A Haptic Continuum Interface for the Teleoperation of Extensible Continuum Manipulators

We describe a novel haptic interface designed specifically for the teleoperation of extensible continuum manipulators. The proposed device is based off of, and extends to the haptic domain, a kinematically similar input device for continuum manipulators called the MiniOct. This letter describes the physical design of the new device, the method of creating impedance-type haptic feedback to users, and some of the requirements for implementing this device in a bilateral teleoperation scheme for continuum robots. We report a series of initial experiments to validate the operation of the system, including simulated and real-time conditions. The experimental results show that a user can identify the direction of planar obstacles from the feedback for both virtual and physical environments. Finally, we discuss the challenges for providing feedback to an operator about the state of a teleoperated continuum manipulator.