The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 21, 2010
Filed:
Jul. 22, 2005
Gary A. Zets, Winter Park, FL (US);
Thomas H. Ensign, Winter Park, FL (US);
Frank D. Chapman, Winter Park, FL (US);
Bruce J. P. Mortimer, Winter Park, FL (US);
Gary A. Zets, Winter Park, FL (US);
Thomas H. Ensign, Winter Park, FL (US);
Frank D. Chapman, Winter Park, FL (US);
Bruce J. P. Mortimer, Winter Park, FL (US);
Engineering Acoustics, Inc., Casselberry, FL (US);
Abstract
A vibrotactile transducer provides a point-like vibrational stimulus to the body of a user in response to an electrical input. The apparatus includes a housing held in contact with the skin and a moving mechanical contactor protruding through in an opening in said housing and preloaded into skin. The contactor is attached to a torroidal moving magnet assembly suspended by springs in a magnetic circuit assembly consisting of a housing containing a pair of electrical coils. The mass of the magnet/contactor assembly and the compliance of the spring are chosen so that the electromechanical resonance of the motional masses, when loaded by a typical skin site on the human body, are in a frequency band where the human body is most sensitive to vibrational stimuli. By varying the drive signal to the vibrotactile transducer and activating one or more transducer at specific location on the body using an appropriate choice of signal characteristics and/or modulation, different information can be provided to a user in a intuitive, body referenced manner.