Interactive systems employing robotic companions

摘要

An interactive system for interacting with a sentient being. The system includes a robotic companion of which the sentient being may be a user and an entity which employs the robot as a participant in an activity involving the user. The robotic companion responds to inputs from an environment that includes the user during the activity. The robotic companion is capable of social and affective behavior either under control of the entity or in response to the environment. The entity may provide an interface by which an operator may control the robotic companion. Example applications for the interactive system include as a system for communicating with patients that have difficulties communicating verbally, a system for teaching remotely-located students or students with communication difficulties, a system for facilitating social interaction between a remotely-located relative and a child, and systems in which the user and the robot interact with an entity such as a smart book. Also disclosed are control interfaces for the robotic companion, techniques for rendering the robotic companion sensitive to touch and responding to those touches, and techniques for providing quiet, back-drivable motion to components of the robotic companion.

主权项

1. An interactive system comprising, in combination:
(a) a robot; and (b) an operator interface for accepting input from and displaying output to a remote human operator; in which system
(i) the robot includes actuators and movable parts for performing at least one of an affective touch and a social touch;(ii) the robot includes a plurality of sensors for taking sensor measurements selected from the group consisting of a pressure sensor, a proximity sensor, a light sensor and a sound sensor;(iii) the robot is programmed to function in a plurality of modes, the plurality of modes comprising at least two of an autonomous robotic behavior mode, a non-autonomous behavior mode in which actions of the robot are controlled by the remote human operator, and a semi-autonomous behavior mode in which a sequence of actions by a robot are initiated by a command by the remote human operator; and(iv) the input from the remote human operator comprises a selection by the remote human operator of a mode out of the plurality of modes or a selection by the remote human operator of a behavior, out of a set of behaviors by the robot, which set of behaviors by the robot includes at least one of a group consisting of laughing, giggling, crying, and clapping.