Using Real Mouse Whiskers as Sensors

Posted 30 Sep 2004 at 21:48 UTC by steve

Last's weeks article on cyborg rats involved a live rat with machine implants. Now we've got a story about a robot called AMouse that uses real mouse whiskers as sensors. Each whisker is attached directly to a capacitor microphone that measures vibrations. The whiskers are sensitive enough to measure acceleration, distinguish textures, and sense disturbances in the movements of air around the robot. The sensors were developed as part of the European IST Artificial Mouse Project. For more details on AMouse and its mouse-whisker sensors, read The Artificial Mouse - A Robot with Whiskers and Vision (PDF format). For an even more detailed description of the capacitor microphone and whisker sensor itself, including a schematic, read An Artificial Whisker Sensor for Robots (PS format).