goals of the project

One of the goals of the project is to develop a finger shaped sensor and equip it to a robotic hand. Herewith, the robot is granted with tactile sensation and can perform fine manipulation tasks just as humans do. Existing sensors equipped on mechanical hands cannot measure sufficient force information to perform most everyday tasks, which has severely hampered the development of field robotics. To develop a sensor with a finger shape, there are key two technical issues. One is that the sensor needs to be prepared at a small size and with high density, comparable to the layout of mechanoreceptors in the skin. The other key issue is that the force sensor must adapt to the particular form of the fingertip. The simple structure of this elastic sensor leads to an elegant solution to these two issues. The sensor does not require a complex sensing unit, but only markers within a gelatin body, which can be arranged at high density. In addition, because the sensor needs only to capture the markers, it may be crafted into any shape that allows it to do so. From these points, we are now developing the finger shaped sensor.