Human-Robot Collaboration in Microgravity: the Object Handover Problem
This addresses the challenge of human-robot collaboration in space for astronauts and space missions, but it is incremental as it focuses on a specific handover scenario.
The paper tackled the problem of object handover between humans and free-flyer robots in microgravity, developing an algorithm and finding that rigid robot behavior was more preferable and achieved higher transfer success in user studies.
Collaborative space robots are an emerging technology with high impact as robots facilitate servicing functions in collaboration with astronauts with higher precision during lengthy tasks, under tight operational schedules, with less risk and costs, making them more efficient and economically more viable. However, human-robot collaboration in space is still a challenge concerning key issues in human-robot interaction, including mobility and collaborative manipulation of objects on a microgravity environment. In this paper we formulate an algorithm that enables a free-flyer robot, equipped with a manipulator, to perform an object handover between a human and a free-flyer robot, in a microgravity environment. To validate and evaluate this algorithm, we present a systematic user study with the goal of understanding the subjective outcome effects of a rigid and compliant impedance robot behavior during the interaction. The results showed that the rigid behavior was overall more preferable and registered higher transfer success during the tasks.