The DLR artificial skin step I: Uniting sensitivity and collision tolerance

The integration of artificial skin into robotic systems has long been foreseen. For the last decades the introduction was always just a couple of years away. One of the possible reasons for the slow progress is the focus of the research efforts on high sensitivity and spatial resolution. The resulting tactile sensor prototypes are presented as laboratory prototypes with no or little chance to be successfully integrated into a robotic system. In order to enable the operation of an artificial skin on a robotic system in real-world applications the conflict of goals between high sensitivity and an overload-proof, collision tolerant, design needs to be solved. Within this paper we present a stretchable tactile surface sensor as a major functional component of an artificial skin setup that is able to unite the required sensitivity with the ability to withstand collisions. The results of first experiments regarding sensitivity and the ability of the DLR Artificial Skin setup to withstand high impact forces are presented.