Projects: Tactile sensory substitution for robots to aid persons with quadriplegia (Quadbot)

This project developed a first prototype tactile feedback system for a tongue-controlled robot to assist persons with quadriplegia. We expect the tactile feedback to enhance the ease and speed with which users may manipulate objects using the robot. The block diagram below illustrates this concept schematically.

Pilot research in this project demonstrated simple geometric shape perception when the shapes were pressed against the tactile sensor on the robot gripper (show below) and the sensed shapes were presented to the tongue using the Tongue Display Unit.

This work is published in: N. Droessler, D. Hall, M. E. Tyler and N. J. Ferrier, "Tongue-based electrotactile feedback to perceive objects grasped by a robotic manipulator: Preliminary results," in Proc. 23rd Annu. Int. Conf. IEEE Eng. Med. Biol. Soc., Istanbul, IEEE, 2001.

This is a collaborative project with Nicola Ferrier at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Mechanical Engineering, Robotics and Intelligent Systems Laboratory,