Magnetoinductive skin for robots

Abstract

A flexible tactile imaging skin for robots based on magnetoinductive technology is proposed. This skin would be inexpensive and suitable for use either as a sophisticated imaging device or as a simple on/off tactile sensor. In the proposed design the skin would consist of a thin flexible magnetoinductive array with the sensor elements .5 mm apart covered on each of its two sides by a sheet of rubber and a row of flat wires etched on a Kapton film. I/O's should be easily accessible and the system's electronics should be simple. It would be able to be trimmed to size. The skin is expected to bend around a 25.4 mm radius. Linear pressure and compression relationships are expected over a 8 bit dynamic range. Cross talk between sensor elements should be nonexistant; and the system should be low power (.25 W/cm <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> ) and high speed. The array would be electronically tunable over a 10/1 range in pressure and spatial sensitivity.