Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
reliable map-based navigation with obstacle-avoidance capability;
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fetch and carry visible objects;
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autonomous manipulation of well-known objects;
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supervised manipulation of partially known objects;
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classification of ADLs (based mainly on user localization and on limited
information about involved objects);
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interaction with user-friendly interfaces (requiring human learning);
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limited speech recognition.
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Looking to everyday life an important part of daily activities is devoted to take
care of ourselves and is the result of various tasks that help to preserve person's
wellness and dignity. Such tasks are perceived as natural and easy to carry out by
health persons, but for subjects with motor inabilities, even if they are only slight, this
statement is not valid. Technological services can support people in carrying out tasks
like monitoring health, taking drugs, dressing and undressing and personal hygiene.
Services for dressing and undressing.
Dressing and undressing are two tasks that
persons carry out naturally and easily but they conceal complex movements that people
with reduced motor abilities in their upper and/or lower limbs cannot perform.
Technological solutions should support these subjects in carrying out these activities.
Robotic platforms with multi-joints arms and specific control strategies can help people
dress and undress by performing complex movements that people are unable to carry
out, at the same time guaranteeing compliance and safe interaction with subjects.
Services for personal hygiene.
Personal hygiene is a basic necessity in maintaining a
person's health. Although this is self-evident, the access to a bathroom and the use of
sanitary fixtures are not tasks easily to perform. Statistics bear this out: the bathroom is
the environment in the house where the second highest number of accidents happens.
Technological services can be used to support people who are not self-sufficient in
tasks relating to personal hygiene (e.g. using the toilet, having a wash, taking a bath,
shaving) and to save people from possible accidents. The main requirements of these
systems are the ability to work in a wet environment, safety in interacting with users,
the ability to carry out complex movements and the capability to support the weight of
a person.
An innovative approach to in-home service robotics for care and autonomy has been
presented recently by the MATS Project (Balaguer, 2006). With the aim of introducing
a robotic manipulator in the environment of a person needing it, the researchers
abandoned the “traditional” scenarios (i.e. a manipulator fixed in the space, on a mobile
base or on a wheelchair) and developed a robot manipulator able to move from one
room to another or from the static environment (walls, tables, etc.) to the wheelchairs
or vice versa by climbing. The MATS robot was developed as a 5-DOF robotic arm,
equipped at its extremities with a conical connector that could also serve as a gripper,
allowing total symmetry in the use of the robot extremities as a docking device, or as
an end-effector for manipulation. The climbing process was performed by letting the
robot to move between very simple docking stations (DSs) placed in the environment.
Experimental tests were performed with users, related to tasks like eating (the MATS
robot, attached to a Docking Station, could take food from a special plate and bring it
to the user's mouth and shaving/making up) (Balaguer, 2005).
