Bone Conduction As Sensory Feedback Interface: A Preliminary Study

Non-invasive sensory feedback is a desirable goal for upper limb prostheses as well as in human robot interaction and other human machine interfaces. Yet many approaches have been studied, none has been broadly deployed in upper limb prostheses. Bone conduction has the potential to excite an effect known as osseoperception and therefore provides a novel sensory interface. This paper presents the preliminary results of our study into the temporal parameters of a sensory feedback interface utilizing vibrotactile stimulus onto the ulnar olecranon representing a non-invasive sensory feedback interface. Three different tests are performed to establish the characterizing parameters of the interface; perception threshold, sensation discrimination and reaction time. Our results are similar to the results obtained for invasive bone conduction. The perception threshold for lower frequencies is small and therefore allows using small transducers with low power consumption. The sensation discrimination shows comparable results as reported in existing literature as well as the reaction time for the amputee is within the same range.