Humans have the ability to sense objects without direct contact, a sense that some animals share, according to a new study.
Chen etc.. conducted two studies: the first was a human study assessing the sensitivity of fingertips to tactile cues from buried objects; the second is a robotic experiment using a robotic arm equipped with haptics and a long short-term memory model to detect the presence of an object. Image credit: Gemini AI.
Human touch is usually understood as a proximal sensation limited to what we physically touch.
However, recent discoveries in animal sensory systems have challenged this view.
Some shorebirds, such as sandpipers and plovers, use the remote contact form To discover prey hidden under the sand.
Remote touch detects objects underneath bulk materials using subtle mechanical signals transmitted through a medium when moving pressure is applied nearby.
In a new study, Dr Elisabetta Versace from Queen Mary University of London and her colleagues investigated whether people have similar abilities.
Participants carefully ran their fingers through the sand to find the hidden cube before physically touching it.
Notably, the results revealed a capability comparable to that seen in shorebirds, despite the fact that humans do not have the specialized beak structures that provide such a sense in birds.
By modeling the physical aspects of this phenomenon, the researchers found that human hands are extremely sensitive: they detect the presence of buried objects by sensing minute movements in the sand around them.
This sensitivity approaches the theoretical physical threshold of what can be detected by mechanical “reflections” in granular material, where the movement of sand is “reflected” off a stable surface (a hidden object).
When comparing human actions with a robotic tactile sensor trained using Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) Algorithmhumans achieved an impressive 70.7% accuracy over the expected detection range.
Interestingly, the robot was on average able to detect objects at slightly longer distances, but often gave false positives, providing only 40% overall accuracy.
These results confirm that humans can truly sense an object before making physical contact—an amazing sensing ability that is typically associated with objects that come into direct contact with us.
Both humans and robots performed very close to the maximum sensitivity predicted by physical models and bias.
The study shows that humans can detect objects buried in sand before actual contact, expanding our understanding of how far the sense of touch can reach.
It provides quantitative evidence of tactile skills not previously documented in humans.
The results also offer valuable guidelines for improving assistive technology and robotic haptic perception.
Using human perception as a model, engineers can develop robotic systems that integrate natural touch sensitivity for real-world applications such as sensing, excavation or search tasks where vision is limited.
“This is the first time remote touch has been studied in humans, and it changes our understanding of the perceptual world (called the 'receptive field') of living things, including humans,” Dr Versace said.
“This discovery opens the door to the development of tools and assistive technologies that enhance human tactile perception,” said Queen Mary University of London Ph.D. student Zhengqi Chen.
“These ideas could help develop advanced robots capable of performing delicate tasks, such as finding archaeological artifacts without damage or exploring sandy or grainy terrain, such as Martian soil or the ocean floor.”
“More broadly, this research paves the way for sensor systems that will make covert or dangerous exploration safer, smarter and more efficient.”
“What makes this study particularly interesting is how the human and robot studies mutually influenced each other,” said Dr Lorenzo Jamone, a researcher at University College London.
“Human experiments have shaped the robot's approach to learning, and the robot's performance has opened new perspectives for interpreting human data.”
“This is an excellent example of how psychology, robotics and artificial intelligence can come together, showing that interdisciplinary collaboration can stimulate both fundamental discoveries and technological innovation.”
conclusions were presented in September at 2025 IEEE International Conference on Development and Learning (ICDL) in Prague, Czech Republic.
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Z. Chen etc.. Exploring tactile perception for object localization in granular environments: A human-robot study. 2025 IEEE International Conference on Development and Learning; doi: 10.1109/ICDL63968.2025.11204359
