Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.

Takuya Mori

Teruyuki Takizawa

Jiro Seki

Minoru Kumahara

Takeshi Nakazawa

An input and output operation device includes an actuatorincluding an operation unit; a movable unit having the operation unit and at least one attraction magnet mounted thereon and including a concaved portion in a part thereof; a secured unit including a convexed spherical surface loosely engageable with at least one magnetic member and the concaved portion of the movable unit, the convexed spherical surface being point-contactable or line-contactable with the concaved portion of the movable unit by a magnetic attraction force, the secured unit supporting the movable unit such that the movable unit is freely rotatable as centered around a spherical center of the convexed spherical surface; a first driving unit rotating the operation unit as centered around an X-axis passing the spherical center; a second driving unit rotating the operation unit as centered around a Y-axis perpendicular to the X-axis; a third driving unit rotating the movable unit as centered around a Z-axis that is perpendicular to the X-axis and the Y-axis and is a central axis of the operation unit; and a detector detecting a first rotation angle and a second rotation angle of the operation unit around the X-axis and the Y-axis; and also includes a detection circuit unitgenerating first and second rotation angle signals; a control computation processing unitgenerating first and second target rotation angle signals; and a driving circuit unitgenerating a signal usable to drive the first and second driving units.

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Mie, Japan

Takuya Mori