Introducing robotics in the healthcare sector revolutionizes medical services by providing advanced treatments, medication management, and robotic assistance while overcoming resource limitations. In the current healthcare domain, an intermediate robotic communication platform is essential for distributing equal medical services, facilitating remote consultations, and maintaining the integrity of medical education, especially in rural areas and during pandemics. This work introduces ARIS, a multitasking medical service robot designed for telemedicine aspects and to facilitate remote medical education activities such as ward rounds. The prototype called ARIS 1.0 was developed, including a three-wheeled omnidirectional mobile platform, a torso and a novel movable neck mechanism with a face. The prototype robot can generate an online summarized report using its integrated language interaction and IoT-based vital sign extraction modules. The ROS-based semi-autonomous navigation facilitates the robot to be an assistive agent, allowing it to either accompany doctors or visit patients individually. Ultimately, ARIS 1.0 serves telepresence and novel regional language capabilities, specifically Sinhala-based self-communication features. This enables inter-party communication among doctors, medical students, and patients. The functionalities of ARIS 1.0 were validated in an emulated indoor environment to evaluate their feasibility. The results indicate that ARIS 1.0 is feasible for providing remote medical services. Furthermore, the paper discusses several promising research directions related to the proposed concept.

Cleaning glass surfaces is a prevailing maintenance problem in high-rise buildings. In the traditional methods of cleaning windows, hanging on ropes poses significant occupational hazards to workers. Furthermore, most glass facades feature window frames to securely fasten the glass panels to the building structure, ensuring durability and elegance. In this context, existing robotic cleaning methods are limited by their capability to move-over window frames and need more flexibility to access tight corners and curved surfaces. This paper presents a novel reconfigurable glass cleaning robot called "WiBot" to address these limitations. WiBot is a kinematic chain comprising modular linkages with a prismatic joint and two revolute joints at each end. Each revolute joint has a suction unit that enables locomotion and adhesion. Window frames are detected using image processing with an onboard camera, and design optimizations were performed to improve the robot’s capabilities. The prototype WiBot 1.0 was developed, and several experiments were conducted to evaluate the feasibility of the proposed system focusing on robot motion, window frame detection and move-over mechanism. The results show that WiBot can overcome the limitations of existing window cleaning solutions. Finally, several promising research directions are mentioned involving the proposed reconfigurable robot architecture in cleaning operations.

With the rapid advancement of the Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) field necessitates a focus on associated surface analysis and manipulation techniques. Existing methods, such as Atomic Force Microscopy, and Optical Interferometry, present an effective but complex approach to surface profiling. These methods often involve intricate calibration processes, and require sophisticated equipment, thereby limiting their usage. To address these challenges, this paper introduces a novel MEMS based capacitive profilometer that offers an easy accessible, and efficient solution for surface roughness measurement, while integrating surface manipulation capabilities. This proposed system is simple, compact, and highly versatile. It is capable of measuring surface roughness in the range ±10 µm, making it suitable for a wide range of applications. The sensing, and actuation mechanisms are governed by the principle of capacitance. This paper provides a detailed design analysis, simulation results, and fabrication procedure for successful implementation.

This study investigates the development of a robotic walker for gait rehabilitation that integrates social assistive robotics and principles of Rhythmic Auditory Stimulation (RAS), a form of music therapy. The robotic system is intended to supplement, rather than replace, the work of professional music therapists by enabling therapeutic interventions to continue outside of therapy sessions. Robot-facilitated Music Therapy is an evolutionary step of telerehabilitation, providing patients with greater autonomy while still benefiting from the expertise and guidance of therapists. Contributions of the research include 1) Robot-facilitated Music Therapy through a robotic walker as a platform for gait rehabilitation. 2) Remote Music Therapy through a robotic walker as a telerehabilitation platform for music therapists to remotely monitor and consult with patients. 3) Intelligent companionship integrated with a robotic walker for comprehensive user assistance. The proposed system, tested for its functionalities including personified RAS, social interaction, user monitoring, mobility control, and emergency response yielded promising results for real-world application.

Micro-electromechanical Systems (MEMS) based Lab on a Chip (LoC) devices are becoming increasingly popular as they have the capacity to perform complicated chemical and biological analyses with small sample quantities. The paper proposes a MEMS based microfluidic LoC device that incorporates a novel process with three preliminary stages; insertion, mixing, and dielectrophoretic (DEP) separation. The novel approach proposes an in vitro-based method to detect the existence of Dengue Virus (DENV) in a serum sample through electroosmotic flow generation followed by micromixing, DEP separation, and through fluorescence detection. The proposed LoC is 8 mm x 4 mm x 2 mm in size which will take minimally 5 minutes to generate the results using a 1.5 μL blood sample with an adjustment volume up to 15 μL. Simulations from COMSOL Multiphysics justify the overall operation, flow parameters maintained within the micro-channels, overlapping regions of sample concentration, and ensuring the 100% separations of viral particles from the substance. Moreover, L-Edit software was used to design the required masks and an appropriate fabrication process is proposed for the LoC device.

Higher efficiency and the safety of hull inspection can be achieved by replacing the conventional methods with modern crawling robots. This paper consists of detailed study of the design and development of a crawling robot with a novel permanent magnetic wheel based on Halbach magnetic array. The magnetic array and the wheel assembly were designed based on the magnetic simulation results. Maintaining the adequate adhesion force as well as the friction force of the wheels were considered in designing the wheels. The crawling robot is equipped with a steering system based on Ackermann steering method hence the steering angles are controlled by an algorithm and actuated using servo motors. The driving system of the robot is equipped with four geared stepper motors and they are controlled separately by the algorithm according to the inputs of the controller. The control architecture and the components used for the robot control system are explained. The operator can remotely control the robot and inspect the hull surface via the camera feed available in the HMI (Human Machine Interface) of the robot. The prototype of the crawling robot was tested in a similar environment and the test results are included in the paper.