Guillermo Garrido |
Edinburgh (United Kingdom) (EFE).- Researchers at the University of Edinburgh have created the first intelligent electronic skin, which brings machines closer to humans by providing them with a sense of their own movement, perception of space and a response to stimuli external similar to living beings.
Led by doctors Yunjie Yang and Francesco Giorgio-Serchi, scientists from the Scottish university have managed to develop sensor technology that makes it possible to replicate the ability of living beings to perceive or feel their own body movement, called proprioception.
As if it were a nervous system, “with the different sets of electrodes located on the surface of the robot we can capture the information on movement and deformation in different positions,” Dr. Yang explained to EFE.
An electronic skin with 3D perception and movement
“We have microchannels formed by liquid metals, which conduct the response of the different sensor electrodes to a processor, which controls the collection of signals from the electronic skin”, he continues.
That is where “the information from the electronic skin is encoded and the useful information related to the movement of the body is extracted, which will be transmitted to a computer,” says Yang, who details that “by means of automatic learning, 3D perception is obtained and the movements.”
“Until now, there is no technology that can provide real-time movement and tactile information,” says the researcher, so the experience in Edinburgh makes them “pioneers.”
This advance opens up a range of “movement control methods in soft robotics” with various potential applications in the future.
From surgeries to virtual twins
The technology being developed by the University of Edinburgh’s SMART research group is safer than conventional robots and can be used in more hostile environments, facilitating more complex tasks.
The first of the applications from which it can benefit is the manufacturing industry: “Robots obtain sense of their own movements, such as pressure and touch information, useful for handling fragile objects” explains the researcher.
In this direction, smart electronic skin could be used in the healthcare sector.
A virtual version of the human body
“With movement and tactile feedback, it would give the doctor more precise control, closer to the level of a magnifying glass” with a surgical robot, Yang says, something they are already working on with a prototype endoscope, along with the Council of British Medical Research.
Within the lines of research is the use of this dermis in underwater robots. With it, it would be easy to “provide complete movement information (…) useful for control and complex tasks”, compared to optical cameras “which have a difficult time capturing movement and figures in the water”, he explains.
Another of its potential future uses is in artificial intelligence: giving life to copies, virtual twins in the metaverse, once connected to mobile devices.
Thanks to its ability to transmit movement information in real time, “we can provide parameters related to health and obtain a more accomplished virtual version of the human body,” says Yang.
Digitize emotions and interactions
“By using these devices in the real world, we will be able to record our emotions and interactions with different humans, and then transmit that information to the digital world,” says the researcher.
But the opposite path would also be possible: “Interactions in the digital world between different digital humans can be sent through the electronic skin to the human body in the physical world.”
So in the future, with the skin developed by Dr. Yang and Giorgio-Serchi, “we will be closely connected between the digital world and the physical world.”