• Journal of the Institute of Electronics Engineers of Korea SC
• /
• v.47 no.4
• /
• pp.55-60
• /
• 2010

Rodents can recognize objects by using their whiskers. Not only rodents but also mammals use their whiskers to recognize objects. However, rodents can discriminate surface roughness in micrometer resolution throughout their whisker sensing. Rats can distinguish an target object's shape, roughness and surface pattern by moving their whisker back and forth freely. Mechanoreceptors surrounding the whisker in their follicle measure deflection and vibration of the whisker. In this paper, we designed biomimetic whiskers modeling rodent whiskers and showed the characteristic properties to extract the information of surface roughness.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
• /
• v.4 no.1
• /
• pp.34-42
• /
• 2009

Rodents, specially rats, can recognize distance and shape of an object and also pattern of the textures by using their whiskers. Mechanoreceptors surrounding the root of whisker in their follicle measure deflection of the whisker. Rats can move their whisker back and forth freely. This ability, called active whisking or active sensing, is one of characteristics of rat behaviours. Many researches based on the mechanism have been progressed. In this paper, we test a simple and accurate method based on deflection of the whisker: we designed biomimetic whiskers modeling after a structure of follicle using the microphone. The microphone sensor measures a mechanical vibration. Attaching an artificial whisker beam to the microphone membrane, we can detect a vibration of whisker and this can show the deflection amount of whisker indirectly.