Realization of a Life Support Robot that Plays and Interacts with Children through Dynamic Physical Contact

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K04389
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 20020:Robotics and intelligent system-related
• Research Institution: Osaka Institute of Technology
• Principal Investigator: Hiroi Yutaka 大阪工業大学, ロボティクス&デザイン工学部, 准教授 (80405927)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: ロボティクス / ヒューマン・ロボットインタラクション / 遊びロボット / 生活支援 / 子ども

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We are developed a robot that plays tag as “it.” The robot used a 2-D Laser Range Finder to track the player. It chased the player by generating a circle around the nearest player and moves towards the target point on the circle. Then, the robot touched the player at the nearest point of the player and moves away. To implement the touch behavior, we implemented two arms on the robot. When the robot approaches the player's vicinity, the arm facing the player is deployed horizontally to perform the touch operation. The arms have one degree of freedom and deactivate when the threshold for touch is exceeded. The purpose of this research is to verify the behavior of a one-degree-of-freedom arm that can perform touch operation on an ogre robot playing tag.

Free Research Field

ロボット工学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

近年，少子化や一人っ子の増加の影響により，子どもの運動能力の低下が指摘されている．本研究は，ロボットと子どもが共に走る状態で，ロボットが子どもに“タッチする”ことが可能な「子どもと遊ぶ生活支援ロボット」の実現を目指した．これまでの生活支援ロボットでは共に動いた状態で“タッチする”は実現が困難であった．本システムが確立されると，家事支援，伝統的遊びの継承，子ども同士のコミュニティ支援，リレーのコーチロボット等への応用展開が可能になる．