Related papers: Navigation beyond Wayfinding: Robots Collaborating…
A robot guide dog has compelling advantages over animal guide dogs for its cost-effectiveness, potential for mass production, and low maintenance burden. However, despite the long history of guide dog robot research, previous studies were…
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…
While there is no replacement for the learned expertise, devotion, and social benefits of a guide dog, there are cases in which a robot navigation assistant could be helpful for individuals with blindness or low vision (BLV). This study…
Robotic guide dogs hold significant potential to enhance the autonomy and mobility of blind or visually impaired (BVI) individuals by offering universal assistance over unstructured terrains at affordable costs. However, the design of…
Guiding robots can not only detect close-range obstacles like other guiding tools, but also extend its range to perceive the environment when making decisions. However, most existing works over-simplified the interaction between human…
Dog guides are favored by blind and low-vision (BLV) individuals for their ability to enhance independence and confidence by reducing safety concerns and increasing navigation efficiency compared to traditional mobility aids. However, only…
This paper presents a framework to navigate visually impaired people through unfamiliar environments by means of a mobile manipulator. The Human-Robot system consists of three key components: a mobile base, a robotic arm, and the human…
People with visual impairments (PwVI) often have difficulties navigating through unfamiliar indoor environments. However, current wayfinding tools are fairly limited. In this short paper, we present our in-progress work on a wayfinding…
Visually-guided underwater robots are deployed alongside human divers for cooperative exploration, inspection, and monitoring tasks in numerous shallow-water and coastal-water applications. The most essential capability of such companion…
Intelligent systems are increasingly part of our everyday lives and have been integrated seamlessly to the point where it is difficult to imagine a world without them. Physical manifestations of those systems on the other hand, in the form…
Socially aware robot navigation is a planning paradigm where the robot navigates in human environments and tries to adhere to social constraints while interacting with the humans in the scene. These navigation strategies were further…
Finding obstacle-free paths in unknown environments is a big navigation issue for visually impaired people and autonomous robots. Previous works focus on obstacle avoidance, however they do not have a general view of the environment they…
We claim that navigation in human environments can be viewed as cooperative activity especially in constrained situations. Humans concurrently aid and comply with each other while moving in a shared space. Cooperation helps pedestrians to…
While guide dogs offer essential mobility assistance, their high cost, limited availability, and care requirements make them inaccessible to most blind or low vision (BLV) individuals. Recent advances in quadruped robots provide a scalable…
An autonomous robot that is able to physically guide humans through narrow and cluttered spaces could be a big boon to the visually-impaired. Most prior robotic guiding systems are based on wheeled platforms with large bases with actuated…
Assistive robotics is an important subarea of robotics that focuses on the well-being of people with disabilities. A robotic guide dog is an assistive quadruped robot that helps visually impaired people in obstacle avoidance and navigation.…
Autonomy and independent navigation are vital to daily life but remain challenging for individuals with blindness. Robotic systems can enhance mobility and confidence by providing intelligent navigation assistance. However, fully autonomous…
Persons with visual impairments (PwVI) have difficulties understanding and navigating spaces around them. Current wayfinding technologies either focus solely on navigation or provide limited communication about the environment. Motivated by…
While commendable progress has been made in user-centric research on mobile assistive systems for blind and low-vision (BLV) individuals, references that directly inform robot navigation design remain rare. To bridge this gap, we conducted…
Robot-assisted navigation is a perfect example of a class of applications requiring flexible control approaches. When the human is reliable, the robot should concede space to their initiative. When the human makes inappropriate choices the…