A Biomimetic Vocalisation System for MiRo
This work addresses the challenge of improving animal-like robots for companionship and therapy applications by developing a biomimetic vocalisation system, though it is incremental as it builds on existing robot architecture.
The paper tackled the problem of creating a voice for the biomimetic robot MiRo that aligns with its physical and behavioral characteristics, resulting in a system that avoids the 'uncanny valley' effect and enhances its interactivity.
There is increasing interest in the use of animal-like robots in applications such as companionship and pet therapy. However, in the majority of cases it is only the robot's physical appearance that mimics a given animal. In contrast, MiRo is the first commercial biomimetic robot to be based on a hardware and software architecture that is modelled on the biological brain. This paper describes how MiRo's vocalisation system was designed, not using pre-recorded animal sounds, but based on the implementation of a real-time parametric general-purpose mammalian vocal synthesiser tailored to the specific physical characteristics of the robot. The novel outcome has been the creation of an 'appropriate' voice for MiRo that is perfectly aligned to the physical and behavioural affordances of the robot, thereby avoiding the 'uncanny valley' effect and contributing strongly to the effectiveness of MiRo as an interactive device.