Challenges in Collaborative HRI for Remote Robot Teams

Collaboration between human supervisors and remote teams of robots is highly challenging, particularly in high-stakes, distant, hazardous locations, such as off-shore energy platforms. In order for these teams of robots to truly be beneficial, they need to be trusted to operate autonomously, performing tasks such as inspection and emergency response, thus reducing the number of personnel placed in harm's way. As remote robots are generally trusted less than robots in close-proximity, we present a solution to instil trust in the operator through a `mediator robot' that can exhibit social skills, alongside sophisticated visualisation techniques. In this position paper, we present general challenges and then take a closer look at one challenge in particular, discussing an initial study, which investigates the relationship between the level of control the supervisor hands over to the mediator robot and how this affects their trust. We show that the supervisor is more likely to have higher trust overall if their initial experience involves handing over control of the emergency situation to the robotic assistant. We discuss this result, here, as well as other challenges and interaction techniques for human-robot collaboration.Comment: 9 pages. Peer reviewed position paper accepted in the CHI 2019 Workshop: The Challenges of Working on Social Robots that Collaborate with People (SIRCHI2019), ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, May 2019, Glasgow, U

Dynamic Control of Mobile Multirobot Systems: The Cluster Space Formulation

The formation control technique called cluster space control promotes simplified specification and monitoring of the motion of mobile multirobot systems of limited size. Previous paper has established the conceptual foundation of this approach and has experimentally verified and validated its use for various systems implementing kinematic controllers. In this paper, we briefly review the definition of the cluster space framework and introduce a new cluster space dynamic model. This model represents the dynamics of the formation as a whole as a function of the dynamics of the member robots. Given this model, generalized cluster space forces can be applied to the formation, and a Jacobian transpose controller can be implemented to transform cluster space compensation forces into robot-level forces to be applied to the robots in the formation. Then, a nonlinear model-based partition controller is proposed. This controller cancels out the formation dynamics and effectively decouples the cluster space variables. Computer simulations and experimental results using three autonomous surface vessels and four land rovers show the effectiveness of the approach. Finally, sensitivity to errors in the estimation of cluster model parameters is analyzed.Fil: Mas, Ignacio Agustin. Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Kitts, Christopher. Santa Clara University; Estados Unido

Marine Robot Sample Retrieving System

The exploration of our underwater ecosystems is critical. The aquatic ecosystem has a significant effect on human life, yet our understanding of the oceanic environment is severely lacking. Santa Clara University’s Robotic Systems Lab contributes to subsea exploration through its investment in remotely operated vehicle (ROV) technology. This project was done with the guidance of not only professors in the Robotics Systems Lab, but also stakeholders from the US Geological Survey scientists and researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI). Our team goal was to further advance SCU’s efforts by creating a sediment sample collection system consisting of a manipulator arm and sample storage container compatible with an existing SCU ROV. Our project has the potential to give researchers better access to submerged ecosystems and assists their efforts to understand and protect subsea environments in the future. We designed, built, and tested a prototype of a multiple degree-offreedom arm and storage system for the existing Nautilus ROV, for safely manipulating and storing submerged sedimentary artifacts at 300 feet deep with a maximum dive time of 45 minutes. At the end of this project, we were able to see robust three degree of freedom movement of the arm within its anticipated workspace. We achieved a basic level of motion control of the arm which was successfully tested and evaluated within a testing tank. However, there is still need for additional testing and increased functionality of the mechanical and controls systems. The storage system for samples design needs a thrust bearing to better rotate and there is still much work to make the controls of the arm user friendly such as end effector control for depositing a sample into the storage system instead of doing all the movements manually

Marine Robot Sample Retrieving System

The exploration of our underwater ecosystems is critical. The aquatic ecosystem has a significant effect on human life, yet our understanding of the oceanic environment is severely lacking. Santa Clara University’s Robotic Systems Lab contributes to subsea exploration through its investment in remotely operated vehicle (ROV) technology. This project was done with the guidance of not only professors in the Robotics Systems Lab, but also stakeholders from the US Geological Survey scientists and researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI). Our team goal was to further advance SCU’s efforts by creating a sediment sample collection system consisting of a manipulator arm and sample storage container compatible with an existing SCU ROV. Our project has the potential to give researchers better access to submerged ecosystems and assists their efforts to understand and protect subsea environments in the future. We designed, built, and tested a prototype of a multiple degree-of-freedom arm and storage system for the existing Nautilus ROV, for safely manipulating and storing submerged sedimentary artifacts at 300 feet deep with a maximum dive time of 45 minutes. At the end of this project, we were able to see robust three degree of freedom movement of the arm within its anticipated workspace. We achieved a basic level of motion control of the arm which was successfully tested and evaluated within a testing tank. However, there is still need for additional testing and increased functionality of the mechanical and controls systems. The storage system for samples design needs a thrust bearing to better rotate and there is still much work to make the controls of the arm user friendly such as end effector control for depositing a sample into the storage system instead of doing all the movements manually

The Widely scalable Mobile Underwater Sonar Technology (WiMUST) H2020 project: first year status

The Widely scalable Mobile Underwater Sonar Technology (WiMUST) project aims at developing a system of cooperative Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs) for geotechnical surveying and geophysical exploration. The paper reports about the first year activities and it gives an overview of the main objectives and methods. Results relative to distributed sensor array, cooperative control, mission planning, communications and preliminary experiments are summarized

The Vessel for Autonomous Research Underwater (The VARUNA)

Humans are intimately connected to the Earth’s ocean, and yet only 5% of it has been explored. Learning more about marine life and ocean chemistry can only improve our stewardship efforts. The addition of an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle to the Santa Clara University Robotic Systems Laboratory’s collection of marine robots will contribute to this quest for knowledge. It will assist researchers by providing a low-cost, easy-to-use, portable, reliable, and safe alternative to operator-controlled vehicles. This report describes our motivations for this project, the decisions we made in the design and manufacturing of the VARUNA, and tradeoff analyses of possible options. We also include descriptions of the subsystems, an account of testing, a summary of our accomplishments, and suggestions for the future of the project