Gnome applications: future development

Hello to you all,
Since I am new to the mailing list I briefly want to introduce myself. 
My name is Jan Dittrich and I am a undergraduate at the Bauhaus Weimar 
studying media design. Since many years I am interested in Interaction 
Design. At the moment I am mainly working on digital and paper 
prototyping. I have a strong interest in cognitive psychology as well.
During a mail-conversation with Brian Cameron he suggested to ask here 
my questions regarding gnome usability and my (possible) future involvement.

Studying at the Bauhaus, there is the possibility for me to do projects 
together with my fellow students as part of our curriculum. Supporting 
gnome usability could be such a project -- and I hope both sides would 
benefit in case there is a good opportunity to work together.

Being new here, I would like to start with a general question concerning 
the future of the gnome applications

Myself and some fellow students as well  would be especially interested 
in applications for gestural/touch Interfaces. Writing about this to 
Brian he told to me that the gnome shell was already designed targeting 
touch interaction too. He pointed as well out that the gnome 
applications itself need to evolve towards a better UserExperience which 
acts in concert with the improvements made by gnome shell.
I would be especially interested in that issue (whether dealing with 
touch-input or not) and would be grateful about any further information 
on that.
Is there already any material on that like...
- improvements that need to be made to the applications GUIs
- changes that are necessary because the current application design is 
not "compatible" to the activity-based design of gnome shell?

If you have any further informations or advices about supporting the 
gnome usability please let me know.

kind regards,
  Jan