Program delves into robotic research
Imagine you were working to design a robot. You would have to determine how you would respond to a robot that you needed to interact with, what would you want it to look like and what would you want it to do. Last week, during National Robotics Week, UMass Lowell hosted Dr. Cindy Bethel of Yale University came to UMass Lowell to discuss “Non-Facial and Non-Verbal Affective Expression for Appearance-Constrained Robots”.
While many may wonder why we would even care why we would need to understand the way that humans interact with robots, the reality is we see robots becoming more and more a part of our everyday lives.
With recent earthquake disasters in Haiti and China, the need for robots that can go and search and rescue individuals has grown. But the question is of how we can control these robots in a way that is simple so that they are practical for rescue workers to use.
UMass Lowell in conjunction with other universities is working on the Situation Understanding Bot Through Language And Environment project (SUBTLE). The goal of this program is to work on a program language that can be used to control the robot using simple voice commands, making it easier to control a robot in military and search and rescue operations.
In some situations a robot might need to evaluate a situation and on its own change its ability or function to fit the need of the situation. The controller needs to be able to change its shape or form to complete the task. Tragus, a Variable Geometry Tracked Vehicle (VGTV), is studying how information and sensors can be used by the operators to make search ad rescue robots more effective and allow the user to change the shape of the robot to better fit the situation it is being used in.
Much of UMass Lowell’s research in robotics deals with robots helping individuals in their day-to-day lives. The manus arm is one of these projects to help a person who is wheel chair bound or with limited use of their arms control a mechanical arm to help them pick up objects that are far off.
It uses a visual system to help users choose the object they wish to select and pick up and then can choose where the wish to put the object. This allows the arm to become much similar to use allowing more users to use the technology and for it to be easier to use.
The robotics lab is also about education in other fields with robots. A popular class, Artbotics, combines basic robotics programming with student’s creative ideas to produce unique and original artwork. This artwork is then displayed in The Revolving Museum in downtown Lowell. This program allows students from disciplines outside of computer science to become involved in robotics at UMass Lowell.
In additions, these students then work with High School students in designing similar projects and introducing robotics to high school students in Lowell.
UMass Lowell also hosts Botfest, a program designed to let middle school students and anyone of any age show off the robots they created and to help foster an interest in robotics.
The Robotics Lab at UMass Lowell is helping to design the technology of the future, but also finding those who will car
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