Tactile Avatar: Tactile Sensing System Mimicking Human Tactile Cognition

Abstract

As a surrogate for human tactile cognition, an artificial tactile perception and cognition system are proposed to produce smooth/soft and rough tactile sensations by its user's tactile feeling; and named this system as “tactile avatar”. A piezoelectric tactile sensor is developed to record dynamically various physical information such as pressure, temperature, hardness, sliding velocity, and surface topography. For artificial tactile cognition, the tactile feeling of humans to various tactile materials ranging from smooth/soft to rough are assessed and found variation among participants. Because tactile responses vary among humans, a deep learning structure is designed to allow personalization through training based on individualized histograms of human tactile cognition and recording physical tactile information. The decision error in each avatar system is less than 2% when 42 materials are used to measure the tactile data with 100 trials for each material under 1.2N of contact force with 4cm s−1 of sliding velocity. As a tactile avatar, the machine categorizes newly experienced materials based on the tactile knowledge obtained from training data. The tactile sensation showed a high correlation with the specific user's tendency. This approach can be applied to electronic devices with tactile emotional exchange capabilities, as well as advanced digital experiences.

Recent Development of Flexible Tactile Sensors and Their Applications

“…It has been proven that the device can even detect a human’s fingerprint. Kim et al reported an artificial tactile sensor that can mimic the feeling of skin on different surface materials ( Figure 11 d) [ 164 ]. The human was sensed based on the piezoelectric multiarray system and the deep learning process.…”

“…( c ) Multimodal Electronic Whiskers [ 163 ]. ( d ) Tactile sensing system mimicking human tactile [ 164 ].…”

A cutaneous receptors-mimicking system for real-time and multimodal detection of tactile stimuli

“…Human skin is considered the most e cient and powerful tactile sensor 1,2 , and hence many studies have been conducted to develop exible electronic skin that emulate the properties of human skin and provide various tactile information, such as force feedback and texture classi cation, which would allow a robot to perform precise and delicate motions [3][4][5][6][7][8][9] . Advances in skin-mimicking tactile sensing technology could provide diverse human-machine interfaces in virtual/augmented reality and the metaverse 10,11 .…”

Flexible Ti3C2Tx MXene/PANI/Bacterial Cellulose Aerogel for e-Skins and Gas Sensing

“…Electronic skins (e-skins) with high flexibility, stretchability, adaptability, and portability have sparked significant attention in the field of healthcare monitoring, 1−3 flexible touch pads, 4 artificial intelligence, 5,6 and human−computer interactions. 7,8 In particular, flexible pressure sensors have been widely used in e-skins due to their excellent wearability, sensitivity, and conductivity.…”