A Multisensory Approach to Obstacle Detection in Footwear for Enhanced Navigation and Safety

For people, getting around safely and effectively is an essential part of everyday living in a variety of situations. Whether traversing urban streets, outdoor trails, or indoor spaces, the ability of detecting and navigating around obstacles is crucial for maintaining independence and ensuring personal safety. According to estimate from the World Health Organization (WHO), 2.2 billion people globally are blind or have other visual impairments. This amounts to roughly 26.8% of the global populace. Under the current setup, water sensors detect the presence of water and ultrasonic sensors detect obstacles within a three-meter radius. The Arduino Uno powers the model. In addition to buzzers and vibrating motors, the output part has Bluetooth connectivity that allows spoken output via an Android app. The SmartFoot innovations incorporates distinctive qualities to overcome difficulties compared to the previous works. Piezoelectric sensors, ultrasonic sensors, Global Positioning System (GPS), accelerometers, Arduino microcontrollers, LCD screens, buzzers, NodeMCU, and Internet of Things (IoT) technology are all integrated into SmartFoot. In addition to enabling remote monitoring, it can identify obstructions, track ground contact, evaluate motion data, and give prompt feedback. Interestingly, it uses piezoelectric and ultrasonic sensors for ground contact and obstacle detection, respectively. By enhancing data sharing and remote monitoring, integration with Internet of Things (IoT) technology improves user safety and navigation. When an accident is detected by the tilt sensor, the smartfoot innovations use the Internet of Things to share the location of the incident with emergency contacts using Global positioning system (GPS) technology. Comparing this technique to other recent works results in increased safety.