MSGID: 1:317/3 63f6ebeb   
   PID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
   TID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
    Hands-free tech adds realistic sense of touch in extended reality    
    Tactile bracelet and 'pseudo-haptic' visuals make virtual touch more   
   believable    
      
     Date:   
         February 22, 2023   
     Source:   
         Rice University   
     Summary:   
         Researchers have demonstrated a new hands-free approach to   
         convey realistic haptic feedback in virtual reality (VR). Their   
         'multisensory pseudo-haptics' uses a combination of headset visuals   
         and tactile feedback from a wrist bracelet to convey sensations   
         of touch.   
      
      
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   FULL STORY   
   ==========================================================================   
   With an eye toward a not-so-distant future where some people spend most   
   or all of their working hours in extended reality, researchers from Rice   
   University, Baylor College of Medicine and Meta Reality Labs have found   
   a hands-free way to deliver believable tactile experiences in virtual   
   environments.   
      
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Users in virtual reality (VR) have typically needed hand-held or   
   hand-worn devices like haptic controllers or gloves to experience tactile   
   sensations of touch. The new "multisensory pseudo-haptic" technology,   
   which is described in an open-access study published online in Advanced   
   Intelligent Systems, uses a combination of visual feedback from a VR   
   headset and tactile sensations from a mechanical bracelet that squeezes   
   and vibrates the wrist.   
      
   "Wearable technology designers want to deliver virtual experiences that   
   are more realistic, and for haptics, they've largely tried to do that   
   by recreating the forces we feel at our fingertips when we manipulate   
   objects," said study co-author Marcia O'Malley, Rice's Thomas Michael   
   Panos Family Professor in Mechanical Engineering. "That's why today's   
   wearable haptic technologies are often bulky and encumber the hands."   
   O'Malley said that's a problem going forward because comfort will become   
   increasingly important as people spend more time in virtual environments.   
      
   "For long-term wear, our team wanted to develop a new paradigm,"   
   said O'Malley, who directs Rice's Mechatronics and Haptic Interfaces   
   Laboratory. "Providing believable haptic feedback at the wrist keeps the   
   hands and fingers free, enabling 'all-day' wear, like the smart watches   
   we are already accustomed to."  Haptic refers to the sense of touch. It   
   includes both tactile sensations conveyed through skin and kinesthetic   
   sensations from muscles and tendons. Our brains use kinesthetic feedback   
   to continually sense the relative positions and movements of our bodies   
   without conscious effort. Pseudo-haptics are haptic illusions, simulated   
   experiences that are created by exploiting how the brain receives,   
   processes and responds to tactile and kinesthetic input.   
      
   "Pseudo-haptics aren't new," O'Malley said. "Visual and spatial illusions   
   have been studied and used for more than 20 years. For example, as you   
   move your hand, the brain has a kinesthetic sense of where it should be,   
   and if your eye sees the hand in another place, your brain automatically   
   takes note. By intentionally creating those discrepancies, it's possible   
   to create a haptic illusion that your brain interprets as, 'My hand has   
   run into an object.'  "What is most interesting about pseudo-haptics is   
   that you can create these sensations without hardware encumbering the   
   hands," she said.   
      
   While designers of virtual environments have used pseudo-haptic illusions   
   for years, the question driving the new research was: Can visually driven   
   pseudo- haptic illusions be made to appear more realistic if they are   
   reinforced with coordinated, hands-free tactile sensations at the wrist?   
   Evan Pezent, a former student of O'Malley's and now a research scientist   
   at Meta Reality Labs in Redmond, Washington, worked with O'Malley and   
   colleagues to design and conduct experiments in which pseudo-haptic   
   visual cues were augmented with coordinated tactile sensations from Tasbi,   
   a mechanized bracelet Meta had previously invented.   
      
   Tasbi has a motorized cord that can tighten and squeeze the wrist, as   
   well as a half-dozen small vibrating motors -- the same components that   
   deliver silent alerts on mobile phones -- which are arrayed around the   
   top, bottom and sides of the wrist. When and how much these vibrate and   
   when and how tightly the bracelet squeezes can be coordinated, both with   
   one another and with a user's movements in virtual reality.   
      
   In initial experiments, O'Malley and colleagues had users press virtual   
   buttons that were programmed to simulate varying degrees of stiffness. The   
   research showed volunteers were able to sense varying degrees of   
   stiffness in each of four virtual buttons. To further demonstrate the   
   range of physical interactions the system could simulate, the team then   
   incorporated it into nine other common types of virtual interactions,   
   including pulling a switch, rotating a dial, and grasping and squeezing   
   an object.   
      
   "Keeping the hands free while combining haptic feedback at the wrist with   
   visual pseudo-haptics is an exciting new approach to designing compelling   
   user experiences in VR," O'Malley said. "Here we explored user perception   
   of object stiffness, but Evan has demonstrated a wide range of haptic   
   experiences that we can achieve with this approach, including bimanual   
   interactions like shooting a bow and arrow, or perceiving an object's   
   mass and inertia."  Study co-authors include Alix Macklin of Rice,   
   Jeffrey Yau of Baylor and Nicholas Colonnese of Meta.   
      
   The research was funded by Meta Reality Labs Research, and Macklin's work   
   was supported by a National Science Foundation training grant (1828869).   
      
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   ==========================================================================   
   Story Source: Materials provided by Rice_University. Original written   
   by Jade Boyd. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.   
      
      
   ==========================================================================   
   Journal Reference:   
      1. Evan Pezent, Alix Macklin, Jeffrey M. Yau, Nicholas Colonnese,   
      Marcia K.   
      
         O'Malley. Multisensory Pseudo‐Haptics for Rendering Manual   
         Interactions with Virtual Objects. Advanced Intelligent Systems,   
         2023; 2200303 DOI: 10.1002/aisy.202200303   
   ==========================================================================   
      
   Link to news story:   
   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/02/230222141144.htm   
      
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