Sympathetic Haptics

Haptics is the process of simulating the sense of touch using computer. Sympathetic haptics is a method of transmitting the sense of touch to another person. This technology that transmits the sensation of touch over the Internet has been developed by engineers in the Virtual Reality Laboratories at the University at Buffalo (UB) in 2003. The conjoint words `sympathetic haptics’ which means “having the ability to feel what another person feels,”

Sympathetic haptics captures the sensation of one user and repeat it in such a fashion that the second user re-lives it in exactly the same way as the original user intended it to be. It can be used to improve training, collaboration and communication in such varied fields as medicine, engineering and art, distance learning and telemedicine. Another benefit of the technology is its ability to capture for future replay and continual instruction the sensation of an activity after it’s been transmitted. Touch is the ‘missing link’ in today’s multimedia tools and that is what this technology allows probably to provide.