Robotic bodily aware interaction within human environments

Abstract

This paper describes an approach in which a robot is using a virtual or inner representation of its own body to ensure a safe and efficient interaction within the physical world. By analysing correlations within its surroundings, the robot is able to plan task-oriented and socially accepting responses. This approach is inspired by the phenomenon called bodily awareness, which is found in humans. Compared to conventional approaches where robots are preprogramed to react on finite number of environmental occurrences or states, the proposed approach gives the robot an ability to adapt to changes through a constant interaction. To achieve this, a robot interaction space is discretized and constantly analysed. As a part of the new cognitive model, a virtualized image of the robot body is used to avoid all possible collisions. The model also contains a probabilistic component to provide the most appropriate solution to given environmental conditions where the environment is naturally highly dynamic and unpredictable.