Development of the master hand for grasping information capturing

Analysis of human hand grasp provides information that can be used to develop a grasping algorithm of robot hands that takes advantage of human knowledge and experience. In analysing the human hand grasp, not only motion of the fingers but also contact force acting on the fingertips should be measured. This paper presents a new master hand which can be attached to a human hand and measures motion of the human fingertips and contact force acting on the fingertips. Our purpose in developing the master hand is to clarify the strategy of a human hand grasp, which is subjected to the same physical constraints as those of a robot hand, and use the obtained information to develop a grasping algorithm of robot hands. Concepts of the development, mechanism and features of the master hand are described