| Research Abstract |
This work proposes a new active sensor system (Active Antenna) motivated by insect's antenna. Insects use their antennae skillfully so that they may avoid hitting with objects, while crawling, running, and even staying still. The antenna can be characterized by its "flexibility" and "active motions". Based on these observations on insect's antenna, we newly proposed an active sensor system composing of only four components, an insensitive flexible beam, a position sensor, a torque sensor, and an actuator. We showed this simple sensor system still makes it possible to localize any contact point between the insensitive flexible beam and enviroment by applying an active motion to the beam, while it does not detect any contact point without active motions. The basic working principle was considered not only for straight-lined beam but also curved beam. We found that friction dose not influence on the sensing for the straight-lined beam, while it dose for a curved one. We also considered the effect of environment's curvature on the sensing accuracy. Through precise analysis, we found that the environment's curvature dose not give a large influence on the sensing accuracy as far as the pushing angle is kept small enough. Finally, we designed and developed an active sensor system based on this idea, and verified the working principle by experiments.
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