C2I 2024 Young Innovator winner: dotFlow - A Refreshable Braille Display

In-Depth

The lack of affordable and accessible braille learning tools prompted Mohammad Alim and Nizar Abdelhannane to develop a solution.

dotFlow is a single-celled refreshable braille display designed to make the learning process more accessible and cost-efficient
dotFlow is a single-celled refreshable braille display designed to make the learning process more accessible and cost-efficient - Mohammad Alim and Nizar Abdelhannane

Category: Young Innovator

Project: dotFlow

Partners: Mohammad Alim and Nizar Abdelhannane

For millions of visually impaired individuals around the world, learning braille remains an immense challenge due to the high costs of educational tools.

The reality is stark: refreshable braille displays can cost thousands of pounds, making them inaccessible to most. This financial barrier has contributed to the alarmingly low braille literacy rate - only seven per cent among blind individuals, according to the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB).

 

 

Recognising this issue, Year 12 students Mohammad Alim and Nizar Abdelhannane from Featherstone Highschool in London set out to create an affordable, effective solution. Their invention, dotFlow, is a single-celled refreshable braille display designed to make the learning process more accessible and cost-efficient.

“A video I saw showed someone really happy to receive a braille book, and I wondered why that was,” said Mohammad. “When I researched the price of braille books online, I realised, yeah, they’re quite hefty, and it’s unaffordable for most.”

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