Elbow Angle Guidance System Based on Surface Haptic Sensations Elicited by Lightweight Wearable Fabric Actuator

The demand for wearable haptic devices has rapidly increased for various applications. However, many haptic devices interfere with the wearer’s activities and movements. In addition, several haptic devices fail to elicit intuitive haptic sensations by adjusting to the natural posture of the wearer. To address these issues, we propose an elbow angle guidance system using a lightweight wearable fabric actuator. The proposed actuator is made of fabric and has two McKibben-type artificial muscles attached to it, rendering it extremely lightweight and facilitating the delivery of surface haptic sensations to intuitively induce elbow extension and flexion. The surface haptic sensation elicited by the fabric actuator is adjusted to natural body movements without interfering with the wearer’s movements. Moreover, the proposed system measures and guides the elbow angle by changing the intensity of the surface haptic sensation delivered to users in real time. The accuracy of the proposed system is demonstrated through experiments involving human participants.