<title>Force feedback system using magneto-rheological fluids for telerobotic surgery</title>

Abstract

Force feedback is a new technology that has great potential in human-machine interfaces. While guiding the end effector of a robot through an environment using a hand-held actuator, force feedback is needed to make the user feel the environment conditions like stiffness along which the end effector moves. This along with the already available visual feedback will allow the user to guide the robot exactly along the path that he or she intends thereby enhancing the performance. Easily controllable actuators that give quick response at the user end are needed here. This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of MR fluid devices in such force feedback applications. The force-feedback experiment includes a simple setup that depicts a typical situation wherein a user controls the movement of an external linear hydraulic actuator using a MR sponge damper. Force and displacement sensors sense the environment conditions along which the end effector of the hydraulic actuator moves. This information is then used to control the MR damper to provide appropriate force feedback to the user. The setup is tested with different environments like springs with various stiffnesses and for extreme cases with mechanical stops thereby demonstrating the flexibility in using MR sponge dampers for various force feedback applications.