Researchers at the University of Washington’s Wearable Intelligence Lab have led a project to develop smart gloves that can record signals of pressure to measure the sense of touch.
The goals for the devices are to help physical therapy patients track progress, to teach robots to grasp objects, and more, according to a release from UW.
UW electrical and computer engineering doctoral student Devin Murphy says the glove uses a grid of wires to process signals to create a “heat map” to show where force is being applied.
That data is then recorded to show force being used on different objects.
“I’m particularly excited about how this technology might help patients recovering from an injury.” Murphy said.
“I want to figure out how we can capture the nuances of touch-based interactions, so that ultimately we can get better insights into our daily lives.”
The OpenTouch Glove project collaborated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Multisensory Intelligence Lab.
Learn more about the project at washington.edu.