Microchip's New Digitizer Gives Robot Hands a Faster Sense of Touch

The ATFCD52 reads 52 tactile channels at up to 800 frames a second, so a gripper can catch a slipping object in real time.

Microchip Technology has introduced a chip that gives robot grippers and humanoid hands a faster sense of touch. The ATFCD52 is a high-speed capacitance digitizer that converts signals from fine-grid, two-dimensional capacitive sensor arrays into digital data a processor can act on.

Cameras can locate an object, but they cannot tell a robot how firmly it is holding it, or whether it is starting to slip. The ATFCD52 fills that gap: it reads up to 52 channels, arranged as 32 transmit by 20 receive lines, at frame rates of up to 800 Hz, with capacitance-change resolution below one femtofarad. Twenty parallel analog front ends sit on the chip. From that data an external processor can calculate normal and shear forces, letting the robot detect slip and adjust its grip while the object is still in hand.

The part is aimed squarely at dexterous manipulation, where handling soft, fragile or irregular objects depends on contact feedback as much as vision. It pairs with Microchip's own microcontrollers, microprocessors and FPGAs, and the company also points it at wearables, gaming accessories and data-collecting gloves. An evaluation board, the EV-ATFCD52, and configuration software let customers test sensor designs and log data in real time. The chip is available directly from Microchip or through its distributors. The announcement gave no pricing or sales expectations.