ROASIS Project
ROASIS: Robots capable of interaction and adaptation in healthcare environments.
Project financed by the Junta de Castilla y León and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)
The General Objective of this project is to progress towards the full integration of robotics in society through experimental research. To this end, it is proposed to advance in two major directions: on the one hand, in the coexistence of social robots with elderly people to improve their level of well-being, autonomy and, ultimately, quality of life; and on the other, in human-robot interaction through robotic heads combined with virtual animation techniques that can be used for friendly human-robot interaction specifically in the case of elderly people, although it will also be applicable to other sectors of the population.
The main scientific and technical objectives are the following:
- Develop strategies for the integration of social robots in care environments, based on learning, adaptation and user modeling.
- Progress in the development of services in the field of assistance to dependent people: care, therapy, leisure, entertainment. Robots must be long-term companions, and also an effective and profitable tool.
- Develop a robotic head that combines the sense of physical presence provided by mechatronic heads with the high expressiveness of virtual avatars, to achieve a robotic system that fosters user empathy.
- Moving towards the integration of cloud services to benefit from their computing, storage and communications resources.
The research will be validated in the context of a real environment of care for dependent elderly people in a Gerontology Center and in the benchmarking environment of the RoboCup@Home competition.
Perception and interaction in social robotics
User perception and activity:
- Detect and identify users
- Person talking, attentive, distracted...
- Identification of the person leading the interaction.
Adaptation and learning
Development of adaptation and learning strategies based on:
- Few users, long term, age limitations
- Adaptive planning-action model
- MDP, reinforcement learning, for each user and between users
- Dialogue and user skill modeling
Robotic head
Development of a robotic head that combines high presence, with expressiveness, control and adaptability:
- Robotic head with retro avatar projected onto translucent mask
- Open architecture, cloud integration, adaptability
Services
Services customized to the condition, status and preferences of users:
- Personalización a patir de una base de conocimiento con datos y preferencias
- Operation and service metrics to estimate satisfaction
- Chronemics, proxemics, user expression, frequencies of use
Operational environment
Validation in operational environment:
- Validación en una Unidad de Convivencia de un Centro Gerontológico colaborador del proyecto, con salón, comedor, dormitorios, cocina, baño geriátrico, etc.
- Validation in benchmarking environment (RoboCup@home).
Planning
The development of this research project is planned between January 1, 2019 and December 31, 2021. The project, led by the ITAP University Institute, involves the collaboration of a Gerontological Center and the Cartif Technology Center.
Health, demographic change and well-being
The project is part of the area of Health, demographic change and well-being. The presence of an increasingly ageing population means that the need for assistance and the use of new technologies that improve the quality of life of elderly and dependent people will be a market that will be in full expansion in the coming years.
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