A semi-autonomous communication robot: a field trial at a train station

ABSTRACT

This paper reports an initial field trial with a prototype of a semiautonomous communication robot at a train station. We developed an operator-requesting mechanism to achieve semiautonomous operation for a communication robot functioning in real environments. The operator-requesting mechanism autonomously detects situations that the robot cannot handle by itself; a human operator helps by assuming control of the robot.

This approach gives semi-autonomous robots the ability to function naturally with minimum human effort. Our system consists of a humanoid robot and ubiquitous sensors. The robot has such basic communicative behaviors as greeting and route guidance. The experimental results revealed that the operator-requesting mechanism correctly requested operator's help in 85% of the necessary situations; the operator only had to control 25% of the experiment time in the semi-autonomous mode with a robot system that successfully guided 68% of the passengers. At the same time, this trial provided the opportunity to gather user data for the further development of natural behaviors for such robots operating in real environments.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.2 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
      I.2.9 Robotics

General Terms:
Design, Experimentation

Keywords:
field trial, human-robot interaction, operator-requesting mechanism, semi-autonomous commutation robot