A Non-Array Soft Capacitive Tactile Sensor with Simultaneous Contact Force and Location Measurement for Intelligent Robotic Grippers

Tactile sensing is essential for robotic manipulations and human‒machine interactions. It is vital to provide contact location and force information between the robotic gripper and objects for safe and effective operation. Many existing tactile sensors deploy an array of sensing units for pressure m...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:IEEE transactions on instrumentation and measurement 2023-12, p.1-1
Main Authors: Tang, Chao, Chang, Xinxin, Wang, Jinxing, Peng, Yulian, Wu, Houping, Wang, Hongbo
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Capacitance
Capacitive sensors
Contact location
Electrodes
Force
force sensor
Grippers
non-array
robotic gripper
Robots
Sensors
soft sensor
tactile sensing
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Summary:Tactile sensing is essential for robotic manipulations and human‒machine interactions. It is vital to provide contact location and force information between the robotic gripper and objects for safe and effective operation. Many existing tactile sensors deploy an array of sensing units for pressure mapping and contact location recognition. However, it is still challenging to utilize such array sensors in robotic grippers for real-world applications due to the complex wiring and electronics, high cost, and l ow r eliability. I n t his w ork, w e p ropose a n on-array soft tactile sensor (NA-STS) that utilizes two triangle textile electrodes and a rectangle electrode to form a pair of soft capacitive pressure sensors in a differential configuration along its length. The sum of the two capacitance variations represents the amplitude of the force, whereas the difference between them represents the contact location. A three-layer electrode, shielded soft tactile sensor with dimensions of 12 mm × 60 mm was fabricated, characterized, and calibrated for simultaneous contact force and location measurement. The results show that the sensor can detect the force as low as 2.1mN, with a range over 25 N, and a maximum error of 2.5 mm for contact location detection. In addition, key design parameters of the NA-STS were investigated. Finally, two NA-STSs were integrated into a robotic gripper and demonstrated for monitoring the contact force and location during the gripping of various objects. The NA-STS has a simple structure, high performance, rapid response and is easy-to-implement, immune to proximity effect, and robust for real-word applications.
ISSN:0018-9456
1557-9662
DOI:10.1109/TIM.2023.3343795