This Haptic Vest Helps Us Control Dogs Remotely And Quickly

Instincts can be powerful cues. For example, when your phone vibrates in your pocket with a notification, your first instinct is to drop whatever you’re doing and take it up. That’s essentially what researchers from Israel are trying to do with dogs: By harnessing them with a vibrating vest, the handlers or owners can remotely control their dogs through silent commands translated into specific vibrations within a haptic vest.

Dogs At the Front Line

Dogs aren’t just humans’ best friends. They’re also confidential partners in a line of some very important (and dangerous) jobs. From search and rescue mission where their amazing sense of smell can track down a person for miles, to bomb and drug-detecting for police and the military. K-9 units have also been greatly useful for law enforcement to track down and apprehend suspects.

Dogs are obedient and to a degree, smart. They can be trained to respond to a series of commands such as whistles, key phrases, and with advanced training, even hand signals. But, just like us, dogs can only do these tasks when they see or hear the commands. And in the chaotic working environment that dogs often find themselves in the middle of, this can be quite a luxury.

Haptic Vest

Before the arrival of this vest, handlers will have to rely on a large megaphone or an obscenely loud whistles to get the dog’s attention or keep in contact with it after it had ventured into dangerous territories. Researchers from Ben-Gurion University’s Robotics Lab in Israel have placed a vibrating motor within an ordinary, lightweight mesh canine vest. The motor touches the sides and the back of the dog to provide certain levels of haptic feedback.

The Lab’s test subject was a mixed breed between a Labrador Retriever and German Shepherd named Tai. The rate that he learned different commands through the patterns, locations, and duration of each vibration was amazing. In no time, he learned commands such as ‘spin’, ‘down’, and even advanced commands like ‘back pedal’.

Of course, since the motor can be wirelessly controlled through a remote, the handler doesn’t need to be in listening or visual range of the dog at all. The researchers also found that Tai actually found it easier and quicker to respond to haptic commands instead of vocal or visual. On average, he learned each haptic command at a rate of one command every hour.

Let’s say in a search and rescue operation in terrains or environments too dangerous for a human to safely traverse. A camera can be mounted on top of the dog’s vest and the handler can just sit from afar, directing the dog’s motions through the vest.

Great Uses Elsewhere

But the benefits of this finding will not only be enjoyed by the military, law enforcement, and civil serving roles. It could also be used to improve the life quality of animals that are blind, deaf, or have degraded sensory. Pet owners who have physical challenges can also find great use in such a vest. Furthermore, it adds another method of communicating between humans and dogs, and this method is no doubt considerably more humane than shock collars and the likes.