Active Antenna with Quartz Resonators as Force Sensor and Recognition of Environment by Use of Active Antenna

Abstract

Recognition of an environment using tactile sensing plays an important role in the field of robotics. An active antenna, based on the concept of an insect antenna, has been suggested as a suitable tactile sensor for use in recognition of an environment in recent years. A robot sensor, such as an active antenna, usually coexists with an actuator which generates electrical noise. Accordingly, it is a requirement that the sensor is insensitive to the noise. A force sensor using a quartz resonator is inherently insensitive to noise because the output is a frequency shift. This paper deals with the application of a quartz resonator to a force sensor built into an active antenna for use in recognition of the environment, and confirms that a quartz resonator is useful as a sensor to acquire information about the contact.