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Meet the robots at Reading: Haptic Master

Demo of the Haptic Master in action; a multi-sensory robotic arm that allows users to explore different textures in 3D virtual reality environments.

In this video Andrew Glennerster and Peter Scarfe explain how the Haptic Master, a multi sensory robotic arm, enables the user to explore the texture of different surfaces whilst navigating through the 3D computer simulation of a ‘haptic’ maze.

Peter explains why he became interested in haptics and explains how the Haptic Master, based in the Virtual Reality Lab in the School of Psychology at Reading is used in collaborative research with William Harwin’s Haptics Robotics Lab. He explains that although engineers and psychologists have different skills sets they are interested in similar questions.

The collaboration between the two groups is opening up new and exciting possibilities with the engineers designing, modifying and building haptic robotic devices that enable the psychologists to probe further into the function of the human brain.

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