Related papers: Human-centered Control of a Growing Soft Robot for…
Robot-to-human object handover is an essential skill for robot assistants, from serving drinks at home to passing surgical tools in the operating room. We expect robots to perform handover robustly -- to release the object only after a firm…
Our research explores the potential of a humanoid robot for work in unpredictable environments, but controlling a humanoid robot remains a very difficult problem. In our previous work, we designed a prototype virtual reality (VR) interface…
This paper proposes a neural network-based user simulator that can provide a multimodal interactive environment for training Reinforcement Learning (RL) agents in collaborative tasks involving multiple modes of communication. The simulator…
A key challenge in robotics is to create efficient methods for grasping objects with diverse shapes, sizes, poses, and properties. Grasping with hand-like end effectors often requires careful selection of hand orientation and finger…
This paper presents a first contribution to the design of a small aerial robot for inhabited microgravity environments, such as orbiting space stations. In particular, we target a fleet of robots for collaborative tasks with humans, such as…
Fluidically actuated soft robots have promising capabilities such as inherent compliance and user safety. The control of soft robots needs to properly handle nonlinear actuation dynamics, motion constraints, workspace limitations, and…
In real-world human-robot systems, it is essential for a robot to comprehend human objectives and respond accordingly while performing an extended series of motor actions. Although human objective alignment has recently emerged as a…
Teleoperation provides a way for human operators to guide robots in situations where full autonomy is challenging or where direct human intervention is required. It can also be an important tool to teach robots in order to achieve…
Telerobotics enables humans to overcome spatial constraints and physically interact with the environment in remote locations. However, the sensory feedback provided by the system to the user is often purely visual, limiting the user's…
Collaborative robots can relief human operators from excessive efforts during payload lifting activities. Modelling the human partner allows the design of safe and efficient collaborative strategies. In this paper, we present a control…
We present a robot-to-human object handover algorithm and implement it on a 7-DOF arm equipped with a 3-finger mechanical hand. The system performs a fully autonomous and robust object handover to a human receiver in real-time. Our…
Soft robots offer more flexibility, compliance, and adaptability than traditional rigid robots. They are also typically lighter and cheaper to manufacture. However, their use in real-world applications is limited due to modeling challenges…
We present a feasibility-driven teleoperation framework designed to generate humanoid multi-contact maneuvers for use in unstructured environments. Our framework is designed for motions with arbitrary contact modes and postures. The…
Despite recent advancement in virtual reality technology, teleoperating a high DoF robot to complete dexterous tasks in cluttered scenes remains difficult. In this work, we propose a system that allows the user to teleoperate a Fetch robot…
Soft robots promise inherent safety via their material compliance for seamless interactions with humans or delicate environments. Yet, their development is challenging because it requires integrating materials, geometry, actuation, and…
Soft robots are inherently compliant and have a strong potential to realize human-friendly and safe robots. Despite continued research highlighting the potential of soft robots, they remain largely confined to laboratory settings. In this…
We can make it easier for disabled users to control assistive robots by mapping the user's low-dimensional joystick inputs to high-dimensional, complex actions. Prior works learn these mappings from human demonstrations: a non-disabled…
This paper presents a soft robot finger capable of adaptive-twist deformation to grasp objects by wrapping them. For a soft hand to grasp and pick-up one object from densely contained multiple objects, a soft finger requires the…
This paper presents the design and implementation of a Human Interface for a housekeeper robot. It bases on the idea of making the robot understand the human needs without making the human go through the details of robots work, for example,…
Robotic systems that are intended to augment human capabilities commonly require the use of semi-autonomous control and artificial sensing, while at the same time aiming to empower the user to make decisions and take actions. This work…