PolyTouch: A Robust Multi-Modal Tactile Sensor for Contact-rich Manipulation Using Tactile-Diffusion Policies

PolyT ouch: A Robust Multi-Modal T actile Sensor for Contact-rich Manipulation Using T actile-Diffusion Policies Jialiang Zhao 1, Naveen Kuppuswamy 2, Siyuan Feng 2, Benjamin Burchfiel 2, Edward Adelson 1 This paper has been nominated for the Best Paper A ward at ICRA 2025. Figure 1: (a) PolyTouch is a robot finger that combines tactile, acoustic, and peripheral vision sensing. Abstract -- Achieving robust dexterous manipulation in unstructured domestic environments remains a significant challenge in robotics. T o address these limitations, we introduce PolyT ouch, a novel robot finger that integrates camera-based tactile sensing, acoustic sensing, and peripheral visual sensing into a single design that is compact and durable. PolyT ouch provides high-resolution tactile feedback across multiple temporal scales, which is essential for efficiently learning complex manipulation tasks. Experiments demonstrate an at least 20-fold increase in lifespan over commercial tactile sensors, with a design that is both easy to manufacture and scalable. We then use this multi-modal tactile feedback along with visuo-proprioceptive observations to synthesize a tactile-diffusion policy from human demonstrations; the resulting contact-aware control policy significantly outperforms haptic-oblivious policies in multiple contact-aware manipulation policies. This paper highlights how effectively integrating multi-modal contact sensing can hasten the development of effective contact-aware manipulation policies, paving the way for more reliable and versatile domestic robots.