The texture on leather surfaces act as an important role to control useful functions, such as tactile sensation and anti-fouling technology. The purpose of this paper is to reveal the relationship between physical properties and tactile sensation of leather by considering viscoelasticity and wettability. Storage modulus and loss modulus were used as the viscoelasticity of leathers. Contact angle hysteresis was measured as an index of wettability. Tactile sensation was quantitatively evaluated by function evaluation by using five kinds of leather samples. As the results, it was found that the viscoelasticity affected to both “Softness” (R = -0.98, p = 0.004) and “Moistness” (R = -0.79, p = 0.11), and the contact angle hysteresis affected to “Slipperiness” (R = -0.96, p = 0.009). It was clarified that considering the viscoelasticity and the wettability was needed to express the tactile sensation of leather surfaces. Additionally, lowering the elasticity and viscosity, and flatting the surface were effective to improve the “good touch feeling”

Crosswalk and pedestrian signal are effective for safe road crossing for the sighted persons. However, this system dependent on visual information is a barrier for person with visual impairment, and therefore, customizable alternative methods are required to recondition the restriction. In this study, we developed a portable crosswalk guidance device which can detect crosswalks and signal lights from images acquired from small camera, and mounted on a hand to present information by haptic sensations: vibration and Braille. To assess the haptic interface, the Braille stimulation of conventional projection's and suggested projection's response time are compared. There was no significant difference between tactile projection methods. Vibration alert system was combined to the crosswalk detection system to inform the detected crosswalk condition. A field test on crosswalk search and detection was conducted comparing the number of successful crosswalk detections between passive search with static upper limb posture and active search with arm swing. The number of successful detection were higher by 40% with active searching protocol. Furthermore, detection of the crosswalk position and direction was confirmed to be more effective when horizontally swinging the hand with the device at an effortless speed, approximately 5.7 degrees per seconds.

Hemiplegic patients cannot ground the foot from the heel by foot drop in the gait stance phase. Therefore, the patients develop an abnormal gait because the heel rocker does not function. To solve this problem, we developed the first prototype of a highdorsiflexion upport device using the artificial muscle. However, the responsiveness of the artificial muscle was too slow to support the heel rocker, and resulted the knee bending at stance phase. Subsequently, we developed the second prototype of the high-dorsiflexion support device, which compensates for the responsiveness and supports the ankle rocker using a spring system. We verified the effect of this device on the knee joint in a clinical trial. The results demonstrated that the second prototype was beneficial for preventing buckling.