7 DOF arm type haptic interface for teleoperation and virtual reality systems

This paper presents a new type of human interface with force feedback attached to an arm, which we named Sensor Arm. The Sensor Arm can be utilized as an interface for interactive communication with the virtual environment and as a master manipulator of a tele-operation system. The number of degrees-of-freedom (DOF) of the Sensor Arm is seven, which is the same DOF of a human arm. Angle and torque of each joint can be measured. Moreover, in this system, force feedback can be realized at each joint of the human arm. To measure human force a new type of force sensor system is proposed in the Sensor Arm system. The structure of the Sensor Arm system and the experimental results are shown