Motion Tracking Glove for Human-Machine Interaction: Inertial Guidance

Abstract

<p>Impairment of mobility is an issue that negatively affects a large percentage of the general population. A mobile robotic assistive device may be greatly beneficial to many people with mobility issues. The objective was to develop a glove that tracks basic movements of the human hand, such that it can control a distant robotic assistive device for people with limited mobility. In this project the distant robotic assistive device was implemented as a virtual model, controllable with the user’s natural hand movements while wearing a glove that covers the hand and fingers. The glove focused on tracking the most distinct types of relative movements of the hand; orientation, position and finger flexion.</p> <p>This work presents the complete implementation of the first two tracking features: orientation and position. An inertial measurement unit (IMU) was implemented with the use of an accelerometer and gyroscope, to measuring acceleration and angular velocity. The outputs from these sensors were sent to a microcontroller (μC). An algorithm was developed and programmed to the μC to translate the sensor data into information on orientation and position in measurements of attitude and displacement. This information was then used as input to a custom virtual simulation of an assistive device that follows the user’s hand movements, thus establishing accurate inertial guidance.</p>