The Visual Control of Grasping

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

The human hand is a remarkable piece of engineering. We can reach out and grasp objects with exquisite accuracy - far better than any robot yet developed. One of the things that makes this possible is our keen sense of sight. Prof. Mel Goodale and his colleagues at Western’s Brain and Mind Institute are studying how visual information is used in guiding the hand as it reaches out and grasps an object, how previous experience with objects such as tools affects how an object is grasped, how the presence of others with whom we are interacting affects our grasping, and what brain areas are engaged in these different situations. To study how the hand is moving, Prof. Goodale uses special infra-red sensitive cameras to track tiny infra-red lights that have been attached to the fingertips, hand, and wrist. The data from these cameras can then be used to reconstruct the trajectory of the hand and fingers as the grasping movement unfolds.