Hi Everyone,
At the interdepartmental group of Hand Surgery and Rehabilitation at the Erasmus MC (Rotterdam) we are currently in the process of developing a hand dexterity test for use in rehabilitation. We think the space navigator (SN) could potentially be used as a device to perform such a test.
There are many disorders in which hand function is affected. To asses hand function there exist a variety of tests. These tests are used to evaluate the progress of disease or fatigue, the success of interventions like hand surgery or exercise programs. In our research we want to investigate the ability of subjects to control the direction of finger force(s) for precise movements in particular directions. Since the Space Navigator (SN) is a 6D feedback device we think it could be an ideal measurement tool to test hypothesis about specific deficits in directional control in patient populations. Of course many technical details such as, sensitivity, calibration, orthogonality of the Navigator signals need to be addressed, before we are certain such a test could be performed reliably.
Since I am not a developer (learing the SDK and or C++ is not really an option for me (I do know Matlab very well though)), I was wondering whether some people could help us out with the following:
Calibration program for the device: Since we are interested in hand function we would like to know hand and finger motions related to certain output of the SN. For all 6 df we would like to know how motion around or along an axis (in degrees rotation or mm displacement for translations) is related to output generated by the SN. So I would need a program in which I can make a recording of SN output in real time (6 channels) while performing certain standard movements on the SN. Output saved in an ascii file or so.
This would yield calibration curves (hope the device is more or less linear) given a particular setting of the device sensitivity (from control panel).
But perhaps these calibration curves already exist? Help?!
Another question I had is what the calibration button does in the control panel. Does it just subtract baseline activity in all the channels or does it do something else.
I would be most grateful if somebody could help me with these issues.
Best regards,
Harm
Using spacenavigator as device for measuring hand dexterity
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harmslijper
- Posts: 6
- Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 6:08 am
- Location: rotterdam
Sounds like an interesting project.
Some of our demos write a constant stream of values to stdout (HIDTest in particular). Using the shell, you can redirect that to a file that Matlab can parse. HIDTest is available on our ftp site. BTW, Matlab may have support for our devices directly integrated into it. Contact them.
Our devices are not laboratory instruments. There is some variance in manufacturing. You'll have to calibrate each device to each installation. You would have to develop response curves for each device through some sort of calibration program, like joysticks use. I.e., push all the way to one direction, record the values. Push/twist/etc along each direction.
The devices report displacement away from a rest position. The calibrate button resets that rest position to the current position of the device. Normally this is used when the device was away from its physical center position when it started up (e.g., if something was resting on it). Each device is basically a set of springs. They have a natural rest position.
Jim
3Dx Software Development
Some of our demos write a constant stream of values to stdout (HIDTest in particular). Using the shell, you can redirect that to a file that Matlab can parse. HIDTest is available on our ftp site. BTW, Matlab may have support for our devices directly integrated into it. Contact them.
Our devices are not laboratory instruments. There is some variance in manufacturing. You'll have to calibrate each device to each installation. You would have to develop response curves for each device through some sort of calibration program, like joysticks use. I.e., push all the way to one direction, record the values. Push/twist/etc along each direction.
The devices report displacement away from a rest position. The calibrate button resets that rest position to the current position of the device. Normally this is used when the device was away from its physical center position when it started up (e.g., if something was resting on it). Each device is basically a set of springs. They have a natural rest position.
Jim
3Dx Software Development