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Crafting workshops are useful methods for the promotion of products because it can let customers know about the technical and social appeal of the product. In this study, we have developed simple, portable, and active multisensory VR systems of crafting experiences for product promotion. It comprises a video of crafting a wooden object with scent and hand motion synchronized with the video. The result of the product evaluations demonstrated positive effects, wherein the participants were found to be more attracted to the product in the video, where only scent or haptic stimulations were presented. However, the result also indicated that there is a negative synergetic effect when two stimulations were simultaneously presented.

In this paper, we propose a haptic transmission system for telexistence to improve the ability to sense the presence of remote objects. This system can transmit information about the existence and surface textures of objects in remote locations. The system consists of a conjugated haptic sensor and display. The sensor on the robot's finger detects the pressure, vibration, and temperature of a remote object, and the display provides above information on the operator's finger. Based on this information, the operator can understand what he/she is touching and whether its surface is hard or soft, cold or hot, and smooth or rough. With the use of our system, the operator can recognize the difference between objects such as silk and denim.

This paper focuses on design of a dexterous anthropomorphic robot where the operator can perceive the transferring bodily consciousness to the slave robot during a tele-operation. Accordingly, we propose a telexistence surrogate anthropomorphic robot called “TELESAR V”, which was designed and constructed by development of the following: a 52 DOF slave robot with a torso, upper limbs, hands and head to model the operator's posture on all parts of the upper body and maintain a 6 DOF accuracy in arm endpoint; a HD Head mounted display with 6 DOF point of view accuracy for wide angle stereovision; and a mechanism for sensing and reproducing fingertip haptic and thermal sensation. This paper describes the development of the TELESAR V system, where the effectiveness has been verified through functional experiments.

Telerobotics is one of the most traditional fields of robotics and it played a crucial role in the history of robotics and of the mankind, especially in the areas of space and undersea exploration and of remote material handling. On the other hand, teleoperation is still a very active research area and many problems are still open. In particular, the design of the control strategy for coupling local and remote site is of paramount importance for implementing telepresence, namely the feeling of being directly interacting with the remote environment. The IEEE RAS Technical Committee on Telerobotics would like to propose a half-day tutorial for illustrating several successful control strategies for implementing high performance bilateral teleoperation systems.

A thermal change on a fingertip is essential for haptic perception. We have proposed a vision-based thermal sensor using thermo-sensitive paint and a CCD camera for telexistence. The thermo-sensitive paint is employed to measure thermal information on the basis of its color, which changes according to its temperature. The proposed sensor can simulate the physical interaction between a human fingertip and an object in order to measure surface thermal information correctly. Furthermore, because the proposed sensor can be easily integrated with our vision-based force sensor, a comprehensive measurement device for measuring haptic information can be realized. In this study, we constructed a prototype of the proposed thermal sensor and experimentally confirmed that this sensor could measure surface thermal information.

Our aim is to afford a remote person the opportunity to participate virtually in some event by using a surrogate robot to communicate with local participants while moving about freely at the venue. Accordingly, we propose a mutual telexistence surrogate robot system, called TELESAR4, which was designed and constructed by development of the following: an immersive audiovisual system; an omnidirectionally mobile robot with a robot arm and hand; an omnidirectional stereo camera system (VORTEX); a head with a retroreflective screen for embodiment of the remote participant; and a retroreflective projection system for local participants. This paper describes the development of the TELESAR4 system, whose efficacy has been verified through demonstration experiments.

We propose a novel grip-type master hand called MeisterGRIP that measures grip force in terms of a force vector distribution. This device is expected to allow intuitive robot manipulation using vision-based haptic-sensing technology. Furthermore, it can be used for general-purpose manipulation and is tolerant to individual differences in hand size and grasping posture. We constructed MeisterGRIP and evaluated the accuracy of the measured grip force. Furthermore, we constructed and exhibited a complete robot manipulation system using MeisterGRIP to demonstrate the possibility of using MeisterGRIP as a general-purpose master hand.

In order to realize haptic interaction (e.g., holding, pushing, and contacting the object) in virtual environment and mediated haptic communication with human beings (e.g., handshaking), the force feedback is required. Recently there has been a substantial need and interest in haptic displays, which can provide realistic and high fidelity physical interaction in virtual environment. The aim of our research is to implement a wearable haptic display for presentation of realistic feedback (kinesthetic stimulus) to the human arm. We developed a wearable device FlexTorque that induces forces to the human arm and does not require holding any additional haptic interfaces in the human hand. It is completely new technology for Virtual Reality that allows user to explore surroundings freely. The concept of Karate (empty hand) Haptics proposed by us is opposite to conventional interfaces (e.g., Wii Remote, SensAble's PHANTOM, SPIDAR [Murayama et al. 2004]) that require holding haptic interface in the hand, restricting thus the motion of the fingers in midair.

It is expected that the use of haptic sensors to measure the magnitude, direction, and distribution of a force will enable a robotic hand to perform dexterous manipulations. Therefore, we have developed a new type of finger-shaped haptic sensor that can measure a three-dimensional force vector field over a contact surface. The sensor consists of a transparent elastic body, two layers of internal blue and red markers, and a CCD camera to capture the movements of the markers. Using the elastic theory, we can calculate the force vector field from the captured movements of the markers. However, the elastic theory cannot be applied to the finger-shaped sensor because of its complicated shape. Therefore, we use actual measurements for the calibration in order to develop a prototype of the sensor. Then, we evaluate its basic performance. The result shows that the sensor performance can be improved further, and the sensor can be successfully used in a robotic hand.

The goal of this study is to develop a haptic interface for dexterous manipulation. To achieve this, we proposed electrotactile-kinesthetic integration. Our electrotactile display presents natural touch sensations of objects. In addition, this display is so small that it is considered to not affect the moving range of fingers. The haptic interface for dexterous manipulation is realized by mounting it on a kinesthetic display having a wide workspace. The electrotactile display on the integrated haptic interface is used actively. Therefore, we actively evaluated the performances of the electrotactile display on the single-fingered prototype system. The results revealed the present performance of the system. Subsequently, it also shows the possibility of further improving of the haptic interface by devising an electrotactile rendering method.