Abstract
The human is covered with soft skin and has tactile receptors inside. The skin deforms along a contact surface. The tactile receptors detect the mechanical deformation. The detection of the mechanical deformation is essential for the tactile sensation. We propose a magnetic type tactile sensor which has a soft surface and eight magnetoresistive elements. The soft surface has a permanent magnet inside and the magnetoresistive elements under the soft surface measure the magnetic flux density of the magnet. The tactile sensor estimates the displacement and the rotation on the surface based on the change of the magnetic flux density. Determination of an estimate equation is difficult because the displacement and the rotation are not geometrically decided based on the magnetic flux density. In this paper, a stepwise regression analysis determines the estimate equation. The outputs of the magnetoresistive elements are used as explanatory variables, and the three-axis displacement and the two-axis rotation are response variables in the regression analysis. We confirm the regression analysis is effective for determining the estimate equations through simulation and experiment. The results show the tactile sensor measures both the displacement and the rotation generated on the surface by using the determined equation.
Highlights
The human body is covered with soft skin
We propose a magnetic type tactile sensor that measures three-axis displacement and two-axis rotation applied on the surface of it
To determine the surface displacement from the outputs of the giant magnetoresistive (GMR) elements, we proposed an estimate equation of x-axis displacement expressed in (1) [12]
Summary
The human body is covered with soft skin. We have perceptions of mechanical and thermal stimulation via the skin. With regard to optical tactile sensors, the methods which capture images of contact surfaces and calculate the deformation of the surface have been proposed. The pattern of the contacts determined three-axis force These optical tactile sensors have an advantage which has no wiring inside the soft surface, downsizing of camera devices and high-speed calculation are required. Soft surface and multiaxis tactile sensors based on various measurement principles have been proposed. Their improvement is expected for practical use. In regard to magnetic tactile sensors, Nowlin proposed a tactile sensor with hall elements [9] To reduce noise, this sensor used a stochastic method based on elaborate calculation. To confirm the effectiveness of the proposed method, we verify results of both simulation and experiment
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have