Translating Adaptive Electro-tactile Stimulation and Communication Mechanism into a Smart Electro-Braille for Enhancing Health and Wellbeing of the Blind and Visually Impaired
Recently, an increasing research effort in substituting touch sensation for haptic/tactile rendering has shown that electrical stimuli can effectively deliver a significant amount of information about patterns
and physical properties of stimuli such as texture, geometry, contour, movement, pressure, elasticity, etc; thus, ample research supports the notion that electrical stimuli through an electrode array are a
viable means for delivering tactile sensory information. This mechanism, is also called electro-tactile. In this talk, our research pertains to investigation of the ability to induce high performance touch sensations on the fingertip skin using electro-tactile mechanism. An adaptive electro-tactile stimulation scheme is then proposed and developed for this purpose, including modeling of fingertip bioimpedance, on-line sensing/identification of the bioimpedance parameters, dynamical characterization of the bioimpedance parameters through a custom-built constant-voltage-driver (CVD) based electro-tactile system, and load-aware stimulation current control. The results and findings from our research is currently translated into assistive and rehabilitation engineering applications, especially to an innovative neuroprosthetic system for the Blind and Visually Impaired (BVI), called smart electro-Braille (E-Braille), which will dramatically enhance health and wellbeing of BVI in the future.
Bio: Yantao Shen received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical and Automation from The Chinese University of Hong Kong. He was a research associate in the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, Michigan State University. He joined the University of Nevada, Reno, in 2008 and currently is an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Biomedical Engineering. Dr. Shen has published more than 90 papers in professional journals and conference proceedings and is an inventor on 4 U.S. patents. He was also a finalist of Best Vision Paper Award at IEEE International
Conference on Robotics and Automation in 2001, a finalist of Best Paper Award of the 2007 16th IEEE International Symposium on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, and a winner of the T. J. Tarn Best Paper Award at IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Biomimetics in 2009. Currently, his research interests lie in the areas of bioinstrumentation, bio-mechatronics/-robotics,
visual tracking and servo systems, smart sensors and actuators, sensorized micro/nano systems, and haptic/tactile interfaces. Dr. Shen is a member of Sigma Xi and IEEE. He currently serves as Associate Editors of several major conferences of the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society.
Friday, February 14, 2014 at 2:00 pm to 3:00 pm
Davidson Math and Science Center, 102
1055 Evans Avenue, Reno, NV 89512, USA
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Electrical and Biomedical Engineering, College of Engineering, Mechanical Engineering
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