A human touch

Roberto Saracco January 3, 2017 Blog 140 Views

Our sense of touch can pick up thousands of nuances because we have soft flesh. Try to touch an object with your nails and you’ll miss a lot of the sensations that your fingertips can provide.
Robots are facing a similar problem. Having a rigid surface they have a limited touch sensitivity. However, with the recent progress in 3D printing of soft materials it has become possible to create soft skin for robotic "hands" and to fill it with sensors able to pick up a broader set of sensations.
This is what has been done at Cornell University where a team of researchers have created a robotic hand optoelectronically innervated that is able to sense object with a resolution similar to the one of a human hand.
In a demonstration, watch the clip, they have shown that the robot is able to identify the ripest tomato among a set of three by touching it, just like we do at the supermarket, judging the ripeness by touching the softness and texture of the tomato. Clearly, this capability can improve the range of application of a robot making it more aware of its environment.
However, the long term goal is to create a prosthetic hand for amputees that can pick up touch sensation and relate them to the brain by connecting with the nerves in the arm.

About Roberto Saracco

Roberto Saracco fell in love with technology and its implications long time ago. His background is in math and computer science. Until April 2017 he led the EIT Digital Italian Node and then was head of the Industrial Doctoral School of EIT Digital up to September 2018. Previously, up to December 2011 he was the Director of the Telecom Italia Future Centre in Venice, looking at the interplay of technology evolution, economics and society. At the turn of the century he led a World Bank-Infodev project to stimulate entrepreneurship in Latin America. He is a senior member of IEEE where he leads the New Initiative Committee and co-chairs the Digital Reality Initiative. He is a member of the IEEE in 2050 Ad Hoc Committee. He teaches a Master course on Technology Forecasting and Market impact at the University of Trento. He has published over 100 papers in journals and magazines and 14 books.

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