Vibrotactile haptic feedback for intuitive control of robotic extra fingers

Abstract

Wearable robots have been mostly designed as exoskeletons, with segments and joints corresponding to those of the person they are coupled with. Exoskeletons are mainly employed to augment human body force and precision capabilities, or for rehabilitation purposes. More recently, new wearable robots resembling additional robotic limbs have been developed thanks to the progress in miniaturization and efficiency of mechanical and sensing components. However, wearable robotic extra limbs presented in the literature lack of effective haptic feedback systems. In this paper, we present a robotic extra finger coupled with a vibrotactile ring interface. The human user is able to control the motion of the robotic finger through a switch placed on the ring, while being provided with vibrotactile feedback about the forces exerted by the robotic finger on the environment. To understand how to control the vibrotactile interface to evoke the most effective cutaneous sensations, we executed perceptual experiments to evaluate its absolute and differential thresholds. We also carried out a pick-and-place experiment with ten subjects. Haptic feedback significantly improved the performance in task execution in terms of completion time, exerted force, and perceived effectiveness. All subjects preferred experimental conditions employing haptic feedback with respect to those not providing any force feedback

An EMG Interface for the Control of Motion and Compliance of a Supernumerary Robotic Finger

“…Moreover, datagloves can be only used for position control of the robotic device without having any control on force or stiffness regulation. As a preliminary solution to the above mentioned issues, we implemented a trigger-based control approach (Hussain et al, 2015a,b). The trigger signal was activated by a wearable switch placed on a ring.…”

Operator Awareness in Human–Robot Collaboration Through Wearable Vibrotactile Feedback

“…In this paper, we focused on using a vibrotactile ring, as it is one of the most simple and unobtrusive wearable haptic devices [19], and acts directly on the user's body part (the hand) that is mainly in charge of performing the assembly task. Other possible solutions, including different haptic devices (e.g., bracelets, armbands, headbands), and different feedback signals (e.g., vibrations patterns, vibration bursts with different durations, force feedback) could be tested in future works to convey meaningful information during HRC tasks.…”

“…Haptic thimbles and bracelets were successfully applied in human-robot cooperation scenarios such as teleoperation [16] and human-robot teams navigation [17]. Haptic rings were found to be particularly suitable in augmented reality applications, where humans have to interact not only with a virtual environment, but also with real objects [18], and in conjunction with a wearable extra robotic finger, both to control it and to perceive tactile feedback from it [19], [20]. The most widespread tactile displays are those that generate vibrotactile sensations [21].…”

Power Wheelchair Navigation Assistance Using Wearable Vibrotactile Haptics

“…Haptic feedback has been indeed proven to be more effective than visual or auditory feedback to warn car drivers about safety-related events [9]. For example, wearable vibrotactile stimulation has been successfully employed for providing navigation and environmental information in a variety of applications, using vibrotactile vests [10], rings [11], belts [12], and armbands [13], [14], [15]. In these applications, the navigation path can be defined by This work has been funded by the Inria associated team "ISI4NAVE" and has been carried out as part of the INTERREG VA FMA project "Assistive Devices for empowering disAbled People through robotic Technologies (ADAPT)".…”