Recently, drone technology has developed rapidly, expected to play an active part in various fields. Especially, in the field of surveying and monitoring, the usefulness in the indoor and the farm is high, and reproducibility about drone flight indoors is regarded as important. Drone flight in an indoor environment had a problem that it was difficult to secure a stable flight posture and flight route due to the bounce of the wind at the wall and the low ceiling. On the other hand, in this research, I propose a new monitoring method using circular orbit and a customized drone. By connecting the drone with the orbit installed on the ceiling, it is possible to perform highly reproducible patrol work by flying along the circular orbit. In the experiment, a stable flight route was secured, and it was confirmed that it was useful as a monitoring method. Experimental results have shown the effective of the proposed method.

Climbing stairs with loading luggage in living environment is still a difficult task for a robot. In this paper, we explained about the distance relationship between the rotation axis and the contact point when rotating the mechanism using the involute curve and demonstrated climbing stairs using involute curve quadruped robot attached involute-curve-shaped mechanism.

In order to move and inspect concrete walls, we developed a wall moving robot using vacuum pads. This is a robot that walks on a wall while alternately attaching two vacuum pads. It has five degrees of freedom and can move both walls and between other surfaces. This time, the control method of the previously manufactured robot was improved. As a result of the experiment, parallel movement, rotation movement, and movement between other planes were performed. Therefore, it was confirmed that the assumed moving method can be performed.

Wall mobile robots are often used for inspection. However, the inspection location is not only flat, but also curved like a tunnel. It is difficult for conventional wall mobile robots to move inside a curved surface. Therefore, we have developed a robot that uses a vacuum pad that moves inside a curved surface.This is a robot that moves while attaching three vacuum pads alternately. As a result of the experiment, we were able to flat wall movement, turn, movement and curved surface movement.

Nuclear power plants store low level radioactive waste in drums. Since this drum can is stored for a long time, there is a risk that the contents will leak due to rust and crack. However, since the gap between the stored drum and drum is too narrow, it is impossible for a person to check the scratches on the surface of the drum. So, I made a robot that moves through the narrow gap of the drum. This robot sticks to the side of the drum with a magnet and can move. In addition, this robot has multiple joints and arms and can move across the gap of the drum can like a snake using a crawler. I made this robot and performed experiments.

Operation of the omnidirectional mobile robot is more difficult as compared with the operation of a general mobile robot that controls two degrees of freedom, because it is required to control three degrees of freedom. On this point of view, we have developed a new control device for omnidirectional mobile robot that can be operated by foot, not by hands. By operating with foot, operator can use his hands for another task. A sphere is used as the device operated by the foot. By rotating the sphere in each axis direction, it is possible to control robot motion that has three degrees of freedom, a velocity vector of the robot and an angular velocity around the body.

The omnidirectional motion can move any direction without changing the direction of its own. The authors have developed Wave-wheel mechanism and Screw-type differential rotating mechanism. Also, the stepping performance were improved by extending the ground point from point to line. In addition, we have evaluated the motion characteristics of one ciliated wheel mechanism. In this paper, we examined the composition for vehiclization. In the vehicle configuration, the minimum necessary two units are arranged in parallel. We conducted experiments using actual mechanisms and confirmed that the inventive principle is also effective for vehicle construction, omnidirectional motion.

A gibbon moves between branches by brachiation. This is a fast, dynamic movement that uses the torso as a pendulum and utilizes gravity. Among them, brachiation including aerial phases is faster than normal and can catch farther branches. Such brachiation is called ricochetal brachiation. In this paper, in order to realize brachiation including the aerial phase, we make a robot with symmetrical structure, and perform ricochetal brachiation experiments using the real robots. We used the torque time series we made to do normal brachiation. In addition, based on the torque time series, we realized ricochetal brachiation with a real machine.

In this paper, we have proposed the outer tube holding mechanism of Two Degree-of-Freedom(2-DOF) wheel. Robot needs three or four Omni wheels and Mecanum wheels to move omnidirectionally with conventional systems. The conventional wheels have some problems such as slippage and vibration. We have developed 2-DOF wheel, the omnidirectional moving system with only one wheel. The developed wheel has a drivable outer tube around the outer ring of the wheel, however, the tube tended to drop off from the outer ring when the outer tube rotates to move to the lateral direction. Therefore, we proposed a holding mechanism to prevent dropping off for the outer tube. The mechanism has held the tube effectively and the frequency characteristic of the straight tube is measured in the experiment.

By utilizing series elastic element for the jumping motion, it becomes possible to increase the energy input time and store the kinetic energy as elastic energy. Therefore, a higher jump height can be expected. In the aerial attitude control by exerting the joint torque, repeated jumping with a small number of degree of freedom is possible. In this study, we describe the landing attitude control in a 1-DOF robot using a series elastic component by exerting the joint torque aiming at repeated jumping. we optimize the torque time series, starting from the air and performing a series of movements from landing to jumping.

Because the rotating mobile robot itself rotates, It is difficult to fix the viewpoint of the camera when moving and keep looking in a specific direction. However, when operating remotely in an environment where the robot cannot be seen directly, such as at a disaster site, Mounting the camera is essential. Therefore, it is necessary to fix the viewpoint of the camera in the rotating mobile robot. Currently, there is a projection method that places a spherical camera at the center of the sphere. How much the spherical camera interferes with the robot body. In addition, because the viewpoint fixation process is performed after projection, traditional viewpoint fixation methods cannot be processed in real time. It is not suitable for remote control of robots that require real-time properties. As described above, since the conventional method is not applied to fix the viewpoint of the camera of the rotating mobile robot, I need a new solution. In this research, we propose a new viewpoint fixation method to solve the above problem.

The authors have proposed a crawling like locomotion robot, whose body shapes an arc, with an inner wobbling mass, and it is investigated that the body rotation gives a propulsion according to the body shape. In this paper, we analyze the propulsion effect of an asymmetric shape in the forth-back direction of the body through numerical simulations. First, we introduce the mathematical model of a crawling like locomotion robot with a reaction wheel, the body shape is asymmetric in the forth-back direction. Second, we derive the equation of motion and the control. Third, we discuss the propulsion effect of the asymmetric shape of the body with simulation results. Fourth, we analyze the effect of the position of the center of mass and the driving frequency of the reaction wheel.

General industrial robot arms adopt no-backdrivable gear reducers, which can maintain its posture with low electric power. On the other hand, for a collaborative robot, the compliance is required. To achieve both high compliance and posture maintenance, switchable backdrivability is required. 1st report of this study showed that vibration enables to switching backdrivability of a planetary gear reducer. To select the vibration actuator, this report clarifies switching conditions: tooth number of the fixed gear, and tooth number difference between fixed and output gear. In the experiments, switching backdrivability occurred if the tooth number difference was 1, and the planetary gear was more likely to backdrive if the tooth number of the fixed gear was smaller. Moreover, we observed the behavior of the output shaft during backdriving. We found that the output shaft speed of the planetary gear converged, and that the output shaft stopped when the vibration was stopped.

In this paper, the static analysis of the (2-RRU-URR) parallel mechanism is described. This mechanism was designed for thumb rehabilitation therapy and this mechanism is an overconstrained mechanism. Furthermore, this mechanism performs two rotational and one translational degree of freedom (DOF) from the configuration of joints. Each DOFs are assisted for the thumb finger joint. The static analysis method was presented based on the overall jacobian, which is obtained by constraint analysis of the mechanism based on the screw theory. Finally, the calculation of the static analysis of the proposed mechanism is described with the numerical example and its results are discussed.

Shock mitigation mechanism is important because mechanical parts can be broken by high acceleration from impact. Springs and dampers are often used, however, the impact is transmitted to the body. To reduce the body velocity for small impact, the mechanism exchanging the momentum from the body to damper-mass has been proposed. On the other hand, mechanical singularity is effective way to avoid the impact transmission. This paper proposes a 1-DOF shock mitigation mechanism inspired by break-fall in Judo. The mechanism exchanges momentum without control system and avoids impact transmission by sequential singular configurations. The first singularity occurs when the center-rod lands, and the second occurs when a weight hits ground. Hitting ground also releases energy by the same way as break-fall in Judo. Through the experiment using a high-speed camera, momentum exchange and avoidance of impact transmission are evaluated.

The purpose of this study is to propose a method of distributing elastic energy stored in one spring to realize multi-DOFs mechanical load compensation equipment using linear spring. In previous studies, many compensation mechanisms have been realized, for example, Mechanical Gravity Canceller (MGC) is one of the mechanism, which is applied to the load compensation equipment with one-DOF. When MGC is applied to the load compensation equipment with multi-DOFs, the spring to compensate load must be housed for each link, and compensates individually. Therefore, if the load has changed, all of spring must be adjusted elastic energy individually according to the angle of the links. Though, the total elastic energy to compensate load depends on the gravitational energy of load. Hence in this study, the method is devised that adjusting the total elastic energy for the gravitational energy of load and then distributing elastic energy for each link.

We have been studying 6-DOF non-contact object manipulation technique that uses multiple air jets driven by pan / tilt actuators. In this paper, we challenge endless horizontal rotation of the floating object which consists of multiple balls linked by thin lines each other. The optimal number of spheres is clarified, the kinematics of the air jet platform are calculated as a parallel link mechanism, and a control method of the air jet platform is proposed.

A singularity free mode changes of a redundantly driven two limbs six-DOF parallel robot ATARIGI is proposed in this paper. The parallel robot has multiple solutions to the inverse and forward kinematics. By changing postures from one solution to another, the parallel robot can expand its workspace. Conditions that ATARIGI loses redundancy but keeps the non-singularity are derived. Using the conditions, singularity free mode changes that the bending direction of the elbow (over and under) of each limb and direction of the gripper (up and down) can be achieved. By the combination of the singularity-free mode changes, ATARIGI switches its postures between ”the elbows-over and gripper-down, suitable posture for the bottom working area,” and ”the elbows-under and gripper-up, suitable for the upper working area.”

In this paper, a Jacobian matrix normalization and an optimal design method for two limbs redundantly actuated six-dof parallel robot “ATARIGI” are proposed. When using the kinematic performance index, the Jacobian matrix must be normalized because the matrix contains elements in non-uniform physical units. The Jacobian matrix of ATARIGI with different types of actuators is normalized based on the thrust and torque ratio between the linear actuator and the motor. The normalized Jacobian matrix is divided into the thrust and the torque elements then the isotropy of the hand is evaluated. Separating the elements makes it possible to compare the isotropic of the manipulating force ellipsoid of the thrust and the torque on the hand. Optimization of the thrust and the torque ratio of the actuators enables a design that well-balances both the thrust and the torque isotropy of the hand.

Various researches are conducted to reduce the influence of winds and waves for safer work environment on offshore operations and to negate the tilt due to acceleration of vehicle for improved comfortableness. Conventional researches have adopted active mechanism like six-degree-of-freedom parallel mechanism that absorbs the sway by constantly keeping its motion base horizontal to suppress such influences. However, current swing machines require vast areas to be installed since their swing mechanisms are large and their bottom structures are thick. Here, we propose a new swing mechanism “Omni-Swing” which is relatively thin and can be applied to curved surfaces. The mechanism is embodied to a real machine and experiments are conducted to verify its basic characteristic in this paper.

We aim to develop a micro robot with skeletal muscle cells as a driving source. In order to design a muscle cell robot, it is necessary to appropriately set the arrangement and direction of tissues, cells, and collagens to as scaffold protein. In this study, we intend to control the shape and internal structure of a muscle cell robot by self-organization of muscle cells with geometric constraints, pins and molds. We confirmed that utilizing of pins and the mold contributes to the orientation of the gel during cell differentiation.

In recent years, attention has been focused on soft actuators, especially dielectric elastomer actuators. DEA has a structure in which a dielectric is sandwiched between flexible electrodes. The performance of DEA depends on the dielectric. Generally, silicon rubber or acrylic rubber is used for the dielectric. When using these materials, the DEA typically requires significant stress during the initial stages of elongation and must be pre-stretched using a rigid frame. This rigid frame limits design and movement, and limits the range of DEA applications. Therefore, we focused on a dielectric material called a slide ring material. SRM can be stretched with low stress during the initial stages of elongation, therefore DEA which has SRM as dielectric can deform largely without pre-stretch. In this paper, a bending unit is developed using DEA with SRM, and its movement is confirmed by experiment.

Many soft robots are inspired by flexible creatures. In particular, inchworm can move in various environments even if its structure and locomotion pattern is quite simple. Real inchworm has two main types of movement mechanism, forward movement and steering movement. Many of the previous studies have achieved forward movement, but not steering movement. Therefore, this study developed steerable inchworm soft robot. In this study, we introduced an electro-conjugate fluid (ECF) as power source. The ECF is a kind of functional fluid, which produces a flow (ECF flow) when subjected to high DC voltage. Since it only requires a tiny electrode pair in micrometer order to generate the ECF flow, the ECF is a smart fluid pressure source. Finally, we developed the soft robot that can move 8 mm and steer 15 °in 10 seconds.

In order to apply soft actuators to extreme environments, the actuators mainly composed of polyimide (PI) was developed. Previous PI film actuators had problems with the life of repeated operation and the difficulty of manufacturing. To solve these problems, a soft actuator was fabricated by using a heat compressed air molding of PI films. By pressing the heated PI film against a mold, the film is transformed into the shape of the mold. After molding, the three sides of a pair of PI films are welded to fabricate an air chamber, and the chamber is connected to a pipe. The relationship between applied air pressure, bending angle under no-load condition, and generating torque of actuator was evaluated. From these results, possibility of using the actuator for end effectors was shown.

A soft robot hand made of flexible materials is one of the most promising research subjects since it can grasp an object safely and gently. In order for the robot hands to grasp objects with various shapes, it is necessary to achieve various grasping postures. A previous research reports the grasping postures can be classified into 33 types. Some of them are known to involve finger flexion and adduction, suggesting that the fingers should have flexion and adduction for dexterous grasping. In conventional robot hands, flexion and adduction of fingers have been realized by arranging a DC motor with reduction gear at each joint. However, in the next generation soft robot hand, a completely new mechanism is required to make the finger flexion and adduction possible. For this reason, we developed a dexterous soft robot hand that can realize various grasping postures with flexion and adduction motions.

This paper describes the development of a redundant manipulator using pneumatic rubber artificial muscle.Manipulator is expected to be used in many situations such as nursing care and service robots as robots enter the living environment in recent years.Thus, manipulators must be safe and adaptable to complex environments in which obstacles must be avoided.In this study, we develop a flexible and safe redundant manipulator with structural flexibility.The redundant manipulator has series structure of units which is having two degrees of freedom.The unit operates by the deformation of the bending type pneumatic rubber artificial muscle caused by the application of air pressure.However, it has nonlinearity and hysteresis, and is difficult to control.We proved using neural network to control unit have nonlinearity and hysteresis is effective.

PCI method intentionally induces cure inhibition, and realizes a flexible joint mechanism. PCI method makes sub-millimeter thick layer of silicone oil by cured an addition reaction silicone in a mold made with an ultraviolet curing type 3D printer. In this paper, we describes a results of a survey conducted on the characterization of silicone oil layer generated by PCI method, and states that PCI method is useful for tendon driving of soft robots from the results.

Recent years, Soft-robots are attracting attention as being used around people because it is safe and environmental adaptable from its flexibility. We developed it with fewer rigid parts than previous soft-robots. It is deformed itself and rolls when driving this robot because this robot flame made of bending-type-artificial-muscle that is bend when air pressure is applied. In this paper, we proposed a way to control this robot. After that, we tried to drive this robot with small compressor mounted. As a result, also we couldn’t run with a road, we could control the robot without road.

Ionic Polymer-Metal Composites (IPMC) can be driven at low voltage, have good responsiveness, and can perform soft motion likely to living creatures. In this paper, we propose a new fabrication method for IPMC soft robot, named contact mask method, in order to improve its design flexibility. This method requires only one step to fix a ion-exchange membrane with contact masks. Then effectiveness of this method is demonstrated through fabricating a starfish-type IPMC soft robot. Finally, we comfirmed independent driving of soft robot arm is possible by applying voltage individually to the divided electrodes.

To realize an arm-type bridge inspection system, a flexible and lightweight vibration suppression mechanism is required. In this study, we proposed vibration suppression mechanisms using the friction of the string, measured the angle change during bending, and confirmed how quickly the posture was stabilized. We proposed a tendon-type and cloth-type vibration suppression mechanism. Bending experiments were performed with nothing attached to the joint and with a tendon-type or cloth-type vibration suppression mechanism attached to the joint, and the angle change was calculated from the acceleration. By adding the tendon-type and cloth-type vibration suppression mechanisms, vibration suppression effects of 40% and 45%, respectively, were obtained.

Flexible electrostatic adhesive device with double layered electrode pattern was developed successfully to improve adhesive characteristics. The adhesive force for the electrostatic adhesive devices with the different electrode arrangement patterns was verified in the experiment. The experimental results showed that their adhesive force was improved approximate 1.5 times, comparing with the previous model. In addition, it showed that there was a difference in the adhesion force depending on the polarity arrangement of the lower electrode and the upper electrode. The flexible electrostatic adhesive device is useful for a practical tool to handle a target object.

In this paper, we focus on pinching motion using soft fingers with polyurethane bend sensors. First, in order to unify the control time until the soft fingers touch the object to be grasped, trajectory tracking control was introduced and the control performance was evaluated. Control was possible with an error of about 0.2m⁻¹. After realizing stable grasping by trajectory tracking control, we measured the relationship between the curvature difference of each finger and the orientation of the gripping object. Based on the above relationship, the orientation of the object was actually controlled. As a result, orientation control is possible with an error of about 1 degree.

The purpose of this research is to develop a robot hand that holds tableware. The conditions for the robot hand to grasp tableware were to adapt to the object, to have a high frictional force even under water or oil and to slide the environment. We create a robot hand using the friction controllable surface developed in previous research. The friction control surface obtains high friction in any state of dryness and reduces friction by a lubricant. First, we created a robot finger and verified the performance of the surface structure. Using robot fingers, we created a three-fingered hand and performed a gripping experiment.

It is difficult to grasp the posture of the soft robot arm since they have low rigidity and high degree of freedom and bend in various directions and positions. So the development of a method to grasp the posture is desired. In this study, we proposed a method of estimating the bending angle and the bending direction by arranging three optical fibers on a soft robot arm and measuring the amount of light attenuation by bending each optical fiber. We experimentally confirmed its practicality, and confirmed that the proposed method can estimate the approximate bending angle and the approximate bending direction.

This study suggests a pneumatic actuator that is shortened by the inside vacuum pressure, and a soft gripper that coils itself around objects such as a rubber band. The actuator is a soft tube that contains laminated sponges interleaving hard sheets between the sponges. Evacuation of the inside air shrinks the sponges and shortens the actuator. The suggested gripper is a ring-shaped one composed of the actuator. By evacuating the inside air, the diameter of the ring decreases and it coils itself around objects of various shapes. The minimum diameter of the gripper after evacuating the inside air is approximately one sixth of the original one. This study examines the shrink property and holding force of the gripper.

In this research, a new kind of soft robotic hand design was proposed to hand the food like Sushi which is easy to crumble. This soft robotic hand is made of silicon which can ensure the safety and controlled by air pressure to grab the food. This hand is controlled by micro controller Arduino, and the hand was installed distance sensors and contact sensors, so this soft robotic hand can grab the soft food like Sushi and drop the food gently by an appropriate force to the target place. By this method, the food can be safety and keep the shape. Furthermore, this research also is expected can process some simple tasks to grab the food and even more complicate task like making sushi like chief and setting the Sashimi on the rice.

The Full-Body Tactile Sensor was developed to sense how contacts are there on Soft Robot. This tactile sensor has been researched by previous members in lab, it has structure with silicone as skin and acrylic pipe as bone. These previous sensors use image processing and marker tracing for analyzing a state on deformation. However, it is difficult for this system to analyze large deformations with occlusion correctly. Then it was proposed that using machine learning for this sensor, and it was work well with low resolution. The main purpose of this research is developing improved sensor with more versatility base on previous researches. So, I research about using machine learning to analyze contact points and displacement with less calculation and high resolution than previous one. The basic method to analyze deform information is machine learning using camera image as input, contact information as output. In this paper, I describe about this method and its experiments.

In nature, flying animals such as insects display great flight performances with high stability and maneuverability even under the unpredictable disturbances in the wake of the buildings or vegetation. Unlike man-made mechanical systems like drones, insects realize flapping wing motion by their flexible musculoskeletal system. In this study, the robustness of the flapping wing flyer under lateral wind is researched with the specific focus on the mechanical link between the left and right wing of the flapping mechanisms that is confirmed in the thorax of insects. It is found that the extra torque generated by external disturbances can be suppressed by the appropriate stiffness of torsion spring, while the leading edge and the link with unsuitable stiffness lead to the decrease of robustness. These results point out the importance of the mechanical design of the flapping wing mechanism in insects and insect-inspired flying robot.

Recently, soft robotics has become a very popular, and many robots have been developed. In our previous work, we developed a soft inflatable robot. This robot can grow horizontally, turn by yaw-axis bending and climb a wall by pitch-axis bending. In this paper, we conducted some experiments to evaluate the growing and bending abilities of our robot. Experimental results confirm that we can control the horizontal and vertical growing length and bend radius with yaw-axis bending. High inner pressure enables our robot to grow longer and climb higher. Our robot can make curve shapes whose radii are 160mm or more. These abilities contribute to increasing varieties of applications of our robot.

In this study, the soft manipulator using McKibben artificial muscles has been developed. This manipulator is capable of bending, contracting and twisting motions by artificial muscles arranged in axial and oblique directions around the rubber rod. Because the soft manipulator is composed of only flexible materials, it has high flexibility and shape adaptability. However, due to friction between fibers and between fibers and rubber tube of the artificial muscle, it has a dead zone and hysteresis.

In this report, a new structure of the soft manipulator that eliminates the rubber rod and increases the volume ratio of the actuator by integrating the artificial muscle with rubber was proposed. By this new structure of the manipulator, the dead zone, hysteresis, and bending and contracting motion characteristics were improved.

A spiral air gripper is a pneumatic robot gripper that coils an expandable tube around objects of variable shapes. The elastic tube is covered by an extensible fabric, which restricts the expansion of the diameter when the elastic tube elongates due to the inside air pressure. The expandable tube of the coil-shaped gripper is enlarged by approximately three times the diameter of the coil when the inside air pressure of the tube is increased. By releasing the inside air, the diameter of the coil is reduced, and it wraps itself around objects tightly. This simple structure makes it easy to develop grippers that can hold large objects, such as furniture.

In this study, we are developing a work assist system using Augmented Reality (AR) using a hyperspectral camera. In recent years, spectral information has been used to analyze agricultural products. In the analysis, it is expected that the understanding of the analysis will be improved by comparing it with human visual information such as RGB images. Thus, it is effective to extend the spectral information as AR to the visual environment. However, various corrections are required to convert spectral information into RGB images. In this paper, we introduced rotational blur correction and color correction, and conducted on-site verification. The improvement of the problem in crop analysis is examined by this.

The pulse oximeter needs to come into contact with the skin during measurement. Therefore, long-term measurement places a heavy burden on the patient. Many non-contact oxygen saturations using cameras have been studied. However, switching by high-speed blinking cannot catch up with the response of the image sensor. Therefore, we thought that the accuracy of the camera measurement could be improved by measuring the LED constantly. In this study, we propose a spectroscopic measurement method using a cold mirror as a means of measuring blood oxygen saturation. In the experiment, we report the results of pulse wave measurement on the reflection side and the transmission side of the mirror and the tendency of oxygen saturation change due to breath holding.

Elderly people are increasing every year, and the demand for nursing care is also increasing. There is urination problem of elderly person in the care spot. The reason is that it is difficult to express intention, and the time that the patient can endure after urinating due to aging muscle weakness is short. To solve this problem, I thought it was necessary to measure urine volume in the bladder. In this study, we measure urine volume in the bladder from the change in phase when radio waves pass through water. In this paper, we measure the phase change when a radio wave transmitted from a moving antenna passes through a plastic bottle filled with water using a phase detection circuit, and show the results and discussion.

This paper proposes a new Strobe Imager that can make us to observe the high speed periodic motion of living things by naked eyes. The system is composed of miniature compressor, magnetic valve for controlling the periodic air puff, and LEDs for visualization by naked eye. This new version enables us to change the frequencies and duty factors independently for air puff and LED strobe, so that we can tune up the best condition for observing the dynamics of human skin, for example. This report shows the basic design and structure of the system and show a couple of experimental results.

This research report describes a new flexible whisker sensor. The sensor consists of the ion gel strain gauge. In addition, we have designed a pick up circuit for strain gauge. The experimental result shows us a possibility that estimation of deflection angle.

In food industry, autonomous food arrangement is expected. For the achievement of safety food arrangement by robots, in order to prevent from damaging food, rigidity of the hands is hopeful to be adjusted according to the food stiffness. Measurement of the food stiffness should be estimated before handling. In this research, we propose non-contact stiffness measurement with ultrasound to enable variable rigidity of hands while food handling is ongoing.

We measured power spectrum of ultrasound reflected on food. As the result of the experiment, the spectrum varied according to the stiffness.

To perform fast and precise tooth inspection, a portable gear surface diagnosis system using laser sensor was developed in previous research. While the accuracy and practicality of the system has been proved, the inspection process using magnet stand as setting device can be time-consuming. Hence this study aims to improve the efficiency of the laser sensor setting process between different gears using the portable gear surface diagnosis system. Our proposed setting device utilizing a manipulator mounted with a laser sensor head to control the sensor's position. The method to derive angles of manipulator joints was studied. With supporting software, the posture can be automatically derived using our calculation model according to gear parameters. Therefore, the placement of laser sensor became faster and the efficiency of our portable system improved.

In this study, we propose an evaluation method by measuring the reflected ultrasound from the skin surface to examine the accuracy of the focal position. In the proposed method, we assume that the fingertip exists as the irradiation target inside the workspace of the ultrasonic tactile display and evaluate the validity of the presentation based on the received intensity of a single receiving element. In this paper, the reflected wave when irradiating focused ultrasonic waves to a sphere imitating a fingertip is formulated based on a geometric model at first. Then, the received intensity when the focus is scanned is measured by experiments, and the validity of the proposed method is shown.

This paper explains the motion analysis using a new scope of human manipulability sharing (SoHMS). The new SoHMS is composed of a depth sensor and a head-mount-type VR system, which can provide a human manipulability ellipsoid evaluated at the hand/foot to a user in real time. The user can select one of digital human models, and can measure EMG signals (maximum 4 ch) as needed. A set of basic experiments was carried out for the motion task of the spear throwing and shot put by the right arm in order to validate the developed SoHMS.