Let PR2 do the heavy lifting for you.
A new assistive technology system developed by a team at Georgia Tech aims to help disabled people, specifically those with severe motor impairments, to take better control of their own body and have greater independence in life.
The system is primarily housed in a robot designated ‘PR2 mobile manipulator.’ This robot was created by Willow Garage, a robotics research lab and technology incubator. The robot has a head and two arms like a regular human, but instead of feet, it was wheels that it uses to move around. It can also hold different items such as water bottles, hairbrushes, washcloths, and even an electric shaver.
Most importantly, the robot can be used to give assistance to people using a cocktail of modern computer-interfacing technologies, including eye-tracking and head-tracking. The interface also makes the robot easier for the user to control by providing cameras from inside of its head, showing the view from the robot’s own perspective.
In a statement released to the public, Professor Charlie Kemp from the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech said, “Our goal is to give people with limited use of their own bodies access to robotic bodies so they can interact with the world in new ways.”
