room’s temperature if it detects
dozing at desks.
“We hope to introduce this system commercially in 2020,” a Daikin spokesman
told AFP, adding that a trial had began this month.
The system uses Daikin’s technology to automatically adjust temperatures
and NEC’s facial recognition technology to monitor different types of eyelid
movement that suggest sleepiness.
It was developed after an initial study done by the companies on how best
to keep people alert.
They tried lowering temperatures by a few degrees, increasing brightness
and spraying aromas in a room while participants did simple maths for about
an hour.
“Our study proved that lowering temperature is effective… especially when
the early signs of sleepiness are detected,” the companies said in a joint
statement.
And in news likely to provide cold comfort to Japan’s infamously overworked
salarymen, Daikin hopes to eventually develop air conditioners that can
direct cool blasts to specific snoozing workers.
BSS/AFP/MSY/1402 hrs