Design and development of a virtual reality locomotion simulator .

摘要

The development and application of virtual reality systems have been extensively studied and implemented for the past two decades. A variety of virtual reality locomotion simulators have been developed and are being used for specific purposes. Our research was focused on developing a multipurpose virtual reality locomotion simulator which could be presented as a test bed for research in the fields of biomechanics and neuromechanics.;In order to interface human motion into a virtual reality environment, an array of position sensors were tested; namely rotary position sensors, i.e., optical encoders, potentiometers, and electromagnetic sensors. Rotary position sensors yielded promising results at a lower cost without compromising the accuracy in simulating human motion in the virtual world/model.;An Omni direction treadmill virtual reality locomotion simulator was developed and integrated with virtual world/environment. In the real world, a treadmill facilitates motion only in one direction. To interact with and explore a three dimensional (3-D) virtual world a rotary platform was designed and constructed. A proportional, derivative, and integral (PID) control algorithm was implemented to have a desired velocity during turning motion in the virtual world.