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When you reach out and touch a corduroy blanket, grab your car keys, or flip a light switch, you effortlessly know what you're touching and how to grab or manipulate it without needing to look or listen. This isn't the case with many modern touchscreen or virtual reality interactions, which can replicate the image of objects and buttons but not the tactile feel. This lack of haptic feedback makes our virtual interactions flatter, less realistic, and more difficult to control. 

 

Our research focuses on the actuation and perception of broadband tactile cues for enhanced interactions with haptic displays and virtual reality. We take inspiration from real world touch interactions to develop efficient methods for displaying rich and realistic haptic sensations through a variety of displays. 

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Haptic Touchscreens

Friction-modulating touchscreens create the illusion of touching bumps, edges, and textured surfaces by rapidly changing the friction coefficient between the screen and a user’s finger.

Further effects can be generated through embedded vibrotactile actuators responsive to hand movement. 

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Haptic Wearables

Research Platforms

Virtual reality headsets provide rich visual and auditory stimuli, but little or no haptic feedback. Our lab works with a variety of custom and commercial wearable haptic devices that provide vibratory and pressure feedback during virtual and mixed reality interactions.

Refreshable Pin Arrays

Large refreshable braille displays allow blind and low-vision users to not only read braille, but also create raised-line drawings and animations. We are collaborating with computer science researchers to pair a high density, multi-height pin display with hand and tool tracking for novel tactile drawing interactions. 

Dr. Friesen 

Assistant Professor, Mechanical Engineering, Texas A&M University 

Research Interests: 

  • Surface haptic displays

  • Haptic wearables for extended reality

  • Human-machine interaction

  • Tactile perception

  • Biomechanics of skin

Find Us

600 Discovery Drive

College Station, Texas 77845

Our parking is limited. Travel options: 

  • Bus #03 "White Creek 2" stop

  • Bike & Scooter 

  • Visitor Parking in Lot 100

Contact Us

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