Butterfly Haptics - magnetic levitation haptic interfaces
As multimodal interfaces are one important factor for Augmented, Mixed and Virtual Reality, the developments in this field need to be traced carefully. One recent interface I came across is the Butterfly Haptics.
According to the Butterfly Haptics WebSite it can be described as follows:
Maglev haptics
Butterfly Haptics has taken a different approach to providing a 6-DOF user interface. We have eliminated all the mechanical complexity in favor of a single moving part levitated by magnetic fields. The user’s handle is rigidly attached to a lightweight "flotor" that floats between stators with permanent magnets providing strong magnetic fields. The position and orientation of the flotor is tracked by optical sensors. As the user moves the handle through its motion range in 6 DOFs, position information is sent to the user’s application. Conversely, forces and torques are sent to the handle from the user’s application.
Maglev haptics provides the highest resolution and highest position and force bandwidths of any known method. There is an essentially direct electrodynamic connection between the computer and the hand, conveying gross force and torque effects to the proprioceptive sensors as well as subtle vibratory effects to the skin sensors. The high performance comes at the expense of a small workspace. For many haptic applications, scaling, indexing, and rate control methods can be used to effectively overcome this limitation.
Further information see: