This book covers all topics relevant for the design of haptic interfaces
and teleoperation systems. The book provides the basic knowledge
required for understanding more complex approaches and more importantly
it introduces all issues that must be considered for designing efficient
and safe haptic interfaces. Topics covered in this book provide insight
into all relevant components of a haptic system.
The reader is guided from understanding the virtual reality concept to
the final goal of being able to design haptic interfaces for specific
tasks such as nanomanipulation.
The introduction chapter positions the haptic interfaces within the
virtual reality context. In order to design haptic interfaces that will
comply with human capabilities at least basic understanding of human
sensors-motor system is required. An overview of this topic is provided
in the chapter related to human haptics. The book does not try to
introduce the state-of-the-art haptic interface solutions because these
tend to change quickly. Only a careful selection of different kinematic
configurations is shown to introduce the reader into this field.
Mathematical models of virtual environment, collision detection and
force rendering topics are strongly interrelated and are described in
the next two chapters. The interaction with the virtual environment is
simulated with a haptic interface. Impedance and admittance based
approaches to haptic robot control are presented. Stability issues of
haptic interaction are analyzed in details and solutions are proposed
for guaranteeing stable and safe operation. Finally, haptic interaction
is extended to teleoperation systems. Virtual fixtures which improve the
teleoperation and human-robot cooperation in complex environments are
covered next and the last chapter presents nanomanipulation as one
specific example of teleoperation.
