Related papers: Robots that Evolve with Us: Modular Co-Design for …
Participatory design effectively engages stakeholders in technology development but is often constrained by small, resource-intensive activities. This study explores a scalable complementary method, enabling broad pattern identification in…
This work provides a complete framework for the simulation, co-optimization, and sim-to-real transfer of the design and control of soft legged robots. The compliance of soft robots provides a form of "mechanical intelligence" -- the ability…
Mass customization and shorter manufacturing cycles are becoming more important among small and medium-sized companies. However, classical industrial robots struggle to cope with product variation and dynamic environments. In this paper, we…
The design of future mobility solutions and the design of the mobility systems they enable are closely coupled. Indeed, knowledge about the intended service of novel mobility solutions would impact their design and deployment process,…
As robots increasingly become part of shared human spaces, their movements must transcend basic functionality by incorporating expressive qualities to enhance engagement and communication. This paper introduces a movement-centered design…
This work explores a group learning scenario with an autonomous empathic robot. We address two research questions: (1) Can an autonomous robot designed with empathic competencies foster collaborative learning in a group context? (2) Can an…
Creating autonomous, self-supporting, self-replicating, sustainable systems is a great challenge. To some extent, understanding life means not only being able to create it from scratch, but also improving, supporting, saving it, or even…
Robots are notoriously difficult to design because of complex interdependencies between their physical structure, sensory and motor layouts, and behavior. Despite this, almost every detail of every robot built to date has been manually…
With increasing demand for mass customization, traditional manufacturing robots that rely on rule-based operations lack the flexibility to accommodate customized or new product variants. Human-Robot Collaboration has demonstrated potential…
Evolution and development operate at different timescales; generations for the one, a lifetime for the other. These two processes, the basis of much of life on earth, interact in many non-trivial ways, but their temporal hierarchy --…
The capacity to adapt can greatly influence the success of systems that need to compensate for damaged parts, learn how to achieve robust performance in new environments, or exploit novel opportunities that originate from new technological…
In situ robotic automation in construction is challenging due to constantly changing environments, a shortage of robotic experts, and a lack of standardized frameworks bridging robotics and construction practices. This work proposes a…
Cooperation and collaboration robots, co-robots or cobots for short, are an integral part of factories. For example, they work closely with the fitters in the automotive sector, and everyone does what they do best. However, the novel robots…
The theoretical ability of modular robots to reconfigure in response to complex tasks in a priori unknown environments has frequently been cited as an advantage and remains a major motivator for work in the field. We present a modular robot…
Modular and reconfigurable robotic systems have been designed to provide a customized solution for the non-repetitive tasks to be performed in a constrained environment. Customized solutions are normally extracted from task-based…
To understand and collaborate with humans, robots must account for individual human traits, habits, and activities over time. However, most robotic assistants lack these abilities, as they primarily focus on predefined tasks in structured…
Robotaxis are emerging as a promising form of urban mobility, but removing human drivers fundamentally reshapes passenger-vehicle interaction and raises new design challenges. To inform robotaxi design based on real-world experience, we…
Robot co-design, where the morphology of a robot is optimized jointly with a learned policy to solve a specific task, is an emerging area of research. It holds particular promise for soft robots, which are amenable to novel manufacturing…
We present MOSAIC, a modular architecture for coordinating multiple robots to (a) interact with users using natural language and (b) manipulate an open vocabulary of everyday objects. MOSAIC employs modularity at several levels: it…
Emerging applications of robotics, and concerns about their impact, require the research community to put human-centric objectives front-and-center. To meet this challenge, we advocate an interdisciplinary approach, socially cognizant…