Emma Mogus is pictured with her creation, the Tongue-Interface-Communication (TiC), a tongue controlled computer mouse, in Toronto last Wednesday. We see a lovely girl in a blue sweater with long brown hair sitting behind her invention at a desk.

Emma Mogus is pictured with her creation, the Tongue-Interface-Communication (TiC), a tongue controlled computer mouse, in Toronto last Wednesday.
Photo Credit: CP Photo / Chris Young

Teen creates mouse to unlock Internet for disabled

hat do you get when you mix really smart with really empathic?

Emma Mogus's TiC has tactile stitches inset into a mouthguard, which is soldered to an ethernet cable. The cable connects to a circuit board, which in turn connects to a computer, allowing the user to activate the mouse. We see a plastic device that resembles something a dentist might show you to warn you about brushing every day. A wire comes out of the front.
Emma Mogus’s TiC has tactile stitches inset into a mouthguard, which is soldered to an ethernet cable. The cable connects to a circuit board, which in turn connects to a computer, allowing the user to activate the mouse. © cbc.ca

Answer: Emma Mogus.

Mogus, 17, just graduated high school

But over the course of her final two years at White Oaks Secondary School in Oakville, Ont., she accomplished something extraordinary.

Mobilized when she realized that her friend Tim, a husband and a father who has ALS, was having increasing problems communicating verbally, Mogus created a device will could have a profound effect on Tim and many, many others with severe physical disabilities.

It is called TiC, or Tongue-Interface-Communication.

It has five buttons inside a mouthguard-type device that is connected to a computer. Each button controls a different mouse direction.

Presto!

Emma, right, and Julia Mogus in 2012 when they created 'Books With No Bounds.' Emma has her right arm around her. Both have gorgeous, freshly washed long, light brown hair. Both are wearing dark sports jackets. Julia smiles through a full set of braces.
Emma, right, and Julia Mogus in 2012 when they created ‘Books With No Bounds.’ © Courtesy: Books With No Bounds

People suffering from ALS, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries and other disabilities now have a real shot at joining the rest of us navigating the Internet or sending emails with a minimum of difficulty.

Last week, Mogus was awarded the 2016 Weston Youth Innovation Award from the Ontario Science Centre.

The award includes a $2,000 stipend, money that will go back into further development of the TiC as Mogus develops her fourth prototype.Creating the TiC is not Mogus’s first foray into helping others.

In 2012, she and her older sister, Julia, co-founded “Books With No Bounds.”

They have since shipped 115,000 books to communities across Canada and around the world, impacting the lives of 150,000 world-wide.

Emma, who has a summer job at McMaster University, which she will enter this fall, spoke to RCI by phone from her home in Oakville.

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