Happy Haptics: Haptic Feedback for Robot-Assisted Endoscopy
Team: Maysarah Sukkar, Yousif Alhajji, Benjamin Pedi, Lily Snow, Kaedin Kurtz
Course: ME571 Medical Robotics, Boston University
Overview
Robotic endoscopy separates the surgeon from what the instrument touches. Research consistently shows that force you can feel guides the hand more accurately than force you can only see. Happy Haptics sends contact forces from a mock endoscope to a pneumatic sleeve on the operator's arm, restoring a sense of touch.
System Design
Sensors:
IMU with built-in temperature sensing, for scope orientation
Force-sensitive resistor, for contact force
Infrared time-of-flight sensor, for proximity detection
Processing: A Teensy 4.0 fuses the IMU data with a complementary filter. It auto-calibrates at startup and tracks the scope's pose with quaternions relative to the starting position.
Actuation: A soft pneumatic sleeve inflates in proportion to contact force. A DC pump and solenoid valve drive it through a dual H-bridge, chosen so pump speed can be varied later.
Display: An LCD shows live sensor values, with serial plotting available for detailed data.
Results
In the team NASA-TLX evaluation, physical demand was low across all users. The main issues were sleeve sizing, especially for larger hands, and slow passive deflation, which weakens the max-pressure warning. The detailed paper on this system is below, as well as the video:
Next Steps
Deflate the sleeve actively with vacuum.
Add flex sensing in the sleeve for adaptive pressure limits.
Upgrade to a 9-DOF IMU for absolute orientation.
Replace the IR sensor with ultrasonic or lidar for richer environment sensing.
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