Here we report the new soft sensor “FoamSense” that can measure the deformation state of a volumetric soft object such as compressed, bent, twisted and sheared. This sensor is made by impregnating a porous soft object with conductive ink. The design process of FoamSense is explained. We then summarized the features and basic characteristics of some porous materials for designing these sensors appropriately. We also proposed the potential of using digital fabrication for controlling the carrier structure of FoamSense. Proposed porous structure showed an anisotropic sensor characteristic. We discussed the potential and limitation of this approach. Three possible applications are proposed by using FoamSense. FoamSense supports a richer interaction between the user and soft objects.

Publications:
Satoshi Nakamaru, Ryosuke Nakayama, Ryuma Niiyama, and Yasuaki Kakehi. 2017. FoamSense: Design of Three Dimensional Soft Sensors with Porous Materials. In Proceedings of the 30th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST ’17). ACM, New York, NY, USA, 437-447. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3126594.3126666