A two-axis tactile sensor with 1μm diameter tip of contactor for detection ability of micro region surface texture

摘要

This paper reports development of tactile sensor with a fine tip of contactor has been developed for detection of micro region surface texture. Since human's fingertip can discriminate surface texture finer than 1μm, it is considered that a higher resolution of tactile sensors is required for quantification of tactile sense. Tip diameter of contactor of this device is designed as 1μm to realize higher spatial resolution than previous tactile sensor with 200μm diameter tip. Design of suspension structures and piezoresistive detection circuits is optimized in order to obtain a higher sensitivity and suitable contact pressure for micro region tactile sensing. Measured sensitivity of surface shape is about 2mV/μm at a 10V supply voltage, which is enough for sub-micron shape detection. The device in this study have realized a high spatial resolution which is similar to a stylus surface profiler (DEKTAK8).