Pose Generation for Social Robots in Conversational Group Formations

We study two approaches for predicting an appropriate pose for a robot to take part in group formations typical of social human conversations subject to the physical layout of the surrounding environment. One method is model-based and explicitly encodes key geometric aspects of conversational formations. The other method is data-driven. It implicitly models key properties of spatial arrangements using graph neural networks and an adversarial training regimen. We evaluate the proposed approaches through quantitative metrics designed for this problem domain and via a human experiment. Our results suggest that the proposed methods are effective at reasoning about the environment layout and conversational group formations. They can also be used repeatedly to simulate conversational spatial arrangements despite being designed to output a single pose at a time. However, the methods showed different strengths. For example, the geometric approach was more successful at avoiding poses generated in nonfree areas of the environment, but the data-driven method was better at capturing the variability of conversational spatial formations. We discuss ways to address open challenges for the pose generation problem and other interesting avenues for future work.

Physics-Informed Modeling and Control of Multi-Actuator Soft Catheter Robots

Catheter-based endovascular interventional procedures have become increasingly popular in recent years as they are less invasive and patients spend less time in the hospital with less recovery time and less pain. These advantages have led to a significant growth in the number of procedures that are performed annually. However, it is still challenging to position a catheter in a target vessel branch within the highly complicated and delicate vascular structure. In fact, vessel tortuosity and angulation, which cause difficulties in catheterization and reaching the target site, have been reported as the main causes of failure in endovascular procedures. Maneuverability of a catheter for intravascular navigation is a key to reaching the target area; ability of a catheter to move within the target vessel during trajectory tracking thus affects to a great extent the length and success of the procedure. To address this issue, this paper models soft catheter robots with multiple actuators and provides a time-dependent model for characterizing the dynamics of multi-actuator soft catheter robots. Built on this model, an efficient and scalable optimization-based framework is developed for guiding the catheter to pass through arteries and reach the target where an aneurysm is located. The proposed framework models the deflection of the multi-actuator soft catheter robot and develops a control strategy for movement of catheter along a desired trajectory. This provides a simulation-based framework for selection of catheters prior to endovascular catheterization procedures, assuring that given a fixed design, the catheter is able to reach the target location. The results demonstrate the benefits that can be achieved by design and control of catheters with multiple number of actuators for navigation into small vessels.

Speed Dating with Voice User Interfaces: Understanding How Families Interact and Perceive Voice User Interfaces in a Group Setting

As voice-user interfaces (VUIs), such as smart speakers like Amazon Alexa or social robots like Jibo, enter multi-user environments like our homes, it is critical to understand how group members perceive and interact with these devices. VUIs engage socially with users, leveraging multi-modal cues including speech, graphics, expressive sounds, and movement. The combination of these cues can affect how users perceive and interact with these devices. Through a set of three elicitation studies, we explore family interactions (N = 34 families, 92 participants, ages 4–69) with three commercially available VUIs with varying levels of social embodiment. The motivation for these three studies began when researchers noticed that families interacted differently with three agents when familiarizing themselves with the agents and, therefore, we sought to further investigate this trend in three subsequent studies designed as a conceptional replication study. Each study included three activities to examine participants’ interactions with and perceptions of the three VUIS in each study, including an agent exploration activity, perceived personality activity, and user experience ranking activity. Consistent for each study, participants interacted significantly more with an agent with a higher degree of social embodiment, i.e., a social robot such as Jibo, and perceived the agent as more trustworthy, having higher emotional engagement, and having higher companionship. There were some nuances in interaction and perception with different brands and types of smart speakers, i.e., Google Home versus Amazon Echo, or Amazon Show versus Amazon Echo Spot between the studies. In the last study, a behavioral analysis was conducted to investigate interactions between family members and with the VUIs, revealing that participants interacted more with the social robot and interacted more with their family members around the interactions with the social robot. This paper explores these findings and elaborates upon how these findings can direct future VUI development for group settings, especially in familial settings.

Soft Robotic Deployable Origami Actuators for Neurosurgical Brain Retraction

Metallic tools such as graspers, forceps, spatulas, and clamps have been used in proximity to delicate neurological tissue and the risk of damage to this tissue is a primary concern for neurosurgeons. Novel soft robotic technologies have the opportunity to shift the design paradigm for these tools towards safer and more compliant, minimally invasive methods. Here, we present a pneumatically actuated, origami-inspired deployable brain retractor aimed at atraumatic surgical workspace generation inside the cranial cavity. We discuss clinical requirements, design, fabrication, analytical modeling, experimental characterization, and in-vitro validation of the proposed device on a brain model.

Evolutionary Inverse Material Identification: Bespoke Characterization of Soft Materials Using a Metaheuristic Algorithm

The growing interest in soft robotics has resulted in an increased demand for accurate and reliable material modelling. As soft robots experience high deformations, highly nonlinear behavior is possible. Several analytical models that are able to capture this nonlinear behavior have been proposed, however, accurately calibrating them for specific materials and applications can be challenging. Multiple experimental testbeds may be required for material characterization which can be expensive and cumbersome. In this work, we propose an alternative framework for parameter fitting established hyperelastic material models, with the aim of improving their utility in the modelling of soft continuum robots. We define a minimization problem to reduce fitting errors between a soft continuum robot deformed experimentally and its equivalent finite element simulation. The soft material is characterized using four commonly employed hyperelastic material models (Neo Hookean; Mooney–Rivlin; Yeoh; and Ogden). To meet the complexity of the defined problem, we use an evolutionary algorithm to navigate the search space and determine optimal parameters for a selected material model and a specific actuation method, naming this approach as Evolutionary Inverse Material Identification (EIMI). We test the proposed approach with a magnetically actuated soft robot by characterizing two polymers often employed in the field: Dragon Skin™ 10 MEDIUM and Ecoflex™ 00-50. To determine the goodness of the FEM simulation for a specific set of model parameters, we define a function that measures the distance between the mesh of the FEM simulation and the experimental data. Our characterization framework showed an improvement greater than 6% compared to conventional model fitting approaches at different strain ranges based on the benchmark defined. Furthermore, the low variability across the different models obtained using our approach demonstrates reduced dependence on model and strain-range selection, making it well suited to application-specific soft robot modelling.

Morphological Evolution: Bioinspired Methods for Analyzing Bioinspired Robots

To fully understand the evolution of complex morphologies, analyses cannot stop at selection: It is essential to investigate the roles and interactions of multiple processes that drive evolutionary outcomes. The challenges of undertaking such analyses have affected both evolutionary biologists and evolutionary roboticists, with their common interests in complex morphologies. In this paper, we present analytical techniques from evolutionary biology, selection gradient analysis and morphospace walks, and we demonstrate their applicability to robot morphologies in analyses of three evolutionary mechanisms: randomness (genetic mutation), development (an explicitly implemented genotype-to-phenotype map), and selection. In particular, we applied these analytical techniques to evolved populations of simulated biorobots—embodied robots designed specifically as models of biological systems, for the testing of biological hypotheses—and we present a variety of results, including analyses that do all of the following: illuminate different evolutionary dynamics for different classes of morphological traits; illustrate how the traits targeted by selection can vary based on the likelihood of random genetic mutation; demonstrate that selection on two selected sets of morphological traits only partially explains the variance in fitness in our biorobots; and suggest that biases in developmental processes could partially explain evolutionary dynamics of morphology. When combined, the complementary analytical approaches discussed in this paper can enable insight into evolutionary processes beyond selection and thereby deepen our understanding of the evolution of robotic morphologies.

Challenges and Opportunities in Robotic Food Handling: A Review

Despite developments in robotics and automation technologies, several challenges need to be addressed to fulfill the high demand for automating various manufacturing processes in the food industry. In our opinion, these challenges can be classified as: the development of robotic end-effectors to cope with large variations of food products with high practicality and low cost, recognition of food products and materials in 3D scenario, better understanding of fundamental information of food products including food categorization and physical properties from the viewpoint of robotic handling. In this review, we first introduce the challenges in robotic food handling and then highlight the advances in robotic end-effectors, food recognition, and fundamental information of food products related to robotic food handling. Finally, future research directions and opportunities are discussed based on an analysis of the challenges and state-of-the-art developments.

Who Wants to Grant Robots Rights?

The robot rights debate has thus far proceeded without any reliable data concerning the public opinion about robots and the rights they should have. We have administered an online survey (n = 439) that investigates layman’s attitudes toward granting particular rights to robots. Furthermore, we have asked them the reasons for their willingness to grant them those rights. Finally, we have administered general perceptions of robots regarding appearance, capacities, and traits. Results show that rights can be divided in sociopolitical and robot dimensions. Reasons can be distinguished along cognition and compassion dimensions. People generally have a positive view about robot interaction capacities. We found that people are more willing to grant basic robot rights such as access to energy and the right to update to robots than sociopolitical rights such as voting rights and the right to own property. Attitudes toward granting rights to robots depend on the cognitive and affective capacities people believe robots possess or will possess in the future. Our results suggest that the robot rights debate stands to benefit greatly from a common understanding of the capacity potentials of future robots.

Evaluation of Socially-Aware Robot Navigation

As mobile robots are increasingly introduced into our daily lives, it grows ever more imperative that these robots navigate with and among people in a safe and socially acceptable manner, particularly in shared spaces. While research on enabling socially-aware robot navigation has expanded over the years, there are no agreed-upon evaluation protocols or benchmarks to allow for the systematic development and evaluation of socially-aware navigation. As an effort to aid more productive development and progress comparisons, in this paper we review the evaluation methods, scenarios, datasets, and metrics commonly used in previous socially-aware navigation research, discuss the limitations of existing evaluation protocols, and highlight research opportunities for advancing socially-aware robot navigation.

Visual and Hearing Sensitivity Affect Robot-Based Training for Children Diagnosed With Autism Spectrum Disorder

In this paper, we investigate the impact of sensory sensitivity during robot-assisted training for children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Indeed, user-adaptation for robot-based therapies could help users to focus on the training, and thus improve the benefits of the interactions. Children diagnosed with ASD often suffer from sensory sensitivity, and can show hyper or hypo-reactivity to sensory events, such as reacting strongly or not at all to sounds, movements, or touch. Considering it during robot therapies may improve the overall interaction. In the present study, thirty-four children diagnosed with ASD underwent a joint attention training with the robot Cozmo. The eight session training was embedded in the standard therapy. The children were screened for their sensory sensitivity with the Sensory Profile Checklist Revised. Their social skills were screened before and after the training with the Early Social Communication Scale. We recorded their performance and the amount of feedback they were receiving from the therapist through animations of happy and sad emotions played on the robot. Our results showed that visual and hearing sensitivity influenced the improvements of the skill to initiate joint attention. Also, the therapists of individuals with a high sensitivity to hearing chose to play fewer animations of the robot during the training phase of the robot activity. The animations did not include sounds, but the robot was producing motor noise. These results are supporting the idea that sensory sensitivity of children diagnosed with ASD should be screened prior to engaging the children in robot-assisted therapy.