scholarly journals Spatiotemporal Identification of Moving Patterns on a Fingertip-based Electro-Tactile Display Array

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Rahimi ◽  
Fang Jiang ◽  
Yantao Shen
Keyword(s):  
Communication Channel ◽  
Detection Threshold ◽  
Electrical Signal ◽  
Electrical Contacts ◽  
Tactile Display ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Substitution System ◽  
Specific Order ◽  
Moving Patterns ◽  
Moving Pattern

An electro-tactile display can be used to stimulate sensations in the skin. The ultimate achievement in this area is to open a new information communication channel using this sensory substitution system. One of the requirement of such communication channel is to deliver meaningful commands to the user. The sensations should be distinctive enough to be readily understandable for the operator.<br>This study is perusing the feasibility of generating identifiable moving patterns in the electro-tactile display. Then, the degree of identification performed by the users will be validated.<br><br>An electro-tactile display is built using an array of sixteen contacts to form a moving pattern by delivering electrical signal to the fingertip skin.<br>This signal can have varying voltages, frequencies or duty cycles to form the most comfortable sensation.<br>Moving patterns can be generated by individually or collectively toggling the electrical contacts on the electro-tactile display. This will achieve a stimulation of a moving pattern. In this regard, a moving pattern can be compared to a set of frame-by-frame pictures that construct a movie. Similarly, by toggling the contacts in a specific order, a moving pattern can be achieved.<br><br>In this study, eight subjects participated. A questionnaire was used to assess the sensation of the corresponding movement.<br>The results of these reports were analyzed and a conclusion regarding the identification of the direction of the movement was drawn. It became clear that the direction of the movement had a significant impact on the recognition of the patterns.<br><br>Furthermore, an analysis of the detection threshold (DT) voltage and current mapping was performed to evaluate the effect of the internal structure of the skin for each user on the assessment performance.<br>Based on the mapping results, it became clear that the DT voltage is vastly different for each contact and the resulting spatial map is also unique to each user.

scholarly journals Spatiotemporal Identification of Moving Patterns on a Fingertip-based Electro-Tactile Display Array

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Rahimi ◽  
Fang Jiang ◽  
Yantao Shen
Keyword(s):  
Communication Channel ◽  
Detection Threshold ◽  
Electrical Signal ◽  
Electrical Contacts ◽  
Tactile Display ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Substitution System ◽  
Specific Order ◽  
Moving Patterns ◽  
Moving Pattern

An electro-tactile display can be used to stimulate sensations in the skin. The ultimate achievement in this area is to open a new information communication channel using this sensory substitution system. One of the requirement of such communication channel is to deliver meaningful commands to the user. The sensations should be distinctive enough to be readily understandable for the operator.<br>This study is perusing the feasibility of generating identifiable moving patterns in the electro-tactile display. Then, the degree of identification performed by the users will be validated.<br><br>An electro-tactile display is built using an array of sixteen contacts to form a moving pattern by delivering electrical signal to the fingertip skin.<br>This signal can have varying voltages, frequencies or duty cycles to form the most comfortable sensation.<br>Moving patterns can be generated by individually or collectively toggling the electrical contacts on the electro-tactile display. This will achieve a stimulation of a moving pattern. In this regard, a moving pattern can be compared to a set of frame-by-frame pictures that construct a movie. Similarly, by toggling the contacts in a specific order, a moving pattern can be achieved.<br><br>In this study, eight subjects participated. A questionnaire was used to assess the sensation of the corresponding movement.<br>The results of these reports were analyzed and a conclusion regarding the identification of the direction of the movement was drawn. It became clear that the direction of the movement had a significant impact on the recognition of the patterns.<br><br>Furthermore, an analysis of the detection threshold (DT) voltage and current mapping was performed to evaluate the effect of the internal structure of the skin for each user on the assessment performance.<br>Based on the mapping results, it became clear that the DT voltage is vastly different for each contact and the resulting spatial map is also unique to each user.

scholarly journals Printed Texts Tracking and Following for a Finger-Wearable Electro-Braille System Through Opto-electrotactile Feedback

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mehdi Rahimi ◽  
Yantao Shen ◽  
Zhiming Liu ◽  
Fang Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Optical Character Recognition ◽  
Text Processing ◽  
Tactile Display ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Processing Unit ◽  
Text Line ◽  
Imaging Device ◽  
Substitution System ◽  
Printed Text

This paper presents our recent development on a portable and refreshable text reading and sensory substitution system for the blind or visually impaired (BVI), called Finger-eye. The system mainly consists of an opto-text processing unit and a compact electro-tactile based display that can deliver text-related electrical signals to the fingertip skin through a wearable and Braille-dot patterned electrode array and thus delivers the electro-stimulation based Braille touch sensations to the fingertip. To achieve the goal of aiding BVI to read any text not written in Braille through this portable system, in this work, a Rapid Optical Character Recognition (R-OCR) method is firstly developed for real-time processing text information based on a Fisheye imaging device mounted at the finger-wearable electro-tactile display. This allows real-time translation of printed text to electro-Braille along with natural movement of user's fingertip as if reading any Braille display or book. More importantly, an electro-tactile neuro-stimulation feedback mechanism is proposed and incorporated with the R-OCR method, which facilitates a new opto-electrotactile feedback based text line tracking control approach that enables text line following by user fingertip during reading. Multiple experiments were designed and conducted to test the ability of blindfolded participants to read through and follow the text line based on the opto-electrotactile-feedback method. The experiments show that as the result of the opto-electrotactile-feedback, the users were able to maintain their fingertip within a 2mm distance of the text while scanning a text line. This research is a significant step to aid the BVI users with a portable means to translate and follow to read any printed text to Braille, whether in the digital realm or physically, on any surface.

A Real-Time Algorithm for Identifying Gait in a Sensory Substitution System

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamie E. Poole ◽  
Jhon P. C. Casas ◽  
Roberto A. Bolli ◽  
Hermano I. Krebs
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Time Algorithm ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Substitution System

scholarly journals Designing, Implementing And Evaluating A Cross-Modal Sensory Substitution System For The Effective Communication Of The Emotional And Informative Aspects Of Music

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Pouris
Keyword(s):  
Large Data ◽  
Large Data Sets ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Combined System ◽  
Visualization System ◽  
Substitution System ◽  
Music Visualization ◽  
Visualization Systems ◽  
Visual Domain

Visualizations have existed for millennia as ways to communicate information. Visualizations are ubiquitous tools used every day to help navigate cities and aid in learning complex tasks. Tasks are made simpler when applying various visualization methods to large data sets to discover trends that are otherwise difficult to notice. More recently, music visualization systems have been created to convey music in the visual domain; however, they are not based on any psychological model of auditory and visual equivalents. This thesis discusses a music visualization system called MusicViz, which facilitates in the visual communication of the informative and entertainment aspect of music based on psychologically justified translation principals. MusicViz is combined with a vibro-feedback chair called the Emoti-Chair, which translates auditory music to vibrations along the user’s back. The combined system is coined VITA (Visually Immersive and Tactile Animation). A usability evaluation of the VITA showed it is an enjoyable experience.

scholarly journals Designing, Implementing And Evaluating A Cross-Modal Sensory Substitution System For The Effective Communication Of The Emotional And Informative Aspects Of Music

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Pouris
Keyword(s):  
Large Data ◽  
Large Data Sets ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Combined System ◽  
Visualization System ◽  
Substitution System ◽  
Music Visualization ◽  
Visualization Systems ◽  
Visual Domain

Visualizations have existed for millennia as ways to communicate information. Visualizations are ubiquitous tools used every day to help navigate cities and aid in learning complex tasks. Tasks are made simpler when applying various visualization methods to large data sets to discover trends that are otherwise difficult to notice. More recently, music visualization systems have been created to convey music in the visual domain; however, they are not based on any psychological model of auditory and visual equivalents. This thesis discusses a music visualization system called MusicViz, which facilitates in the visual communication of the informative and entertainment aspect of music based on psychologically justified translation principals. MusicViz is combined with a vibro-feedback chair called the Emoti-Chair, which translates auditory music to vibrations along the user’s back. The combined system is coined VITA (Visually Immersive and Tactile Animation). A usability evaluation of the VITA showed it is an enjoyable experience.

scholarly journals Enabling visually impaired people to learn three-dimensional tactile graphics with a 3DOF haptic mouse

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariacarla Memeo ◽  
Marco Jacono ◽  
Giulio Sandini ◽  
Luca Brayda
Keyword(s):  
Visually Impaired ◽  
Vision Loss ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Contact Point ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Scalar Fields ◽  
Sensory Substitution ◽  
Matching Task ◽  
Virtual Objects ◽  
Substitution System

Abstract Background In this work, we present a novel sensory substitution system that enables to learn three dimensional digital information via touch when vision is unavailable. The system is based on a mouse-shaped device, designed to jointly perceive, with one finger only, local tactile height and inclination cues of arbitrary scalar fields. The device hosts a tactile actuator with three degrees of freedom: elevation, roll and pitch. The actuator approximates the tactile interaction with a plane tangential to the contact point between the finger and the field. Spatial information can therefore be mentally constructed by integrating local and global tactile cues: the actuator provides local cues, whereas proprioception associated with the mouse motion provides the global cues. Methods The efficacy of the system is measured by a virtual/real object-matching task. Twenty-four gender and age-matched participants (one blind and one blindfolded sighted group) matched a tactile dictionary of virtual objects with their 3D-printed solid version. The exploration of the virtual objects happened in three conditions, i.e., with isolated or combined height and inclination cues. We investigated the performance and the mental cost of approximating virtual objects in these tactile conditions. Results In both groups, elevation and inclination cues were sufficient to recognize the tactile dictionary, but their combination worked at best. The presence of elevation decreased a subjective estimate of mental effort. Interestingly, only visually impaired participants were aware of their performance and were able to predict it. Conclusions The proposed technology could facilitate the learning of science, engineering and mathematics in absence of vision, being also an industrial low-cost solution to make graphical user interfaces accessible for people with vision loss.

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