An optoelectromechanical tactile sensor for detection of breast lumps.

We developed a compact tactile imaging (TI) system to guide the clinician or the self-user for noninvasive detection of breast tumors. Our system measures the force distribution based on the difference in stiffness between a palpated object and an abnormality within. The average force resolution, force range, and the spatial resolution of the device are 0.02 N, 0-4 N, and 2.8 mm, respectively. To evaluate the performance of the proposed TI system, compression experiments were performed to measure the sensitivity and specificity of the system in detecting tumor-like inclusions embedded in tissue-like cylindrical silicon samples. Based on the experiments performed with 11 inclusions, having two different sizes and two different stiffnesses located at three different depths, our TI system showed an average sensitivity of 90.8 ± 8.1 percent and an average specificity of 89.8 ± 12.7 percent. Finally, manual palpation experiments were performed with 12 human subjects on the same silicon samples and the results were compared to that of the TI system. The performance of the TI system was significantly better than that of the human subjects in detecting deep inclusions while the human subjects performed slightly better in detecting shallow inclusions close to the contact surface.

Supporting Negotiation Behavior with Haptics-Enabled Human-Computer Interfaces.

An active research goal for human-computer interaction is to allow humans to communicate with computers in an intuitive and natural fashion, especially in real-life interaction scenarios. One approach that has been advocated to achieve this has been to build computer systems with human-like qualities and capabilities. In this paper, we present insight on how human-computer interaction can be enriched by employing the computers with behavioral patterns that naturally appear in human-human negotiation scenarios. For this purpose, we introduce a two-party negotiation game specifically built for studying the effectiveness of haptic and audio-visual cues in conveying negotiation related behaviors. The game is centered around a real-time continuous two-party negotiation scenario based on the existing game-theory and negotiation literature. During the game, humans are confronted with a computer opponent, which can display different behaviors, such as concession, competition, and negotiation. Through a user study, we show that the behaviors that are associated with human negotiation can be incorporated into human-computer interaction, and the addition of haptic cues provides a statistically significant increase in the human-recognition accuracy of machine-displayed behaviors. In addition to aspects of conveying these negotiation-related behaviors, we also focus on and report game-theoretical aspects of the overall interaction experience. In particular, we show that, as reported in the game-theory literature, certain negotiation strategies such as tit-for-tat may generate maximum combined utility for the negotiating parties, providing an excellent balance between the energy spent by the user and the combined utility of the negotiating parties.

Using Haptics to Convey Cause-and-Effect Relations in Climate Visualization.

We investigate the potential role of haptics in climate visualization. In existing approaches to climate visualization, different dimensions of climate data such as temperature, humidity, wind, precipitation, and cloud water are typically represented using different visual markers and dimensions such as color, size, intensity, and orientation. Since the number of dimensions in climate data is large and climate data needs to be represented in connection with the topography, purely visual representations overwhelm users. Rather than overloading the visual channel, we investigate an alternative approach in which some of the climate information is displayed through the haptic channel in order to alleviate the perceptual and cognitive load of the user. In this approach, haptic feedback is further used to provide guidance while exploring climate data in order to enable natural and intuitive learning of cause and effect relationships between climate variables. Our experiments with 33 human subjects show that haptic feedback significantly improves the understanding of climate data and the cause and effect relations between climate variables as well as the interpretation of the variations in climate due to changes in terrain.

Numerical simulation of nano scanning in intermittent-contact mode AFM under Q control.

We investigate nano scanning in tapping mode atomic force microscopy (AFM) under quality (Q) control via numerical simulations performed in SIMULINK. We focus on the simulation of the whole scan process rather than the simulation of cantilever dynamics and the force interactions between the probe tip and the surface alone, as in most of the earlier numerical studies. This enables us to quantify the scan performance under Q control for different scan settings. Using the numerical simulations, we first investigate the effect of the elastic modulus of the sample (relative to the substrate surface) and probe stiffness on the scan results. Our numerical simulations show that scanning in an attractive regime using soft cantilevers with high effective Q factor (Q(eff)) results in a better image quality. We then demonstrate the trade-off in setting Q(eff) of the probe in Q control: low values of Q(eff) cause an increase in tapping forces while higher ones limit the maximum achievable scan speed due to the slow response of the cantilever to the rapid changes in surface profile. Finally, we show that it is possible to achieve higher scan speeds without causing an increase in the tapping forces using adaptive Q control (AQC), in which the Q factor of the probe is changed instantaneously depending on the magnitude of the error signal in oscillation amplitude. The scan performance of AQC is quantitatively compared to that of standard Q control using iso-error curves obtained from numerical simulations first and then the results are validated through scan experiments performed using a physical set-up.

Simulation of tissue cutting and bleeding for laparoscopic surgery using auxiliary surfaces.

Realistic simulation of tissue cutting and bleeding is important components of a surgical simulator that are addressed in this study. Surgeons use a number of instruments to perform incision and dissection of tissues during minimally invasive surgery. For example, a coagulating hook is used to tear and spread the tissue that surrounds organs and scissors are used to dissect the cystic duct during laparoscopic cholecystectomy. During the execution of these procedures, bleeding may occur and blood flows over the tissue surfaces. We have developed computationally fast algorithms to display (1) tissue cutting and (2) bleeding in virtual environments with applications to laparoscopic surgery. Cutting through soft tissue generates an infinitesimally thin slit until the sides of the surface are separated from each other. Simulation of an incision through tissue surface is modeled in three steps: first, the collisions between the instrument and the tissue surface are detected as the simulated cutting tool passes through. Then, the vertices along the cutting path are duplicated. Finally, a simple elastic tissue model is used to separate the vertices from each other to reveal the cut. Accurate simulation of bleeding is a challenging problem because of the complexities of the circulatory system and the physics of viscous fluid flow. There are several fluid flow models described in the literature, but most of them are computationally slow and do not specifically address the problem of blood flowing over soft tissues. We have reviewed the existing models, and have adapted them to our specific task. The key characteristics of our blood flow model are a visually realistic display and real-time computational performance. To display bleeding in virtual environments, we developed a surface flow algorithm. This method is based on a simplified form of the Navier-Stokes equations governing viscous fluid flow. The simplification of these partial differential equations results in a wave equation that can be solved efficiently, in real-time, with finite difference techniques. The solution describes the flow of blood over the polyhedral surfaces representing the anatomical structures and is displayed as a continuous polyhedral surface drawn over the anatomy.

Force interactions in laparoscopic simulations: haptic rendering of soft tissues.

Research in the area of computer assisted surgery and surgical simulation has mainly focused on developing 3D geometrical models of the human body from 2D medical images, visualization of internal structures for educational and preoperative surgical planning purposes, and graphical display of soft tissue behavior in real time. Conveying to the surgeon the touch and force sensations with the use of haptic interfaces has not been investigated in detail. We have developed a set of haptic rendering algorithms for simulating "surgical instrument--soft tissue" interactions. Although the focus of the study is the development of algorithms for simulation of laparoscopic procedures, the developed techniques are also useful in simulating other medical procedures involving touch and feel of soft tissues. The proposed force-reflecting soft tissue models are in various fidelities and have been developed to simulate the behavior of elastically deformable objects in virtual environments. The developed algorithms deal directly with geometry of anatomical organs, surface and compliance characteristics of tissues, and the estimation of appropriate reaction forces to convey to the user a feeling of touch and force sensations.

Lower limb kinematics during treadmill walking after space flight: implications for gaze stabilization.

We examined the lower limb joint kinematics observed during pre- and postflight treadmill walking performed by seven subjects from three Space Shuttle flights flown between March 1992 and February 1994. Basic temporal characteristics of the gait patterns, such as stride time and duty cycle, showed no significant changes after flight. Evaluation of phaseplane variability across the gait cycle suggests that postflight treadmill walking is more variable than preflight, but the response throughout the course of a cycle is joint dependent and, furthermore, the changes are subject dependent. However, analysis of the phaseplane variability at the specific locomotor events of heel strike and toe off indicated statistically significant postflight increases in knee variability at the moment of heel strike and significantly higher postflight hip joint variability at the moment of toe off. Nevertheless, the observation of component-specific variability was not sufficient to cause a change in the overall lower limb joint system stability, since there was no significant change in an index used to evaluate this at both toe off and heel strike. The implications of the observed lower limb kinematics for head and gaze control during locomotion are discussed in light of a hypothesized change in the energy attenuation capacity of the musculoskeletal system in adapting to weightlessness.

Kinematics and dynamic stability of the locomotion of post-polio patients.

The study reported in this article was conducted to propose a set graphical and analytical tools and assess their clinical utility by analyzing gait kinematics and dynamics of polio survivors. Phase-plane portraits and first return maps were used as graphical tools to detect abnormal patterns in the sagittal kinematics of post-polio gait. Two new scalar measures were introduced to assess the bilateral kinematic symmetry and dynamic stability of human locomotion. Nine healthy subjects and seventeen post-polio patients were involved in the project. Significant increases in the knee extension and ankle plantar flexion of post-polio patients were observed during the weight acceptance phases of their gait. Polio patients also exhibited highly noticeable excessive hip flexion during the swing phase of their ambulation. Using the proposed symmetry measure, we concluded that post-polio patients walked less symmetrically than normals. Our conclusion, however, was based on the bilateral symmetry in the sagittal plane only. Finally, we observed that post-polio patients walked significantly less stably than normals. In addition, weaknesses in lower extremity muscles of polio patients were found to be an important factor that affected stable ambulation.

Presenting joint kinematics of human locomotion using phase plane portraits and Poincaré maps.

Additional graphical tools are needed to better visualize the joint kinematics of human locomotion. Standard plots in which the joint displacements are plotted against time or percent gait cycle do not provide sufficient information about the dynamics of the system. In this article, a study based on the two graphical tools of nonlinear dynamics to visualize the steady-state kinematics of human gait is presented. An experimental setup was developed to acquire the necessary data for application of the techniques. Twenty young adults, whose medical histories are free of gait pathology, were tested. Computerized electrogoniometers and foot switches were used to measure the kinematic data of the lower extremities and capture four instants of the gait cycle: heel strike, foot flat, heel off, and toe off. Phase plane portraits of each joint were constructed for the sagittal plane by plotting angular velocity against angular displacement. Poincaré maps were obtained by periodically sampling the joint profiles at toe off and plotting the ith iterate against the (i + 1)th one. Phase plane portraits are useful in monitoring the variations of joint velocity and position on the same graph in a more compact form. Poincaré maps are effective in differentiating steady gait from transient locomotion.

On the measurement of dynamic stability of human locomotion.

The main focus of the present investigation is the development of quantitative measures to assess the dynamic stability of human locomotion. The analytical methodology is based on Floquet theory, which was developed to investigate the stability of nonlinear oscillators. Here the basic approach is modified such that it accommodates the study of the complex dynamics of human locomotion and differences among various individuals. A quantitative stability index has been developed to characterize the ability of humans to maintain steady gait patterns. Floquet multipliers of twenty normal subjects were computed from the kinematic data at Poincaré sections taken at four instants of the gait cycle, namely heel strike, foot flat, heel off, and toe off. Then, an averaged stability index was computed for each subject. Statistical analysis was performed to demonstrate the utility of the stability indices as quantitative measures of dynamic stability of gait for the subject population tested during the present study.