Modeling the data transformations underlying touch sensation to further tactile feedback in neural prosthesis.

The sense of touch is vital to everyday life, yet touch feedback in upper limb prosthesis is limited to vibrating motors on the skin. While touch may one day be recreated with artificial feedback presented through nerves, the transformations that underlie touch sensation must first be better understood. The skin-receptor model described here seeks to understand how skin indentation is transformed into neural pulses bound for the brain.