A vibrotactile feedback user interface for haptic teleoperation of aerial robots

Force feedback haptic teleoperation interfaces have recently been found to considerably improve operator performance in control of aerial robotic vehicles. Existing interfaces are based on kinesthetic principles and are limited in the information they can provide to the operator about the motion of the vehicle and the structure of the local environment. In this paper, we present a novel vibrotactile joystick interface for providing haptic feedback to communicate information about an UAV's flying environment to pilots and enable safe navigation through cluttered environments. Experiments on human perception of vibrotactile haptic cues were conducted to evaluate various vibrotactile stimuli and design an effective information modulation scheme. This modulation scheme was then utilised in user study experiments to assess the effectiveness of vibrotactile feedback in representing environments. The results demonstrated promising potential of the proposed vibrotactile joystick as an effective haptic interface to communicate environment information to pilots of aerial robots.