Design of unit for haptic device on foot

Abstract

Walking and traveling are popular recreation activities for the elderly in Japan. These activities are also mild exercises and have good effects for their health. However, people suffering from physical and / or cognitive disorders have a difficulty in going out and walking in real environments. Therefore we have proposed a virtual walking system with a haptic device on feet. This system consists of visual, sound, and haptic devices to present various kinds of ambient information for users. Especially, development of the haptic interface for feet soles is a new challenge. In this paper, we discuss a use of magnetic field sensitive elastomers (MSEs) as working materials for the device. We developed an electromagnet as a testbed of MSE and evaluated it performance. According to the measurement of planter pressures, this device can perform different pressures on soles by applying magnetic field. The result also implied necessities of the improvement of the magnetic circuit and basic structure for more feasible device. According to the experimental results on a dot-type braille block, a target level of the maximum plantar pressure was clarified. On the basis of these results, we designed a unit for the haptic device on feet.