A direct teaching system emphasizing safety and operability for SP02, an upper-body humanoid that cooperates with a human in a cell-production workspace has been described. The system has a direct teaching device, which enables an operator to teach a multi-D.O.F manipulator at comfortable posture despite large changes in the pose of an end-effector. The double-checked safety-related part(SRP/CS) introducing a safety module satisfies the safety performance defined in the international safety standard. To make the teaching easier to perform, impedance parameters in a variable impedance control are set through several direct teaching experiments. Through a simple direct teaching experiment, the safety performance of the SRP/CS and the teaching performance of the direct teaching system was successfully confirmed.

Although the need for humans and robots to work together in close proximity is increasing, this is currently not allowed with conventional industrial robots for reasons of safety. Next generation robots that can work safely in close proximity with humans must not only be highly functional, but must also be highly reliable with built in safety features. With this aim in mind, we have developed a safety module that integrates safety functions required for robots to work side by side with humans. The safety module is designed to be compliant with international safety standards and Japanese law. Redundant sensory signal processing by an external hardware module and plug-in software installed in the robot controller ensure high-reliability and flexibility. This paper describes the concept and design of the safety module and shows some evaluation results of its safety functions.

It is believed that from this point forward, there will be a need for industrial robots that work alongside and cooperatively with humans. However, the current development of existing robotics technology is inadequate to ensure the safety of such new industrial robots. Our research proposes a safety-planning technology called Coexistence Hazard Avoidance Technology, designed for use with a low-powered human-collaborative industrial robot. We load this technology into a risk-management simulator and verify that by using it, a dynamic planning method for the safe operation of robots can be reasonably undertaken in terms of both theory and calculation.

This paper describes motion control and planning for the standing and sitting motions of an inverted pendulum-type assist robot, I-PENTAR. Whole-body motion based on redundant control that takes positional control of a composite center of gravity(CCoG) and a wrist roller as goal tasks is adopted. Using the motion control, motion planning of the robot can be described intuitively and in a simple manner. Compliance motion of a manipulator by force control of a wrist roller is adopted to move the position of CCoG and to maintain the robotpsilas stability when the wrist roller contacts with the ground, which is an important factor in successfully achieving a sitting motion. Based on this motion control, standing and sitting motion planning is also proposed, which considers the stability and the operational time efficiency of the process. The proposed control method and motion planning were tested experimentally with I-PENTAR, and it was confirmed that standing and sitting motions were achieved stably in a short time period.

This paper describes the mobile control and the standing and sitting motions of an Inverted PENdulum Type Assistant Robot-(I-PENTAR) aiming at the coexistence of safety and work capability. I-PENTAR consists of a body with a high powered waist joint, arms designed for safety, and a wheeled inverted pendulum mobile platform. It is modeled as a three-dimensional robot with controls for inclination angle, linear position, and steering angle, and is controlled by state feedback control based on the LQR method. The motion planning of standing and sitting-important motions for an inverted pendulum type robot in practical use-is proposed. It was experimentally confirmed that I-PENTAR could realize a series of fundamental motions required in practical use, which are standing, running, turning, and sitting stably.

Recently, developers have created a number of manipulators designed to provide physical services to human beings. Collisions between those manipulators and humans or other objects in the environment generate massive impacts, causing injury or limiting execution speed. These collisions are unavoidable, however; therefore it is essential that the force of such impacts be reduced, thus improving safety and task performance. One of the most effective methods to reduce impact force is to decelerate by braking immediately before the collision. In this paper, we propose dynamic acceleration polytope braking (DAPB), a method which is optimal braking to decelerate impact velocity quickly and without varying the direction of motion in redundant manipulators. DAPB uses a dynamic acceleration polytope to represent the acceleration ability, while considering manipulator dynamics to determine braking torque. By adopting DAPB, the velocity at impact can be decelerated faster than by zero-braking, which decelerates all joint velocities to zero; as a result, impact force can be greatly reduced. Moreover, since the path of the impact point does not stray from the initial impact direction, additional dangerous situations could be avoided. Several simulations and experiments are executed to confirm the braking performance of DAPB

Robots working in human environment for personal service should have both safety and dexterity function. Since these two functions have characteristics that influence each other on an implementation process, it is necessary to treat them together in a system. In this paper, we propose a safety serve manipulator system (SSM) which has the potential to realize both the safety and dexterity simultaneously, and discuss on the effectiveness of slip motion that is one of the safety functions of the SSM in reduction of contact force. The SSM slip motion is realized by torque limiters located on the base. We confirm the effectiveness of the torque limiters in reduction of harmful force at various limit torque and improve the reduction efficiency by controlling the limit torque. These are confirmed through simulations and experiments.