Soft areal tactile sensors with embedded semiconductor pressure sensors in a structured elastic body

Abstract

Human symbiotic robots, such as for nursing, which share humans' environments and interact with them, should be covered with soft areal tactile sensors for safety and dexterous manipulation. Unfortunately, we do not have definitive and standard tactile sensors for this purpose. In order to solve this problem, we are now developing tactile sensors by embedding semiconductor pressure sensors, as pressure-sensing elements, into an elastic body. We have established a method of embedding an array of semiconductor pressure sensors in an elastic body using a flexible substrate. We have also proposed a structure for the elastic body consisting of hard and soft elastic materials, for improving sensitivity. We first describe the structure of our soft areal tactile sensors, for detecting normal stress. Then we report results of their simulations and experiments. Finally we describe the extension of our sensor for detecting shearing stress.