Transparent data reduction in networked telepresence and teleaction systems. Part I: Communication without time delay

Limited communication resources represent a major challenge in networked tele-presence and teleaction systems. Video and audio compression schemes are well advanced employing models of human perception. In contrast to that haptic data reduction schemes are rather poorly treated in the known literature. This article introduces a novel approach to reduce network traffic in haptic telepresence systems exploiting limits in human haptic perception. With the proposed deadband control approach, data packets are transmitted only if the signal change exceeds a signal amplitude dependent perception threshold. Experimental user studies show that an average network traffic reduction of up to 85% can be achieved without significantly impairing the perception of the remote environment. The assumption throughout this article is that there is no communication time delay.