Project Type:
Contract No.:
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Starting date:
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 UE STREP
 FP6-NMP-033287
 NanoBioTact
 NANO-engineering BIOmimetic TACTile sensors
 December 1, 2006
 36 months

Project Official Website
 

 

Brief Presentation

The overall scientific objective of NANOBIOTACT is to undertake original research that will lead to a bio-inspired tactile fingerpad incorporating tactile sensors and having the potentiality to assess complex tactile stimuli involving different textures and not just spatial acuity, geometric form, surface topography and vibration, which the artificial finger should also possess. Scientific understanding of the human model for discriminative touch will be developed by means of neurophysiological and psychophysical studies and the tribological properties of human skin will be assessed.
The milestones on the way to the project goal are as follows:

1. To identify a range of relevant textures and surface qualities as the basis for the tactile stimuli that will be characterized

2. To measure the peripheral and brain response to the tactile stimuli and characterize these response in terms of global and time series statistics. To this aim static and dynamic robotic platforms will be designed and developed for the investigation of the tactile stimuli in human active and passive touch studies

3. To develop a validated finite element virtual model of the tactile stimulation of a fingerpad that incorporates time-resolved neuromechanical coupling

4. To model the interrelationships between:
• The interaction mechanics of tactile stimuli
• The real and computer simulated peripheral neural responses
• The brain imaging data
• The effects of peripheral and brain lesions
• The psychophysical assessment of the stimuli
Tactile discrimination algorithms will be developed for this purpose.

5. To develop bio-inspired tactile sensors and integrate them into an artificial finger with the output signals processes to provide tactile assessment and motor feedback.
Participant List
 


No

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8


Leader Name

Mike J. Adams , Coordinator
Simon Watson
Johan Wessberg
Jean Louis Thonnard
Martin Dutko
Jurgen Schmidhuber
Maria Chiara Carrozza
Tomaz Rodic

 


Participant Name

University of Birmingham, Birmingham
Unilever R&D Port Sunlight
Göteborg University, Göteborg
Universitè Catholique de Lovain, Lovain-la-Neuve
Rockfield Software Ltd. , Swansea
Technical University of Munich, Munich
ARTS Lab, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa
C3M d.o.o. , Ljubljana


Country

United Kingdom
United Kingdom
Sweden
Belgium
United Kingdom
Germany
Italy
Slovenia
ARTS Lab Contribution
 

ARTS Lab is responsible for WP5 which will integrate the work carried out in all the other WPs of the project and to which all partners collaborate. ARTS lab will carry out scientific work in two main areas of WP5:

•  by developing and evaluating biomimetic tactile finger prototypes that will both mimic the biomechanical structure of the human finger and the functionalities of the human mechanoreceptors. The results of all WPs will be integrated in this work, in particular those relative to the development of a virtual model for predicting the peripheral neural response during touch by employing physiologically realistic finite element simulations based on mechanical and frictional measurements of the fingerpad. Two demonstrators will be implemented by ARTS Lab: a first one integrating force microsensors based on MEMS technology and a second one incorporating novel tactile nanosensors developed by the Microsystems group of the University of Birmingham . The tactile sensory system that will be integrated in the biomimetic finger pad will be based on an array of micro/nanosensors having sensitivities and dynamic responses that are comparable to human mechanoreceptors. Such features are expected to depend on several aspects, such as the structure of the artificial finger, the sensory system integration approach and also the sensor packaging materials that implement the mechanical interface between the sensorised finger and the external world. ARTS Lab will collaborate to the e valuation of the synthetic vs. tissue engineering approach for human-like finger biomimetic materials.

•  by developing advanced experimental platforms for application in active and passive touch studies. ARTS Lab will develop static and dynamic experimental platforms for the application of the tactile stimuli to human subjects. Investigation of human touch will be carried out during the neurophysiological and psychophysical studies performed in other WPs.

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