Applications of haptics technology in advance robotics

Abstract

Haptic interaction with the world is manipulation using our sense of touch. The term “haptics” arises from the Greek root haptikos, meaning “able to grasp or perceive.” Haptic interaction with computers implies the ability to use our natural sense of touch to feel and manipulate computed quantities. Haptic computer interaction is a relatively new field that has generated considerable interest over the past decade. Initially, computers could deal only with numbers. It took many years to realize the importance of operating with text. The introduction of CRT display technologies allowed graphics to be displayed, giving us a new way to interact with computers. As processing power increased over time, three-dimensional (3D) graphics became more common and we may now peer into synthetic worlds that seem solid and almost real. Likewise, until recently, the notion of carrying on a “conversation” with our computer was far-fetched. Now, speech technology has progressed to the point that many interesting applications are being considered. Just over the horizon, computer vision is destined to play a role in face and gesture recognition. It seems clear that as the art of computing progresses, even more of the human sensory palette will become engaged. It is likely that the sense of touch (haptics) will be the next sense to play an important role in this evolution. We use touch pervasively in our everyday lives, and are accustomed to easy manipulation of objects in three dimensions. Our working definition of haptics includes all aspects of information acquisition and object manipulation through touch by humans, machines, or a combination of the two; and the environments can be real, virtual or teleoperated. This is the sense in which substantial research and development in haptics is being pursued around the World today