A Tactile Display for Presenting Quality of Materials

by Changing the Temperature of Skin Surface

Shuichi INO, Shunji SHIMIZU, Tetsuro ODAGAWA, Mitsuru SATO,
Makoto TAKAHASHI, Takashi IZUMI* and Tohru IFUKUBE

Research Institute for Electronic Science, Hokkaido University

Nishi 6,Kita 13, Kita-ku, Sapporo, 060 JAPAN
*School of Engineering, Hokkaido Tokai University
5-1, Minaminosawa, Minami-ku, Sapporo, 005 JAPAN

TELEPHONE & TELEFACSIMILE: t81-11-757-1250 E-mail: INO%ae%hines@xmail-gw.sys.hokudai.ac.jp

Abstract - Tactile information processing was
studied based on psychophysical experiments in order
to design a tactile display for tele-existence robots or
virtual reality devices. First, the identification
characteristics of the tactile sense concerned with the
quality of materials were investigated when human
fingertips touched the surface of various materials in a
vertical direction. In addition to obtaining the tactile
characteristics, the temperature change of the skin
surface of a fingertip was measured when the
fingertip contacted the surface of materials. From these
experimental results, the temperature difference from
the normal skin temperature was found to be very
important to recognize what kind of materials
contacted the skin surface. Next, the tactile display
for presenting the quality of materials was designed on
the basis of the above experimental results. The tactile
display system was composed of a Peltier module and a
PID controller. It was proven that the tactile display
has the ability to easily present a similar quality of
materials to real objects.
I. INTRODUCTION
Recently, virtual reality and tele-existence have
become attractive research topics in the fields of
the information engineering and the engineering
for the sensory aids. The functions of these
technologies are t o present the human sensory
organs with virtual environment information
controlled by a computer or the real world
information around a tele-operated robot.
Therefore, an operator can feel as if he exists in
the virtual world or has become the robot itself [l].
That is to say, the virtual reality and tele-existence
would provide the ultimate human interface
technology in order to smoothly exchange the
information between man and machine. For the
purpose of this advanced technology, it is
necessary to investigate in detail the human
sensory functions.
IEEE International Workshop ,on
Robot and Human Commun I cat I on
0-7803-1407-7/93 $3.00 1993 Q I EEE
The technologies of virtual reality and tele-
existence have been actively studied in the fields of
the visual and auditory senses [2]. However, there
are very few studies concerning tactile display that
can give the operator's fingers the tactile
information detected by a robot and created by a
computer.
We have been studying a master-slave robot
hand system for tele-existence regarding the
tactile sense [3],[4],[5].This system is called "Hand
with Sensory Feedback which is shown in Figure
1 [61.
This paper first describes the results of
psychophysical experiments in order t o design a
tactile display for presenting qualities of materials.
This display is one of the important elements
which is used for hand with sensory feedback.
These experiments are concerned with the
recognition characteristics of the tactile sense with
respect t o a temperature change of the human
fingertip skin surface when the fingertips touch
various materials. Next, the tactile display for
presenting the quality of materials was designed
on the basis of the above experimental results. The
tactile display system was composed of a Peltier
module and a PID controller.
Figure 1. Photograph of "Hand with Sensory Feedback".
~ 220

Identification scores obtained by randomly presenting five materials
(aluminum, glass, rubber, polyacrylate, wood)to the distal pad of an
index finger.
Aluminum
Aluminum
Glass
Stimuli Rubber
Polyacrylate
Wood
11. TACTILE CHARACTERISTICS REGARDING
QUALITY OF MATERIALS
The tactile sense of human hands not only has
abilities to detect dynamic information such as
pressure or strain but also psychological
information regarding the quality of materials
such as surface roughness and viscosity by using
an active touch. But the quality of materials can be
identified by warmth or coolness of the object
surface in a passive touch, but not in the case of an
active touch. So we could easily identify by the
feeling of touch whether or not an imitation plastic
board modeled after a piece of wood is made of real
wood. For this reason, the psychophysical
experiments were carried out t o investigate static
tactile perception when human fingertips
contacted the surface of various materials in a
vertical direction. Moreover, temperature
differences from the normal skin temperature were
measured for their physical correspondence. This
was done to ascertain the characteristics of the
quality of materials effected by temperature
change of the skin surface produced by touching
an object.
A. Materials for Stimulus Samples
Stimulus samples used in this psychophysical
experiment were familiar materials such as
aluminum, glass, rubber, polyacrylate and wood.
These sample objects have a flat surface, a large
contact area (21cm2) and a hard body as compared
with human fingertips. The temperature of these
samples was kept at room temperature (22.3
degrees centigrade) before contact was made with
fingertips at the surface of sample objects.
B. Procedure and Subjects
The absolute judgment method, which belongs to
1--
TABLE 1
Response in Percent
Glass Rubber Polvawlate Wood
91 09 00 00 00
06 49 23 21 01
01 15 43 31 10
00 17 37 40 06
00 00 07 11 82
confusion ma& for real objects (materials)for 5 subjects.
a psychophysical measurement technique, was
adopted to obtain the identification characteristics
of the tactile sense of human hands. Five different
materials of stimulus objects were placed 20 times
respectively on the distal pad of the index finger at
random. The subjects were then asked to respond
to the material's name as quickly and accurately as
possible. No feedback was given for correct
answers at each presentation. There was no limit
on touching duration and force with respect t o
identifying the stimulus object. The duration and
force were recorded by using a force sensor with six
axes under the sample object. The subjects were
asked t o apply the contact force against the
samples from their fingertips in a vertical direction
without tracing the surface of the stimulus object.
The subjects were blindfolded during the
experiment.
Subjects consisted of four males and one female
who had a normal tactile sense. The five subjects
ranged in age from 23 t o 27. Their mean skin
temperature was 31.3 degrees centigrade before
touching. A thermocouple which was made up of
copper and constantan was used t o accurately
measure the skin temperature.
C. Results
Table 1 shows the identification scores obtained
by presenting five materials t o the subjects. The
percentage of correct responses was very high for
aluminum and wood, but a confusion arose
between glass, rubber and polyacrelate. It was
found that aluminum and wood were identified
more easily better than the other materials.
The temperature changes of the skin of the
subject's fingertips were recorded by using the
thermocouples attached to their skin surface when
they touched the sample materials. The time
patterns of temperature change of the skin surface
produced by contact with aluminum, rubber and
-- 221
wood were shown in Figure 2. The skin TABLE 2
temperature dropped suddenly when contacting
the objects and became stable after around 1.0 sec. The touching duration and the force which were obtained while the
Although the temperature decrease AT from the subjects vertically pressed the surface of sample materials without
tracing. Where, the subjects were asked to identify the materials.
normal skin temperature was found to be 6.9
degrees centigrade for aluminum, the skin
temperature for contacting wood soon returned to Duration ( s ) Force(N)
the normal skin temperature from a temporary
temperature drop. For the other materials, the Aluminum 1.16 (0.82-1.54) 1.20 (0.6-1.6)
values of AT were fell between the temperature Gless 1.62 (1.45-2.04) 1.44 (0.51.9)
range resulting from contact with between Rubber 1.86 (1.32-2.63) 1.56 (0.7-2.7)
aluminum and wood (3.1 degrees centigrade for Polyacrylate 1.93 (1.37-2.79) 1.82 (0.9-2.4)
glass, 2.6 degrees centigrade for rubber, 1.7 Wood 1.58 (1.16-1.95) 1.30 (0.6-2.0)
degrees centigrade for polyaclyrate). These time
patterns of AT were roughly the same as the Values are means. Figures inparenthesesare ranges.
The number of sub+e& is five.
patterns of Aluminum. Therefore, the time
patterns for AT were similar respectively between
Aluminum
the confused sample materials. These results 5
2
indicate that the temperature change (AT) of the c
._
skin surface was related to the identification of the 8
quality of materials through the tactile sensation. CD
2

Q
The touching duration and the force which were .-
tz
needed t o identify the presented materials are 0,

shown in Table 2. The touching duration for the -

i
i
0
identification stood just under 2.0 sec. The forces
with which the subjects vertically pressed the
surface of sample objects were about 1.6 N on the
r-"
- L"

I I I 1
average. Therefore, these touching durations were 0 5 10 15 20
slightly longer than the duration needed for the Rubber
skin temperature to became a stable state after 40
c
._
touching. There was a tendency that the more 8
difficulty the subject had in identifying the sample I
objects, the longer and the bigger the touching CD
._
Q
duration and forces became respectively. r
% 30
i
i
.+-
a,
III. TACTILE DISPLAY
FOR PRESENTING I

QUALITYOF MATERIALS $
L
$ 20
From the results of the above experiment, it has 0 5 10 15 20
become evident that the sense of temDerature is an Wood
important piece of tactile information t o 9 40
understand the quality of materials. Therefore, if E
the same patterns of the temperature change (AT)
were presented to the human fingertip surface, 2.a
humans could feel more precisely the virtual 30
quality of materials by tactile stimulation. In this E
chapter, a tactile display method using a Peltier
module is described. This display can electrically 5
control the AT and can generate the similar
quality of materials. 2
I-
20
0 5 10 15 20
A. Apparatus Time in sec

The structure of the tactile display system is

Figure 2. Time patterns of the skin surface temperature change
in 3. The section was produced by contacting with real objects and a fingertip surface. The
composed of Peltier elements and a ceramic disk upper trace shows aluminum, the middle shows rubber and the
which had an area of 16 cm2. This display device ~OwershOws~ood-

- 222
 TABLE 3
Identification scores obtained by randomly presenting five
temperature changes (AT) produced from the Peltier element display.

Response in Percent
Aluminum Glass Rubber Polvacrvlate Wood

Aluminum (-6.9-C) 100 00 00 00 00

GI- (-3.1'C) 00 62 24 12 02
stimuli (AT) Rubber (-2.6'C) 00 18 16 54 12
Polyacrylate (-1.7'C) 00 06 1s 46 30
Wood (-0.1"C) 00 OS 22 14 56

Conhion mu& for uirtunl objects (Peltier module display)for 5 subjects.

Index Finaer Index Finaer

.......... Radiator
Current
Booster

k 15V.11A

Time

Figure 3. Block diagram of the tactile display for presenting

quality of materials by using a Peltier element.

could become a heater or cooler by changing the
electric current direction into the Peltier elements.
The temperature of the display surface was
measured by a thermocouple and controlled by a
PID control unit which had the control precision of
within 0.1 degrees centigrade. The Peltier module
was driven by using a power supply with 11A and
a current booster.
B. Evaluation
The amount of information on the quality of
materials that could be transmitted to the tactile
sense by our tactile display was examined. The
following procedures were carried out for this
examination. The five temperature differences (AT)
based on the above experimental results were
artificially generated by this tactile display system.
After presenting these artificial thermal stimulus
patterns (AT) t o the fingertip surface of the
subjects, they were asked what kind of materials
they had imagined. This psychophysical
experimental method was administered by using
absolute judgment. The subjects of this experiment
were the same as in the above experiment (See
1I.B.).
A confusion matrix on subjects' response results
obtained by randomly presenting five kinds of
temperature changes produced by the tactile
display system is shown in Table 3. It is clear that
the virtual objects produced by the Peltier element
display and the real objects were similar in the
tendencies of confusion among each of the
categories (i.e. materials). Figure 4 shows the
results of t h e comparison between t h e
identification characteristics in the real objects and
the ones in the virtual objects. There were roughly
the same recognition ratios for each category
between the real objects and the virtual ones.
Next, the amounts of transmitted information

223
 difference from the normal skin temperature was
Number of Subjeds : n.5 RealObjeci
very important in recognizing the quality of
0 PeHief Element materials. Furthermore, our tactile display system
T
seems to have the ability to easily present similar
tactile information about the quality of materials
of real objects. T h e virtual materials presented by
the Peltier module display and the real materials
were alike in the identification score with respect
=.
-
.-c to absolute judgments, but not equal perfectly.
E Chance Therefore the correct recognition of the quality of
r(l Level
0 materials might require other tactile information
E Aluminium Glass Rubber Polyacrylate Wood such as surface roughness or viscoelasticity and so
Materials on. By allowing the surface of real objects to be
traced by fingertips, the identification ability of
human hands with respect to the presenting of real
Figure 4. Comparison of the identification characteristics of real objects could improve drastically.
objects with those of virtual objects produced by the Peltier element
display. In future, this research will be continued t o
identify the physical parameters which determine
the tactile sensation of the quality of materials.
Further tactile display systems are necessary t o
I I have the ability to present the haptic information
Peltier such as the sensation produced by active touch.
Element The goal of this work is to develop the master-slave
robot hand with a sensory feedback system for
supporting the people with disabilities and the
elderly.
0 0.5 1 1.5 2
Transmitted Information in bits ACI(N0WLEDGMENT

Figure 5 . Comparison of the transmitted Information amount in

the case of real objects with those in the case of virtual objects
produced by the Peltier module display.
were calculated from the response results of the
subjects (See Table 1 and Table 3) by the bivariate
information analysis. Figure 5 shows the results of
the comparison of the transmitted information
amounts for real objects with these for virtual
objects. There was no significant difference
between them (1.14bits for the real object's stimuli
and 1.26 bits for the virtual object's stimuli).
Thus, in the case of the static tactile sense
without finger motion for tracing , our tactile
display system could present the similar sensation
of the quality of materials which was felt upon
touching the real objects.
N.CONCLUSION
Psychophysical experiments were carried out to
design a tactile display for presenting the quality
of materials which is very important to tele-
existence robots or virtual reality devices. This
paper shows that the temporal temperature
This work was supported by Grant-in-Aid for
Scientific Research of the Ministry of Education,
Science and Culture in Japan, projects 04555090
and 0154 in Fellowships the Japan Society for the
Promotion of Science for Japanese Junior
Scientists.
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