A touch rendering device in a virtual environment with kinesthetic and thermal feedback

This paper presents a haptic device that has been conceived to render both kinesthetic and thermal sensations computed from operator interaction with a 3D virtual environment. Computer simulation is based on a precise modeling algorithm of the thermal exchange between a bare finger and an object. The rendering is based on a closed loop control of both temperature and thermal flow signals. Each module composing the overall device and the rendering process are thoroughly described. We show that the whole system exhibits good technical performances in 3D multimodal interactive simulation