A design and technology student from The Parsons School is the proud new inventor of the Play-A-Grill, an MP3 player that fits like a retainer, looks like a grill, and uses bone conduction to relay the audio in your head.
Invented by taking a mold of her mouth and combining it with pieces of a disassembled MP3 player, student Aisen Chachin has developed a rather interesting audio listening device.
According to Chachin, vibrations emitted from the MP3 player resonate through the teeth and bones, making it audible in your head. Luckily, the vibrations can only be heard and not felt, eliminating the likelihood of headaches.
Chachin adds that “if the music is loud enough the concave shape of the palate makes the vibrations of bone conduction resonate, resulting in a mouth speaker.”
As for the audio controls, Aisen has placed them in the upper part of the retainer allowing the user to change tracks and control the volume with the use of their tongue.
Obviously only a prototype, Chachin hopes to develop a smaller version (without a wire sticking out the front) that would operate on Bluetooth technology and have more accessible tongue controls.
As entertaining as this is, ideally this type of research could lead to the development of products that would aid people with disabilities in some way or another.
So what do you think? Could you see yourself walking down the street with a grill in your mouth, listening to your favorite tunes in your head? Or is the idea a little too out there for people to really entertain?
