01920nas a2200193 4500008003900000245009300039210006900132260004400201300001700245520128700262653001201549653001301561100001801574700001501592700002001607700001601627700001501643856006801658 2014 d00aThimbleSense: An Individual-Digit Wearable Tactile Sensor for Experimental Grasp Studies0 aThimbleSense An IndividualDigit Wearable Tactile Sensor for Expe a Hong Kong, May 31 - June 7, 2014bIEEE a2728 - 2735 3 a

Measuring contact forces applied by a hand to a grasped object is a necessary step to understand the mysteries that still hide in the unparalleled human grasping ability. Nevertheless, simultaneous collection of information about the position of contacts and about the magnitude and direction of forces is still an elusive task. In this paper we introduce a wearable device that addresses this problem, and can be used to measure generalized forces during grasping. By assembling two supports around a commercial 6-axis force/torque sensor we obtain a thimble that can be easily positioned on a fingertip. The device is used in conjunction with an active marker-based motion capture system to simultaneously obtain absolute position and orientation of the thimbles, without requiring any assumptions on the kinematics of the hand. Finally, using the contact centroid algorithm, introduced in [1], position of contact points during grasping are determined. This paper shows the design and implementation of the device, as well as some preliminary experimental validation.

10aHaptics10aRobotics1 aBattaglia, E.1 aGrioli, G.1 aCatalano, M. G.1 aSantello, M1 aBicchi, A. uhttp://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=6907250