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This paper proposes an architecture for achieving telexistence and teleoperation of humanoid robots. The architecture combines several technological set-ups, methodologies, locomotion and manipulation algorithms in a novel manner, thus…
This paper reports on insights by robotics researchers that participated in a 5-day robot-assisted nuclear disaster response field exercise conducted by Kerntechnische Hilfdienst GmbH (KHG) in Karlsruhe, Germany. The German nuclear industry…
Robot deployment in realistic dynamic environments is a challenging problem despite the fact that robots can be quite skilled at a large number of isolated tasks. One reason for this is that robots are rarely equipped with powerful…
Performing trajectory design for humanoid robots with high degrees of freedom is computationally challenging. The trajectory design process also often involves carefully selecting various hyperparameters and requires a good initial guess…
Humanoid robots are envisioned as general-purpose platforms in human-centered environments, yet their deployment is limited by vulnerability to falls and the risks posed by rigid metal-plastic structures to people and surroundings. We…
We present a reinforcement learning framework for autonomous goalkeeping with humanoid robots in real-world scenarios. While prior work has demonstrated similar capabilities on quadrupedal platforms, humanoid goalkeeping introduces two…
Autonomous robotics and artificial intelligence techniques can be used to support human personnel in the event of critical incidents. These incidents can pose great danger to human life. Some examples of such assistance include: multi-robot…
Recent research has examined the possibility of using robots to guide evacuees to safe exits during emergencies. Yet, there are many factors that can impact a person's decision to follow a robot. Being able to model how an evacuee follows…
A robot cannot lift up an object if it is not feasible to do so. However, in most research on robot lifting, "feasibility" is usually presumed to exist a priori. This paper proposes a three-step method for a humanoid robot to reason about…
This paper describes our recent effort to use virtual reality to simulate threatening emergency evacuation scenarios in which a robot guides a person to an exit. Our prior work has demonstrated that people will follow a robot's guidance,…
Towards the role of humanoid robots as squad mates in urban operations and other domains, we identified doors as a major area lacking capability development. In this paper, we focus on the ability of humanoid robots to navigate and deal…
This paper presents Surena-V, a humanoid robot designed to enhance human-robot collaboration capabilities. The robot features a range of sensors, including barometric tactile sensors in its hands, to facilitate precise environmental…
This paper explores the principles for transforming a quadrupedal robot into a guide robot for individuals with visual impairments. A guide robot has great potential to resolve the limited availability of guide animals that are accessible…
Autonomous robots used in infrastructure inspection, space exploration and other critical missions operate in highly dynamic environments. As such, they must continually verify their ability to complete the tasks associated with these…
Robots are increasingly expected to execute open ended natural language requests in human environments, which demands reliable long horizon execution under partial observability. This is especially challenging for humanoids because…
Dexterous manipulation is a crucial yet highly complex challenge in humanoid robotics, demanding precise, adaptable, and sample-efficient learning methods. As humanoid robots are usually designed to operate in human-centric environments and…
Shared autonomy functions as a flexible framework that empowers robots to operate across a spectrum of autonomy levels, allowing for efficient task execution with minimal human oversight. However, humans might be intimidated by the…
As mobile service robots increasingly coexist with pedestrians, ensuring passively safe behaviour during confined emergency evacuations is critical. Existing multi-robot yielding strategies often focus solely on collision avoidance and…
In this context, a major focus of this thesis is on unintentional collisions, where a straight goal is to eliminate injury from users and passerby's via realtime sensing and control systems. A less obvious focus is to combine collision…
Efficient robotic exploration of unknown, sensor limited, global-information-deficient environments poses unique challenges to path planning algorithms. In these difficult environments, no deterministic guarantees on path completion and…