title: Computational intelligence techniques for tactile sensing systems.
abstract: Tactile sensing helps robots interact with humans and objects effectively in real environments. Piezoelectric polymer sensors provide the functional building blocks of the robotic electronic skin, mainly thanks to their flexibility and suitability for detecting dynamic contact events and for recognizing the touch modality. The paper focuses on the ability of tactile sensing systems to support the challenging recognition of certain qualities/modalities of touch. The research applies novel computational intelligence techniques and a tensor-based approach for the classification of touch modalities; its main results consist in providing a procedure to enhance system generalization ability and architecture for multi-class recognition applications. An experimental campaign involving 70 participants using three different modalities in touching the upper surface of the sensor array was conducted, and confirmed the validity of the approach.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electric, Electronic, Telecommunication Engineering and Naval Architecture, DITEN, University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia 11a, 16145 Genova, Italy. paolo.gastaldo@unige.it.
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gastaldo
authors.affiliation: Department of Electric, Electronic, Telecommunication Engineering and Naval Architecture, DITEN, University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia 11a, 16145 Genova, Italy. luigi.pinna@unige.it.
authors.forename: Luigi
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pinna
authors.affiliation: Department of Electric, Electronic, Telecommunication Engineering and Naval Architecture, DITEN, University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia 11a, 16145 Genova, Italy. lucia.seminara@unige.it.
authors.forename: Lucia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Seminara
authors.affiliation: Department of Electric, Electronic, Telecommunication Engineering and Naval Architecture, DITEN, University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia 11a, 16145 Genova, Italy. maurizio.valle@unige.it.
authors.forename: Maurizio
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Valle
authors.affiliation: Department of Electric, Electronic, Telecommunication Engineering and Naval Architecture, DITEN, University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia 11a, 16145 Genova, Italy. unige.it@unige.it.
authors.forename: Rodolfo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Zunino
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D001185:Artificial Intelligence; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D006801:Humans; D008328:Man-Machine Systems; D055617:Micro-Electrical-Mechanical Systems / Q000295:instrumentation*; D010363:Pattern Recognition, Automated / Q000379:methods*; D012371:Robotics / Q000295:instrumentation*; D013314:Stress, Mechanical; D014110:Touch / Q000502:physiology*; D014584:User-Computer Interface