Workshop II
Tactile display design: from psychophysics of haptic texture to technological considerations.

Duration: Half-day

Organizers
Betty Semail, IRCICA-L2EP, University of Lille
Moustapha Hafez, CEA-LIST, Fontenay aux Roses

Contact:
Betty Semail
L2EP-Polytech'Lille-USTL
59655 Villeneuve d'Ascq, France
E-mail: betty.semail@polytech-lille.fr
Tel.: +33 3 28 76 73 45
Fax: +33 3 28 76 73 41

Lecturers
Betty Semail, (IRCICA-L2EP)
Diane Pawluk, (VCU): "Biomechanical and Neurophysiological Considerations for Portraying Textures.
François Martinot, (IRCICA-LIFL): " Dynamics of the "Lateral motion" EP : a perceptuel rôle"
Moustapha Hafez (CEA-LIST): "Tactile displays: A state of the art and Challenges"
Ramiro Velazquez (LRP) : "A Low-Cost Highly-Portable Tactile Display Based on Shape Memory Alloy Micro-Actuators"
Vincent Hayward (McGill University) and V. Levesques "Laterotactile devices and rendering"

Summary
The design of tactile displays, especially for rough texture simulation, relies on many transdisciplinary studies. The haptic perception requires a good understanding of active touch, of the associated mechanical and neuro-physiological phenomena during the finger-surface contact. Its knowledge is of prime importance to choose the actuator technology of the tactile display, its dimensions, and its control inputs.

The program proposed in this workshop aims at initiating discussions around these several points of view. Authors specialists from the different scientific fields will give some presentations to illustrate the various aspects of the sense of touch. First, the industrial point of view will be given about the importance of the sense of touch, in particular for industrial texture design. Then, some considerations about psychophysics of haptic texture will be described, for thin rough surfaces. Further, the mechanical analysis of the finger-surface contact will be approached according to modelling methods.

All these considerations could help to give a better understanding of touch, and to provide guidelines to stress efficiently the finger pulp with adapted actuators and right control laws. Then, before considering technological point of view, a state of art of the different technologies used for tactile displays will be reminded and some specific displays for particular applications will be described. A design approach for laterotactile devices will be exposed. Finally, a case study for a portable tactile display for visually impaired will be presented.

The workshop is supported by IRCICA: scientific Consortium on hard and soft components from University of Lille.