Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationThe study of haptic interfaces focuses on the use of the sense of touch in human-machine interaction. This document presents a detailed investigation of lateral skin stretch at the fingertip as a means of direction communication. Such tactile communication has applications in a variety of situations where traditional audio and visual channels are inconvenient, unsafe, or already saturated. Examples include handheld consumer electronics, where tactile communication would allow a user to control a device without having to look at it, or in-car navigation systems, where the audio and visual directions provided by existing GPS devices can distract the driver's attention away from the road. Lateral skin stretch, the displacement of the skin of the fingerpad in a plane tangent to the fingerpad, is a highly effective means of communicating directional information. Users are able to correctly identify the direction of skin stretch stimuli with skin displacements as small as 0.1 mm at rates as slow as 2 mm/s. Such stimuli can be rendered by a small, portable device suitable for integration into handheld devices. The design of the device-finger interface affects the ability of the user to perceive the stimuli accurately. A properly designed conical aperture effectively constrains the motion of the finger and provides an interface that is practical for use in handheld devices. When a handheld device renders directional tactile cues on the fingerpad, the user must often mentally rotate those cues from the reference frame of the finger to the world-centered reference frame where those cues are to be applied. Such mental rotation incurs a cognitive cost, requiring additional time to mentally process the stimuli. The magnitude of these cognitive costs is a function of the angle of rotation, and of the specific orientations of the arm, wrist and finger. Even with the difficulties imposed by required mental rotations, lateral skin stretch is a promising means of communicating information using the sense of touch with potential to substantially improve certain types of human-machine interaction

Wearable haptic systems for the fingertip and the hand: taxonomy, review and perspectives

In the last decade, we have witnessed a drastic change in the form factor of audio and vision technologies, from heavy and grounded machines to lightweight devices that naturally fit our bodies. However, only recently, haptic systems have started to be designed with wearability in mind. The wearability of haptic systems enables novel forms of communication, cooperation, and integration between humans and machines. Wearable haptic interfaces are capable of communicating with the human wearers during their interaction with the environment they share, in a natural and yet private way. This paper presents a taxonomy and review of wearable haptic systems for the fingertip and the hand, focusing on those systems directly addressing wearability challenges. The paper also discusses the main technological and design challenges for the development of wearable haptic interfaces, and it reports on the future perspectives of the field. Finally, the paper includes two tables summarizing the characteristics and features of the most representative wearable haptic systems for the fingertip and the hand

A survey of dextrous manipulation

technical reportThe development of mechanical end effectors capable of dextrous manipulation is a rapidly growing and quite successful field of research. It has in some sense put the focus on control issues, in particular, how to control these remarkably humanlike manipulators to perform the deft movement that we take for granted in the human hand. The kinematic and control issues surrounding manipulation research are clouded by more basic concerns such as: what is the goal of a manipulation system, is the anthropomorphic or functional design methodology appropriate, and to what degree does the control of the manipulator depend on other sensory systems. This paper examines the potential of creating a general purpose, anthropomorphically motivated, dextrous manipulation system. The discussion will focus on features of the human hand that permit its general usefulness as a manipulator. A survey of machinery designed to emulate these capabilities is presented. Finally, the tasks of grasping and manipulation are examined from the control standpoint to suggest a control paradigm which is descriptive, yet flexible and computationally efficient1

Multimodal Wearable Sensors for Human-Machine Interfaces

Certain areas of the body, such as the hands, eyes and organs of speech production, provide high-bandwidth information channels from the conscious mind to the outside world. The objective of this research was to develop an innovative wearable sensor device that records signals from these areas more conveniently than has previously been possible, so that they can be harnessed for communication. A novel bioelectrical and biomechanical sensing device, the wearable endogenous biosignal sensor (WEBS), was developed and tested in various communication and clinical measurement applications. One ground-breaking feature of the WEBS system is that it digitises biopotentials almost at the point of measurement. Its electrode connects directly to a high-resolution analog-to-digital converter. A second major advance is that, unlike previous active biopotential electrodes, the WEBS electrode connects to a shared data bus, allowing a large or small number of them to work together with relatively few physical interconnections. Another unique feature is its ability to switch dynamically between recording and signal source modes. An accelerometer within the device captures real-time information about its physical movement, not only facilitating the measurement of biomechanical signals of interest, but also allowing motion artefacts in the bioelectrical signal to be detected. Each of these innovative features has potentially far-reaching implications in biopotential measurement, both in clinical recording and in other applications. Weighing under 0.45 g and being remarkably low-cost, the WEBS is ideally suited for integration into disposable electrodes. Several such devices can be combined to form an inexpensive digital body sensor network, with shorter set-up time than conventional equipment, more flexible topology, and fewer physical interconnections. One phase of this study evaluated areas of the body as communication channels. The throat was selected for detailed study since it yields a range of voluntarily controllable signals, including laryngeal vibrations and gross movements associated with vocal tract articulation. A WEBS device recorded these signals and several novel methods of human-to-machine communication were demonstrated. To evaluate the performance of the WEBS system, recordings were validated against a high-end biopotential recording system for a number of biopotential signal types. To demonstrate an application for use by a clinician, the WEBS system was used to record 12‑lead electrocardiogram with augmented mechanical movement information

Frequency response of human skin in vivo to mechanical stimulation

Supervised by Mandayam A. Srinivasan.Also issued as Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2001.Includes bibliographical references (p. 49-51).by Timothy Thomas Diller

ReHand - a portable assistive rehabilitation hand exoskeleton

This dissertation presents a synthesis of a novel underactuated exoskeleton (namely ReHand2) thought and designed for a task-oriented rehabilitation and/or for empower the human hand. The first part of this dissertation shows the current context about the robotic rehabilitation with a focus on hand pathologies, which influence the hand capability. The chapter is concluded with the presentation of ReHand2. The second chapter describes the human hand biomechanics. Starting from the definition of human hand anatomy, passing through anthropometric data, to taxonomy on hand grasps and finger constraints, both from static and dynamic point of view. In addition, some information about the hand capability are given. The third chapter analyze the current state of the art in hand exoskeleton for rehabilitation and empower tasks. In particular, the chapter presents exoskeleton technologies, from mechanisms to sensors, passing though transmission and actuators. Finally, the current state of the art in terms of prototype and commercial products is presented. The fourth chapter introduces the concepts of underactuation with the basic explanation and the classical notation used typically in the prosthetic field. In addition, the chapter describe also the most used differential elements in the prosthetic, follow by a statical analysis. Moreover typical transmission tree at inter-finger level as well as the intra- finger underactuation are explained . The fifth chapter presents the prototype called ReHand summarizing the device description and explanation of the working principle. It describes also the kinetostatic analysis for both, inter- and the intra-finger modules. in the last section preliminary results obtained with the exoskeleton are shown and discussed, attention is pointed out on prototype’s problems that have carry out at the second version of the device. The sixth chapter describes the evolution of ReHand, describing the kinematics and dynamics behaviors. In particular, for the mathematical description is introduced the notation used in order to analyze and optimize the geometry of the entire device. The introduced model is also implemented in Matlab Simulink environment. Finally, the chapter presents the new features. The seventh chapter describes the test bench and the methodologies used to evaluate the device statical, and dynamical performances. The chapter presents and discuss the experimental results and compare them with simulated one. Finally in the last chapter the conclusion about the ReHand project are proposed as well as the future development. In particular, the idea to test de device in relevant environments. In addition some preliminary considerations about the thumb and the wrist are introduced, exploiting the possibility to modify the entire layout of the device, for instance changing the actuator location

Implicit muscle models for interactive character skinning

En animation de personnages 3D, la déformation de surface, ou skinning, est une étape cruciale. Son rôle est de déformer la représentation surfacique d'un personnage pour permettre son rendu dans une succession de poses spécifiées par un animateur. La plausibilité et la qualité visuelle du résultat dépendent directement de la méthode de skinning choisie. Sa rapidité d'exécution et sa simplicité d'utilisation sont également à prendre en compte pour rendre possible son usage interactif lors des sessions de production des artistes 3D. Les différentes méthodes de skinning actuelles se divisent en trois catégories. Les méthodes géométriques sont rapides et simples d'utilisation, mais leur résultats manquent de plausibilité. Les approches s'appuyant sur des exemples produisent des résultats réalistes, elles nécessitent en revanche une base de données d'exemples volumineuse, et le contrôle de leur résultat est fastidieux. Enfin, les algorithmes de simulation physique sont capables de modéliser les phénomènes dynamiques les plus complexes au prix d'un temps de calcul souvent prohibitif pour une utilisation interactive. Les travaux décrits dans cette thèse s'appuient sur Implicit Skinning, une méthode géométrique corrective utilisant une représentation implicite des surfaces, qui permet de résoudre de nombreux problèmes rencontrés avec les méthodes géométriques classiques, tout en gardant des performances permettant son usage interactif. La contribution principale de ces travaux est un modèle d'animation qui prend en compte les effets des muscles des personnages et de leur interactions avec d'autres éléments anatomiques, tout en bénéficiant des avantages apportés par Implicit Skinning. Les muscles sont représentés par une surface d'extrusion le long d'axes centraux. Les axes des muscles sont contrôlés par une méthode de simulation physique simplifiée. Cette représentation permet de modéliser les collisions des muscles entre eux et avec les os, d'introduire des effets dynamiques tels que rebonds et secousses, tout en garantissant la conservation du volume, afin de représenter le comportement réel des muscles. Ce modèle produit des déformations plus plausibles et dynamiques que les méthodes géométriques de l'état de l'art, tout en conservant des performances suffisantes pour permettre son usage dans une session d'édition interactive. Elle offre de plus aux infographistes un contrôle intuitif sur la forme des muscles pour que les déformations obtenues se conforment à leur vision artistique.Surface deformation, or skinning is a crucial step in 3D character animation. Its role is to deform the surface representation of a character to be rendered in the succession of poses specified by an animator. The quality and plausiblity of the displayed results directly depends on the properties of the skinning method. However, speed and simplicity are also important criteria to enable their use in interactive editing sessions. Current skinning methods can be divided in three categories. Geometric methods are fast and simple to use, but their results lack plausibility. Example-based approaches produce realistic results, yet they require a large database of examples while remaining tedious to edit. Finally, physical simulations can model the most complex dynamical phenomena, but at a very high computational cost, making their interactive use impractical. The work presented in this thesis are based on, Implicit Skinning, is a corrective geometric approach using implicit surfaces to solve many issues of standard geometric skinning methods, while remaining fast enough for interactive use. The main contribution of this work is an animation model that adds anatomical plausibility to a character by representing muscle deformations and their interactions with other anatomical features, while benefiting from the advantages of Implicit Skinning. Muscles are represented by an extrusion surface along a central axis. These axes are driven by a simplified physics simulation method, introducing dynamic effects, such as jiggling. The muscle model guarantees volume conservation, a property of real-life muscles. This model adds plausibility and dynamics lacking in state-of-the-art geometric methods at a moderate computational cost, which enables its interactive use. In addition, it offers intuitive shape control to animators, enabling them to match the results with their artistic vision