Healthcare Robotics Lab
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Haptic Simulation for Robot-Assisted Dressing
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2017)There is a considerable need for assistive dressing among people with disabilities, and robots have the potential to fulfill this need. However, training such a robot would require extensive trials in order to learn the ... -
Optimization of Robot Configurations for Assistive Tasks
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016)Robots can provide assistance with activities of daily living (ADLs) to humans with motor impairments. Specialized robots, such as desktop robotic feeding systems, have been successful for specific assistive tasks when ... -
Autobed: Open Hardware for Accessible Web-based Control of an Electric Bed
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016)Individuals with severe motor impairments often have difficulty operating the standard controls of electric beds and so require a caregiver to adjust their position for utility, comfort, or to prevent pressure ulcers. ... -
Material Recognition from Heat Transfer given Varying Initial Conditions and Short-Duration Contact
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2015)When making contact with an object, a robot can use a tactile sensor consisting of a heating element and a temperature sensor to recognize the object’s material based on conductive heat transfer from the tactile sensor ... -
Multimodal Execution Monitoring for Anomaly Detection During Robot Manipulation
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2016-05)Online detection of anomalous execution can be valuable for robot manipulation, enabling robots to operate more safely, determine when a behavior is inappropriate, and otherwise exhibit more common sense. By using ... -
Towards Assistive Feeding with a General-Purpose Mobile Manipulator
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2016-05)General-purpose mobile manipulators have the potential to serve as a versatile form of assistive technology. However, their complexity creates challenges, including the risk of being too difficult to use. We present a ... -
A Robotic System for Reaching in Dense Clutter that Integrates Model Predictive Control, Learning, Haptic Mapping, and Planning
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2014-09)We present a system that enables a robot to reach locations in dense clutter using only haptic sensing. Our system integrates model predictive control [1], learned initial conditions [2], tactile recognition of object ... -
Finding and Navigating to Household Objects with UHF RFID Tags by Optimizing RF Signal Strength
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2014-09)We address the challenge of finding and navigating to an object with an attached ultra-high frequency radio- frequency identification (UHF RFID) tag. With current off-the- shelf technology, one can affix ... -
Learning to Reach into the Unknown: Selecting Initial Conditions When Reaching in Clutter
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2014-09)Often in highly-cluttered environments, a robot can observe the exterior of the environment with ease, but cannot directly view nor easily infer its detailed internal structure (e.g., dense ... -
Inferring Object Properties from Incidental Contact with a Tactile-Sensing Forearm
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014-09)Whole-arm tactile sensing enables a robot to sense properties of contact across its entire arm. By using this large sensing area, a robot has the potential to acquire useful information from incidental contact that ... -
Interleaving Planning and Control for Efficient Haptically-guided Reaching in Unknown Environments
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2014)We present a new method for reaching in an initially unknown environment with only haptic sensing. In this paper, we propose a haptically-guided interleaving planning and control (HIPC) method with a haptic mapping ... -
Assistive Mobile Manipulation for Self-Care Tasks Around the Head
(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014)Human-scale mobile robots with arms have the potential to assist people with a variety of tasks. We present a proof-of-concept system that has enabled a person with severe quadriplegia named Henry Evans to shave himself ... -
Haptic Classification and Recognition of Objects Using a Tactile Sensing Forearm
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2012-10)In this paper, we demonstrate data-driven inference of mechanical properties of objects using a tactile sensor array (skin) covering a robot's forearm. We focus on the mobility (sliding vs. fixed), compliance (soft vs. ... -
ROS Commander (ROSCo): Behavior Creation for Home Robots
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2013-05)We introduce ROS Commander (ROSCo), an open source system that enables expert users to construct, share, and deploy robot behaviors for home robots. A user builds a behavior in the form of a Hierarchical Finite State Machine ... -
The Wouse: A Wearable Wince Detector to Stop Assistive Robots
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2012-09)Persons with severe motor impairments depend heavily upon caregivers for the performance of everyday tasks. Ongoing work is exploring the potential of giving motor-impaired users control of semi-autonomous assistive mobile ... -
Informing Assistive Robots with Models of Contact Forces from Able-Bodied Face Wiping and Shaving
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2012-09)Hygiene and feeding are activities of daily living (ADLs) that often involve contact with a person's face. Robots can assist people with motor impairments to perform these tasks by holding a tool that makes contact with ... -
In-Hand Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) for Robotic Manipulation
(Georgia Institute of TechnologyInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2013-05)We present a unique multi-antenna RFID reader (a sensor) embedded in a robot's manipulator that is designed to operate with ordinary UHF RFID tags in a short-range, near-field electromagnetic regime. Using specially designed ... -
Improving robot manipulation with data-driven object-centric models of everyday forces
(Georgia Institute of TechnologySpringer Verlag, 2013-06)Based on a lifetime of experience, people anticipate the forces associated with performing a manipulation task. In contrast, most robots lack common sense about the forces involved in everyday manipulation tasks. In this ... -
Reaching in clutter with whole-arm tactile sensing
(Georgia Institute of TechnologySage, 2013-04)Clutter creates challenges for robot manipulation, including a lack of non-contact trajectories and reduced visibility for line-of-sight sensors. We demonstrate that robots can use whole-arm tactile sensing to perceive ... -
An investigation of responses to robot-initiated touch in a nursing context
(Georgia Institute of TechnologySpringer Verlag, 2013-10)Physical human-robot interaction has the potential to be useful in a number of domains, but this will depend on how people respond to the robot’s actions. For some domains, such as healthcare, a robot is likely to initiate ...