Scientists from EFPL’s Reconfigurable Robotics Lab (RRL) and the Laboratory for Soft Bioelectric Interfaces (LSBI) at the School of Engineering have partnered to develop a flexible, ‘artificial skin’, opening up opportunities to develop lifelike VR haptics that fit better than a glove.
The ‘skin’, made of silicone and electrodes, uses soft sensors and actuators to conform to the
shape of a user’s wrist, providing feedback via pressure and vibration.
The haptic feedback can be adjusted
to produce a sense of touch that the team claims is as realistic as possible, with
the integration of sensors and actuators providing a closed-loop control that can actuate and modulate the vibration
stimulation felt by users, with the actuators able to be tuned to varying pressures of up to
100Hz or 100 pulses per second.
The electrodes continuously measure skin deformation, sending data to a microcontroller
that uses the feedback to precisely tune the sensation transmitted to the user in response to
movement and changes in external factors.
The team is currently testing the ‘artificial skin’ on the fingers,
making improvements to the technology with plans to develop a fully wearable prototype in the near future.