A personal robot is one whose human interface and design make it useful for individuals. This is by contrast to

industrial robots An industrial robot is a robot system used for manufacturing. Industrial robots are automated, programmable and capable of movement on three or more axes. Typical applications of robots include welding, painting, assembly, disassembly, pick a ...

which are generally configured and operated by robotics specialists. A personal robot is one that enables an individual to automate the repetitive or menial part of home or work life making them more productive. Similar to the way that the transition from

mainframe computers A mainframe computer, informally called a mainframe or big iron, is a computer used primarily by large organizations for critical applications like bulk data processing for tasks such as censuses, industry and consumer statistics, enterpris ...

to the

personal computers A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or techn ...

revolutionized personal productivity, the transition from industrial robotics to personal robotics is changing productivity in home and work settings. Turning a

robot A robot is a machine—especially one programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the control may be embedded within. Robots may be c ...

like ASIMO or

Atlas An atlas is a collection of maps; it is typically a bundle of maps of Earth or of a region of Earth. Atlases have traditionally been bound into book form, but today many atlases are in multimedia formats. In addition to presenting geographic ...

into a universally applicable personal robot or artificial servant is mainly a programming task. As of today vast improvements in

motion planning Motion planning, also path planning (also known as the navigation problem or the piano mover's problem) is a computational problem to find a sequence of valid configurations that moves the object from the source to destination. The term is used ...

computer vision Computer vision is an interdisciplinary scientific field that deals with how computers can gain high-level understanding from digital images or videos. From the perspective of engineering, it seeks to understand and automate tasks that the hum ...

(esp. scene recognition),

natural language processing Natural language processing (NLP) is an interdisciplinary subfield of linguistics, computer science, and artificial intelligence concerned with the interactions between computers and human language, in particular how to program computers to pro ...

, and

automated reasoning In computer science, in particular in knowledge representation and reasoning and metalogic, the area of automated reasoning is dedicated to understanding different aspects of reasoning. The study of automated reasoning helps produce computer progra ...

are indispensable to make this a possibility.

History

iRobot iRobot Corporation is an American technology company that designs and builds consumer robots. It was founded in 1990 by three members of MIT's Artificial Intelligence Lab, who designed robots for space exploration and military defense. The com ...

Corp. introduced the

Roomba Roomba is a series of autonomous robotic vacuum cleaners made by the company iRobot. Introduced in September 2002, they have a set of sensors that enable them to navigate the floor area of a home. These sensors can detect the presence of obstac ...

in 2002 * The

Institute for Personal Robots in Education Institute for Personal Robots in Education (IPRE) was initiated by a $1 million grant from Microsoft Research to Bryn Mawr College and the Georgia Institute of Technology and announced in July 2006. IPRE is designing introductory computer scienc ...

introduced the concept to teach computing using personal robots in 2006. *

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

Personal Robotics Program introduced PR1 in 2007. *

Willow Garage Willow Garage was a robotics research lab and technology incubator devoted to developing hardware and open source software for personal robotics applications. The company was most likely best known for its open source software suite ROS (Robot ...

introduced the PR2 robot in 2010. * RoboDynamics introduced Luna in 2011. * Milagrow HumanTech introduced India's 1st

Robotic vacuum cleaner A robotic vacuum cleaner, sometimes called a robovac or a roomba as a generic trademark, is an autonomous robotic vacuum cleaner which has a limited vacuum floor cleaning system combined with sensors and robotic drives with programmable controll ...

, the RedHawk in 2011 and then the World's 1st Body Massaging Robot in 2012.

Toys

Robotic toys, such as the well known

Furby Furby is an American electronic robotic toy that was originally released in 1998 by Tiger Electronics. It resembles a hamster or owllike creature and went through a period of being a " must-have" toy following its holiday season launch, with c ...

, have been popular since 1998. There are also small humanoid remote controlled robots. Electronic pets, such as robotic dogs, can be good companions. They have also been used by many universities in competitions such as the

RoboCup RoboCup is an annual international robotics competition founded in 1996 by a group of university professors (including Hiroaki Kitano, Manuela M. Veloso, and Minoru Asada). The aim of the competition is to promote robotics and AI research by offer ...

. There are many different kind of toy robots that have been invented since the late 1900s. There were many robotic toys invented that was used for entertainment. One example that is popular known as

, a toy that children nourished every day. The toy robot, made it seem like it was alive like a pet that you have to watch on and give it attention. There are many different kind of toy robots that are animal related, like, robotic dogs. Another type of robotic toy is the phone-powered robots. Using this toy, you are able to connect with your phone and control the toy while using an application. Now, robotic toys are becoming more mobile device platformed. This in turn is creating a larger demand for these types of products. The increase in demand has a direct effect on the escalation of the technology used in the toys.

Social robots

Social robot A social robot is an autonomous robot that interacts and communicates with humans or other autonomous physical agents by following social behaviors and rules attached to its role. Like other robots, a social robot is physically embodied (avatars ...

s take on the function of social communication. Domestic humanoid robots are used by elderly and immobilized residents to keep them company.

Wakamaru Wakamaru is a Japanese robot made by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries that is intended to perform natural communication with human beings. The yellow, 3-foot domestic robot debuted in 2005 at a $14,300-$15,000 USD price-point exclusively for Japanese ho ...

is a domestic humanoid robot developed in Japan. Its function is to act as a care taker. Wakamaru has a number of operations and “can be programmed to remind patients to take their medicine and even call a doctor when it appears that someone is in distress.” Paro, a robotic baby

seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to impr ...

, is intended to provide comfort to

nursing home A nursing home is a facility for the residential care of elderly or disabled people. Nursing homes may also be referred to as skilled nursing facility (SNF) or long-term care facilities. Often, these terms have slightly different meanings to in ...

patients. Home-

telepresence Telepresence refers to a set of technologies which allow a person to feel as if they were present, to give the appearance or effect of being present via telerobotics, at a place other than their true location. Telepresence requires that the user ...

robots can move around in a remote location and let one communicate with people there via its camera, speaker, and microphone. Through other remote-controlled telepresence robots, the user can visit a distant location and explore it as if they were physically present. These robots can, among other applications, permit health-care workers to monitor patients or allow children who are homebound because of injuries, illnesses, or other physical challenges to attend school remotely. Kuri, JIBO and ConnectR are family robots that includes telepresence.

Entertainment services

Network robots link

ubiquitous network Ubiquitous computing (or "ubicomp") is a concept in software engineering, hardware engineering and computer science where computing is made to appear anytime and everywhere. In contrast to desktop computing, ubiquitous computing can occur using ...

s with

s, contributing to the creation of new lifestyles and solutions to address a variety of social problems including the aging of population and nursing care.

Therapy

Robots built for therapy have been in production for quite some time now. Some of these uses can be for

autism The autism spectrum, often referred to as just autism or in the context of a professional diagnosis autism spectrum disorder (ASD) or autism spectrum condition (ASC), is a neurodevelopmental condition (or conditions) characterized by difficulti ...

physical therapy Physical therapy (PT), also known as physiotherapy, is one of the allied health professions. It is provided by physical therapists who promote, maintain, or restore health through physical examination, diagnosis, management, prognosis, patient ...

. As for robots designed to help autism, authors Daniel J. Ricks and Mark B. Colton suggest that these robots will elicit and bring out specific behaviors of children, ones not previously seen before the use of these robots. This shows the goals set for robots in therapy for children with autism is to help form social behaviors. A large number of children with autism have communication issues, these robots can assist them and help them learn. They can also be used to assist adults with physical issues involving muscles or limbs.

References

External links

EZ-Robot

Stanford University Personal Robotics Program

Cornell University Personal Robotics Program

Imperial College London Personal Robotics
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