Pressure Sensor: State of the Art, Design, and Application for Robotic Hand

Table 1

Relative merits and demerits of various tactile sensor types [17].

Type	Merits	Demerits
Resistive	(i) Sensitive; (ii) Low cost	(i) High power consumption; (ii) Generally detect single contact point; (iii) Lack of contact force measurement
Piezoresistive	(i) Low cost; (ii) Good sensitivity; (iii) Low noise; (iv) Simple electronics	(i) Stiff and frail; (ii) Nonlinear response; (iii) Hysteresis; (iv) Temperature sensitive
Tunnel effect	(i) Sensitive; (ii) Physically flexible	(i) Nonlinear response
Capacitive	(i) Sensitive; (ii) Low cost; (iii) Availability of commercial A/D chips	(i) Hysteresis; (ii) Complex electronics
Optical	(i) Physically flexible; (ii) Sensitive; (iii) Fast; (iv) No interconnections	(i) Loss of light by micro bending chirping; (ii) Power consumption; (iii) Complex computations
Ultrasonic	(i) Fast dynamic response; (ii) Good force resolution	(i) Limited utility at low frequency; (ii) Complex electronics; (iii) Temperature sensitive
Magnetic	(i) High sensitivity; (ii) Good dynamic range; (iii) No mechanical hysteresis; (iv) Physical robustness	(i) Suffer from magnetic interference; (ii) Complex computations; (iii) Somewhat bulky; (iv) Power consumption
Piezoelectric	(i) Dynamic response; (ii) High bandwidth	(i) Temperature sensitive; (ii) Not so robust electrical connection
Conductive rubber	(i) Physically flexible	(i) Mechanical hysteresis; (ii) Nonlinear response