M-Hair: Extended Reality by Stimulating the Body Hair

MAGHair: A Wearable System to Create Unique Tactile Feedback by Stimulating Only the Body Hair

“…However, the authors applied the sensation to the overall forearm surface instead of a specific area. Another approach that gives a more focused stimulation is the one used by Boldu et al in M-Hair [3,4]. The authors augment the body hair with off-the-shelf ferromagnetic cosmetics to attract the hair from a certain distance with magnetic fields.…”

“…They are capable of generating a stimulus at a speed of 3cm/s, which previous research in affective touch states as potentially optimal in stimulating CT afferents [20] by using a modified 2D plotter. This solution was then evaluated with virtual reality content [3], which reportedly improved the immersion on the virtual content. Although the VR experience improved, the bulky form factor presented a substantial limitation.…”

“…The silicone-to-iron ratio of the used mixture was 2:3. The mixing was done with a centrifugal mixer 3 for two 3-minute rounds at 2000rpm. The mixture was then applied on a transfer paper at a thickness of 200µm.…”

“…The usage of MAGHair as a subtle haptic feedback interface could open up potential applications related to affective touch, such as pleasure, pain relief, or social touch [22], as well as enriched media experiences, such as more immersive AR/VR content [3] or music enhancement [8]. The wearable form factor of MAGHair allowed for adaptation to various devices.…”

“…Their approach consisted of augmenting the hair with a mix of off-the-shelf cosmetics and then stimulating these ones with a permanent magnet attached to the head of a large moving 2D plotter. Later work showed how this haptic stimulation could improve media experiences, such as VR [3]. However, it presents substantial limitations due to the form factor, which is bulky and not wearable, restricting user movement while the stimuli are being generated.…”