Danish researchers have come up with an unusual experiment - MusiCure - a soft pillow that chirps like a bird and is designed to sing soldiers to sleep in Kosovo, Iraq and other hotspots.
With built-in speakers, the white pillows release sounds from nature combined with acoustic instruments such as cellos to provide a serenade designed to help stressed-out minds shed unpleasant thoughts.
Its designers say that if it works, the pillow one day could join rifles, flak jackets and helmets as part of the basic equipment soldiers carry into conflicts.
In Kosovo, 10 pillows provided by Denmark's Defense Academy have become popular among the 340 Danish soldiers deployed here, according to Maj. Helmer T. Hansen, the battalion surgeon at the Danish military clinic in the province.
The pillows are part of a trial that began a month ago. So far, about 20 Danish troops in need of relaxation and some quick sleep in the often ethnically tense province have used them to get some shuteye.
Some soldiers that have tried the pillow sing its praises.
"The problem was I fell asleep too quickly," one wrote jokingly.
"It is good to keep the noise out of my mind," wrote another. "It's a very good way to relax. But the pillow is too thick."
First created nearly 10 years ago, the MusiCure pillow originally was intended for use in psychiatric wards and to help patients recover from surgery while minimizing the need for medicine, the AP reports.
V.Y.
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