Darpa Wants Telepathic Soldiers

Right now, soldiers on the go have to shout to each other, or flash hand signals, to communicate. Pentagon researchers have an idea for a different way to connect: tapping one another on the shoulder, from up to 300 feet away. Anybody who's grabbed a buzzing cell phone knows a little something about haptics -- the science of communicating through the sense of touch. The brains at DARPA figure those vibrations might be a good way for troops to share info, across noisy urban battlefields. The idea behind this "Tactical Telehaptic Communication" program is to place "electrotactile or vibrotactile arrays... near or on the soldier’s skin" -- and then buzz the G.I. in the appropriate place, to convey a message. A quick pulse on the belly could mean stop; a zap on the shoulder could mean go. The signals would be sent from a haptic glove, up to 100 yards away.