Optical HMI with biomechanical energy harvesters integrated in textile supports

This paper reports the design, prototyping and experimental validation of a human-machine interface (HMI), named GoldFinger, integrated into a glove with energy harvesting from fingers motion. The device is addressed to medical applications, design tools, virtual reality field and to industrial applications where the interaction with machines is restricted by safety procedures. The HMI prototype includes four piezoelectric transducers applied to the fingers backside at PIP (proximal inter-phalangeal) joints, electric wires embedded in the fabric connecting the transducers, aluminum case for the electronics, wearable switch made with conductive fabrics to turn the communication channel on and off, and a LED. The electronic circuit used to manage the power and to control the light emitter includes a diodes bridge, leveling capacitors, storage battery and switch made by conductive fabric. The communication with the machine is managed by dedicated software, which includes the user interface, the optical tracking, and the continuous updating of the machine microcontroller. The energetic benefit of energy harvester on the battery lifetime is inversely proportional to the activation time of the optical emitter. In most applications, the optical port is active for 1 to 5% of the time, corresponding to battery lifetime increasing between about 14% and 70%.