Intuitive Control System for a Dexterous Robot

The Full Immersion Telepresence Testbed (FITT) is an experimental anthropomorphic-robot remote-control system that is so named because it gives a human control operator some of the sensations of the remote environment as though the operator were in that environment in place of the robot. In comparison with older telerobotic control systems, the FITT provides robotic sensory feedback better suited to the operator’s senses and enables the operator and robot acting together to respond, with more nearly natural, humanlike motions, to changes in the remote environment. In particular, correlating the operator’s movements (principally of the head, arms, and hands) with movements of the robot creates a more intuitive method of teleoperating robotic manipulators. Moreover, the use of an operator’s own movements to control the robot provides the operator with useful kinesthetic feedback. The FITT and other systems like it are expected to reduce training time and costs, task-completion times, and operator workloads and errors. Because the FITT concept mates human intelligence with the durability of robots, it is potentially useful for performing complex tasks in harsh environments; for example, cleaning up radioactive and toxic wastes.