Development of Optical Three-Axis Tactile Sensor and its Application to Robotic Hand for Dexterous Manipulation Tasks

This paper presents the development of a novel tactile sensor device called optical three-axis tactile sensor and its application to robotic hands. The proposed tactile sensor is based on optical waveguide transduction method combines with image processing technique. The hardware structure, sensing principles and force detection method are presented in conjunction with application to the robot hand control system. Since this tactile sensor can detect force from tri-axial force directions, not only normal and shear force distributions are acquired, but also slippage sensation is defined. The control parameters of robot hand system combined with the tactile sensor are defined from calibration tests. The performance of the tactile sensor that mounted to robot hand is verified in experiments of grasping, manipulating and twisting motions. Experimental results revealed that the robot hand system managed to recognize the tactile sensation in high accuracy during grasping, manipulating and twisting real objects.