Researchers at MIT and Tianjin University in China have developed software called X-Hinges. It helps people design objects for 3D printing, a way of making solid objects with a printer. These objects can sense movement and respond to people. Users join shapes and choose up to three directions of movement. The software adds small parts to sense movement where the objects bend.
These parts turn bending or pressing into electrical signals. Paths inside the object carry the signals. X-Hinges uses a different material for each job. This keeps the signals clearer and helps the objects measure movement more accurately. The team made a glove for different hand sizes. It sends finger movements to a robot hand. This could help robots learn to pick things up. Other examples include a folding lamp that changes its light when someone pinches it closed. Another device uses touch to recognise objects, such as a banana. A shark-shaped game controller has a tail that moves up and down.
Small differences during printing can make similar objects give different readings. The team uses a computer system with pictures to correct these readings. They hope to build this correction into future versions. Their longer-term aim is to print objects that both sense touch and make movements in one printing process.
