We split the achievements of TouchDesign along two lines of research: (1) computational models of touch and (2) touch synthesis methods.
** Computational models of touch:
The work has addressed several levels of granularity, building bottom-up from fundamental contact and deformation mechanics to high-level interaction.
- Fundamental modeling of multi-scale deformation [Casafranca and Otaduy 2022, Chan-Lock et al. 2022].
- Computational efficiency of contact mechanics. TouchDesign has pioneered the development of reduced-order deformation models for contact, integrating machine-learning methodologies [Romero et al. 2021, 2022, 2023].
- Covering full-body biomechanical contact models. TouchDesign has created the first realistic physics-based models that integrate the skeletal structure of the body with soft skin deformation and reaction to contact [Romero et al. 2020, Santesteban et al. 2020, Tapia et al. 2021, Ramón et al. 2023].
- Connection between contact-touch and high-level cognition [Tapia et al., under review].
- Understanding of the impact of biomechanical models on interaction algorithms [Sorli et al. 2021, Lobo and Otaduy 2020].
** Touch synthesis methods:
The project has explored a broad set of applications where touch-oriented design is highly relevant, in the context of both virtual reality and real-world touch.
- Optimization-based synthesis for tactile haptics [Verschoor et al. 2020].
- Optimization-based synthesis for ultrasound haptics [Barreiro et al. 2019, 2020, 2021].
- Optimization-based synthesis for glove haptics [Tong et al. 2023].
- Touch synthesis for touchscreens [Torres et al. 2021].
- Utilization of computational touch models for hand tracking [Mueller et al. 2019, Wang et al. 2020].
- Modeling of high-resolution cloth deformations [Sánchez-Banderas et al. 2020, Pizana et al. 2020, Casafranca et al. 2020, Sperl et al. 2022].
- Synthesis of cloth deformation for virtual try-on. TouchDesign has pioneered the design of learning-based cloth-body simulation models for virtual try-onSantesteban et al. 2019, 2021, 2022a, 2022b].
- Design of soft real-world devices, for soft robotics [Tapia et al. 2020] and for scoliosis braces [Koutras et al., under review].