Construction of Ultrasonic Tactile Force Feedback Model in Teleoperation Robot System

Sensors (Basel). 2021 Apr 6;21(7):2560. doi: 10.3390/s21072560.

Abstract

The ultrasonic phased array as an emerging interactive tool is increasingly used for aerial tactile interaction. However, there is almost no method to achieve remote variable force feedback through the ultrasonic phased array as far as we know. This article presents a force tactile feedback method for teleoperating robot systems that tracks the five fingers and forms a focus on the fingertips. First, the perceived size of the focus depends on the input parameters. The influence of the parameters on the physical output pressure intensity was obtained through physical test experiments. Then, the absolute threshold and difference threshold of human perception were studied through psychophysical experimental methods. Finally, the input parameters were selected according to the experimental results. According to the collected data, the construction of the force regression model was completed, and different parameters were mapped to the perceived intensity. The contact force generated in the actual operation is fed back to the haptic system, and the constructed model automatically adjusts the control parameters to ensure that the user's hand presents a sensory output corresponding to the intensity change. The entire force feedback system is evaluated, and results show that the system shows good perceptual quality.

Keywords: force feedback; regression model; tactile interaction; teleoperation system; ultrasound array.