scholarly journals Design of a Tactile Sensor for Robot Hands

Author(s):  
Giorgio Cannata ◽  
Marco Maggiali
Keyword(s):  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Lepora

<div>Reproducing the capabilities of the human sense of touch in machines is an important step in enabling robot manipulation to have the ease of human dexterity. A combination of robotic technologies will be needed, including soft robotics, biomimetics and the high-resolution sensing offered by optical tactile sensors. This combination is considered here as a SoftBOT (Soft Biomimetic Optical Tactile) sensor. This article reviews the BRL TacTip as a prototypical example of such a sensor. Topics include the relation between artificial skin morphology and the transduction principles of human touch, the nature and benefits of tactile shear sensing, 3D printing for fabrication and integration into robot hands, the application of AI to tactile perception and control, and the recent step-change in capabilities due to deep learning. This review consolidates those advances from the past decade to indicate a path for robots to reach human-like dexterity.</div><div><br></div>


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (49) ◽  
pp. eabc8134
Author(s):  
Guozhen Li ◽  
Shiqiang Liu ◽  
Liangqi Wang ◽  
Rong Zhu

Robot hands with tactile perception can improve the safety of object manipulation and also improve the accuracy of object identification. Here, we report the integration of quadruple tactile sensors onto a robot hand to enable precise object recognition through grasping. Our quadruple tactile sensor consists of a skin-inspired multilayer microstructure. It works as thermoreceptor with the ability to perceive thermal conductivity of a material, measure contact pressure, as well as sense object temperature and environment temperature simultaneously and independently. By combining tactile sensing information and machine learning, our smart hand has the capability to precisely recognize different shapes, sizes, and materials in a diverse set of objects. We further apply our smart hand to the task of garbage sorting and demonstrate a classification accuracy of 94% in recognizing seven types of garbage.


Sensors ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (12) ◽  
pp. 2677 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shunsuke Nagahama ◽  
Kayo Migita ◽  
Shigeki Sugano

Soft resistive tactile sensors are versatile devices with applications in next-generation flexible electronics. We developed a novel type of soft resistive tactile sensor called a soft magnetic powdery sensor (soft-MPS) and evaluated its response characteristics. The soft-MPS comprises ferromagnetic powder that is immobilized in a liquid resin such as polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) after orienting in a magnetic field. On applying an external force to the sensor, the relative distance between particles changes, thereby affecting its resistance. Since the ferromagnetic powders are in contact from the initial state, they have the ability to detect small contact forces compared to conventional resistive sensors in which the conductive powder is dispersed in a flexible material. The sensor unit can be made in any shape by controlling the layout of the magnetic field. Soft-MPSs with different hardnesses that could detect small forces were fabricated. The soft-MPS could be applied to detect collisions in robot hands/arms or in ultra-sensitive touchscreen devices.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Lepora

<div>Reproducing the capabilities of the human sense of touch in machines is an important step in enabling robot manipulation to have the ease of human dexterity. A combination of robotic technologies will be needed, including soft robotics, biomimetics and the high-resolution sensing offered by optical tactile sensors. This combination is considered here as a SoftBOT (Soft Biomimetic Optical Tactile) sensor. This article reviews the BRL TacTip as a prototypical example of such a sensor. Topics include the relation between artificial skin morphology and the transduction principles of human touch, the nature and benefits of tactile shear sensing, 3D printing for fabrication and integration into robot hands, the application of AI to tactile perception and control, and the recent step-change in capabilities due to deep learning. This review consolidates those advances from the past decade to indicate a path for robots to reach human-like dexterity.</div><div><br></div>


Polymers ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 143
Author(s):  
Masahiko Mitsuzuka ◽  
Yuho Kinbara ◽  
Mizuki Fukuhara ◽  
Maki Nakahara ◽  
Takashi Nakano ◽  
...  

Eight types of polyurethane were synthesized using seven types of diisocyanate. It was found that the elasto-optical constant depends on the concentration of diisocyanate groups in a unit volume of a polymer and the magnitude of anisotropy of the dielectric constant of diisocyanate groups. It was also found that incident light scattered when bending stress was generated inside photoelastic polyurethanes. A high sensitive tactile sensor for robot hands was devised using one of the developed polyurethanes with high photoelasticity.


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