The Beach Boys sang about “Good Vibrations,” but a new wireless, musical glove, created by researchers at Georgia Tech, uses vibrations for the greater good, to help restore sensation and motor skills in people with paralyzing spinal cord injuries that resulted in limited feeling or movement in their hands, called tetraplegia.

The glove, called Mobile Music Touch, looks like a workout glove with a small box on the back. A computer, MP3 player, or smart phone is used to program a song into the glove, which is used in conjunction with a piano keyboard. Lighted keys on the keyboard indicate the correct notes to play, and the glove sends vibrations to “tap” the corresponding fingers. After using the glove, several people with tetraplegia for more than one year experienced improved sensation in their fingers and significantly improved their ability to grasp.

The researchers believe that the vibration may be triggering activity in the hand’s sensory cortex, which leads to firing in the brain’s motor cortex, but were surprised by how much improvement they observed. Some study participants were able to feel the texture of their bed sheets and clothes for the first time since their injury.

Study participants also wore the glove at home for two hours a day, five days a week, feeling only the vibration without playing the piano.

Source: http://www.gatech.edu/newsroom/release.html?nid=140221