An Immersive Haptic Wearable Hand Exoskeleton

Design requirements of haptic hand exoskeletons, such as functionality, anthropomorphic movement, ergonomics, and portability, represent significant challenges. In addition, when immersive virtual reality (iVR) is also an objective, complex human-in-the-loop functional specifications are imposed to perceive the virtual environment (VE) without delay. Moreover, aiming at grasping and manipulating objects in immersive VE (iVE) demands force feedback to multiple fingers; thus, a multi-finger hand exoskeleton is required. In this paper, we propose an underactuated haptic two-finger hand exoskeleton that meets the above challenges for grasping and manipulation within an iVE. Three experiments were conducted to test the fingertip tracking and haptic capabilities within fingers’ RoM (Range Of Motion). Results showed that the hand exoskeleton enables contacting virtual objects with two fingers, facilitating manipulation afterward; in addition, free motion inside the iVE is possible due to the wearability of the system.