Haptic technology

About: Haptic technology is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 18818 publications have been published within this topic receiving 306713 citations. The topic is also known as: haptics & haptic media.

GraVVITAS: generic multi-touch presentation of accessible graphics

Abstract: Access to graphics and other two dimensional information is still severely limited for people who are blind. We present a new multimodal computer tool, GraVVITAS, for presenting accessible graphics. It uses a multitouch display for tracking the position of the user's fingers augmented with haptic feedback for the fingers provided by small vibrating motors, and audio feedback for navigation and to provide non-geometric information about graphic elements. We believe GraVVITAS is the first practical, generic, low cost approach to providing refreshable accessible graphics. We have used a participatory design process with blind participants and a final evaluation of the tool shows that they can use it to understand a variety of graphics - tables, line graphs, and floorplans.

A Study on Immersion and Presence of a Portable Hand Haptic System for Immersive Virtual Reality

Abstract: This paper proposes a portable hand haptic system using Leap Motion as a haptic interface that can be used in various virtual reality (VR) applications. The proposed hand haptic system was designed as an Arduino-based sensor architecture to enable a variety of tactile senses at low cost, and is also equipped with a portable wristband. As a haptic system designed for tactile feedback, the proposed system first identifies the left and right hands and then sends tactile senses (vibration and heat) to each fingertip (thumb and index finger). It is incorporated into a wearable band-type system, making its use easy and convenient. Next, hand motion is accurately captured using the sensor of the hand tracking system and is used for virtual object control, thus achieving interaction that enhances immersion. A VR application was designed with the purpose of testing the immersion and presence aspects of the proposed system. Lastly, technical and statistical tests were carried out to assess whether the proposed haptic system can provide a new immersive presence to users. According to the results of the presence questionnaire and the simulator sickness questionnaire, we confirmed that the proposed hand haptic system, in comparison to the existing interaction that uses only the hand tracking system, provided greater presence and a more immersive environment in the virtual reality.

The Haptic Tabletop Puck: tactile feedback for interactive tabletops

Abstract: In everyday life, our interactions with objects on real tables include how our fingertips feel those objects. In comparison, current digital interactive tables present a uniform touch surface that feels the same, regardless of what it presents visually. In this paper, we explore how tactile interaction can be used with digital tabletop surfaces. We present a simple and inexpensive device -- the Haptic Tabletop Puck -- that incorporates dynamic, interactive haptics into tabletop interaction. We created several applications that explore tactile feedback in the area of haptic information visualization, haptic graphical interfaces, and computer supported collaboration. In particular, we focus on how a person may interact with the friction, height, texture and malleability of digital objects.

The Intelligent Hand

Abstract: Publisher Summary This chapter presents a theoretical perspective of haptic processing of objects. Haptics is a perceptual system incorporating inputs from multiple sensory systems. It includes a cutaneous system that senses pressure and vibration and—although rarely considered when discussing haptics—thermal sensing, which may be of considerable importance for the perception of objects. The term “haptics” is an umbrella that includes all of the sensory subsystems derived from the involvement of the skin, muscles, and joints. Object processing means both the apprehension of the structural and substantive attributes of objects and the categorization of the objects into previously established classes. The chapter discusses two phenomena that have been documented in both laboratory studies and informal demonstrations: (1) haptics is very poor at apprehending spatial-layout information in a two-dimensional plane and (2) haptics is very good at learning about and recognizing three-dimensional objects. The chapter describes the relationship between the exploratory movements of the human hand and the desired knowledge about an object.

Risk-Sensitive Optimal Feedback Control for Haptic Assistance

Abstract: While human behavior prediction can increase the capability of a robotic partner to generate anticipatory behavior during physical human robot interaction (pHRI), predictions in uncertain situations can lead to large disturbances for the human if they do not match the human intentions. In this paper we present a novel control concept in which the assistive control parameters are adapted to the uncertainty in the sense that a the robot takes a more or less active role depending on its confidence in the human behavior prediction. The approach is based on risk-sensitive optimal feedback control. The human behavior is modeled using probabilistic learning methods and any unexpected disturbance is considered as a source of noise. The proposed approach is validated in situations with different uncertainties, process noise and risk-sensitivities in a tow- Degree-of-Freedom virtual reality experiment.