  This work studies the problem of shape reconstruction and object localization
using a vision-based tactile sensor, GelSlim. The main contributions are the
recovery of local shapes from contact, an approach to reconstruct the tactile
shape of objects from tactile imprints, and an accurate method for object
localization of previously reconstructed objects. The algorithms can be applied
to a large variety of 3D objects and provide accurate tactile feedback for
in-hand manipulation. Results show that by exploiting the dense tactile
information we can reconstruct the shape of objects with high accuracy and do
on-line object identification and localization, opening the door to reactive
manipulation guided by tactile sensing. We provide videos and supplemental
information in the project's website
http://web.mit.edu/mcube/research/tactile_localization.html.

Robotics;Machine Learning