Researchers use sound waves to control iPhones

If you're like me, I'm sure you often look at your skillfully crafted iPhone and think: If only it had really big, physical buttons.

Okay, we don't think that at all, but there are reasons that large external knobs, buttons, levers and even tubes could come in handy on a smartphone

No, seriously — they could, and researchers at Carnegie Mellon University and Disney Research have figured out how to harness ultrasonic waves and the iPhone's speaker and microphone to create something called Acoustruments — or, more colloquially, "Passive, Acoustically-Driven, Interactive Controls for Handheld Devices." I know, none of it exactly rolls off the tongue, but the concept is technically sound. Read more...