5G is the next generation of mobile internet connectivity. It offers speeds 10 to 20 times faster than today's 4G networks, with much faster download and download speeds, higher bandwidth, and more stable connections. This will allow us to do everything we currently do with our mobile devices faster, including streaming 4K live video and downloading movies in an instant. However, the speed and capacity of 5G also opens up new possibilities with other connected devices, including real-time interaction in a way that has never been possible before. One of the most interesting is tactile or haptic communication, which involves transmitting physical contact over a distance.
What is touch internet?
The touch-sensitive Internet will allow the sense of touch to be transmitted over long distances, with or without visual feedback, which was previously impossible due to the amount of data required and the need for low-time connections. Latency for real-time interaction. It has the potential to make augmented and virtual reality much more immersive, to help remote-controlled machines become more precise, to open up new avenues of healthcare, and to offer new ones. Educational opportunities - and this is just a start.
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How does it work?
One of the biggest challenges of the tactile Internet is creating a sensation of pressure on the skin without a physical surface. There are several ways to achieve this, one of the most promising being highly focused sound waves. The British company Ultrahaptics has developed a system that uses ultrasound to produce haptic feedback in flight. Your equipment includes ultrasonic transducers (small high-frequency speakers), individually controlled to create different sensations on the skin. If you can't imagine this, think about how you can feel the bass in your body during a loud concert. These transducers are coupled to a depth camera, allowing the system software to detect the position of your hand and react accordingly. A VR display or headset can provide accompanying audio and visuals, making a virtual object tactile. Microsoft is developing another form of haptic feedback, which uses vortex rings of air. Like the Ultrahaptics technology, the hardware is similar to a speaker diaphragm, but in this case, air is pushed through a small hole that turns it into a focused ring that can travel 8.2 feet with a 4-inch resolution: much less accurate than the ultrasound system, but at a much greater distance. Augmented reality has already taken off in the areas of design and engineering, and the tactile Internet would allow workers to interact more directly with their creations. Virtual objects will feel more robust, and with the reduced latency of 5G, previously disconnected commands will feel tangible to the user.
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How can it be used?
One of the first uses of the touch-based Internet will undoubtedly be in gaming, allowing players to feel the virtual environments they interact with, but it also has much broader potential. One of the most important applications of the tactile internet is medicine. Once 5G goes mainstream, people living in isolated communities may have access to care that would have required hours of travel. This will include real-time consultation via telepresence, but thanks to the touch-sensitive internet, treatment regarding remote-controlled robotics will also be possible. Thanks to 5G, remote robots will not only be controlled over long distances, but doctors will be able to receive tactile feedback that will help them work more precisely. For example, the touch of the Internet could allow a surgeon to feel the pressure applied with a remote-controlled scalpel, or an osteopath to manipulate a joint to help a patient recover from an injury. The touch of the Internet, powered by 5G, also has the potential to improve the lives of people with disabilities. Until now, braille smartphones have rarely evolved beyond conceptual schematics due to the difficulty of creating a surface that can physically change shape on the fly, recreating the necessary patterns of raised dots. With tactile internet and haptic technology, Braille telecommunications could be much easier, as the emitters produce "bumps" that can be felt and altered in seconds.
Image credit: g-stockstudio / Shutterstock (Image: © g-stockstudio / Shutterstock) With Augmented Reality (AR), the tactile internet will also find uses in industry. For designers and engineers, this will allow them to manipulate 3D models in virtual space with greater precision. Companies like Volvo are already experimenting with Microsoft Hololens and Google Glass to make complex assembly on the production line easier, and the addition of haptic feedback could make work even easier and partly safer. provide tactile warnings if a component is out of place and make interactions easier. With the instructions presented in the field of vision of the workers. For car manufacturers, the touch-sensitive Internet will also make it easier for drivers to stay on the road. It will be many years before fully autonomous cars become widespread, and the popularity of large touchscreen infotainment systems means that modern cars are full of potential distractions. With the touch-sensitive Internet, drivers can interact with in-car systems with touch alone, without putting down the screens or controls. The possibilities are almost endless. If a task currently involves audio or video communication, the touch-enabled Internet could add an extra layer of interaction.