The last quarter of a century has seen a dramatic rise of interest in the development of technological solutions for visually impaired people. However, despite the presence of many devices, user acceptance is low. Not only are visually impaired adults not using these devices but they are also too complex for children. The majority of these devices have been developed without considering either the brain mechanisms underlying the deficit or the natural ability of the brain to process information. Most of them use complex feedback systems and overwhelm sensory, attentional and memory capacities. Here we review the neuroscientific studies on orientation and mobility in visually impaired adults and children and present the technological devices developed so far to improve locomotion skills. We also discuss how we think these solutions could be improved. We hope that this paper may be of interest to neuroscientists and technologists and it will provide a common background to develop new science-driven technology, more accepted by visually impaired adults and suitable for children with visual disabilities.

In recent years the robotics field has witnessed an interesting new trend. Several companies started the production of service robots whose aim is to cooperate with humans. The robots developed so far are either rather expensive or unsuitable for manipulation tasks. This article presents the result of a project which wishes to demonstrate the feasibility of an affordable humanoid robot. R1 is able to navigate, and interact with the environment (grasping and carrying objects, operating switches, opening doors etc). The robot is also equipped with a speaker, microphones and it mounts a display in the head to support interaction using natural channels like speech or (simulated) eye movements. The final cost of the robot is expected to range around that of a family car, possibly, when produced in large quantities, even significantly lower. This goal was tackled along three synergistic directions: use of polymeric materials, light-weight design and implementation of novel actuation solutions. These lines, as well as the robot with its main features, are described hereafter.

This paper describes the design and integration of three joint torque sensors on the arm of the iCub platform , . The objective is to enhance the robot arm with joint torque control capability. This activity is part of a general upgrade of the humanoid robot to provide the its 53 degrees of freedom low-level joint torque control capabilities. In particular, the shoulder joint is challenging because of its complex and compact mechanical structure. We first modeled the behaviour of the sensors with analytical equations and the sensor geometry were subsequently optimized using finite element structural simulations. The sensors were then constructed, and integrated in the arm assembly. Finally we present preliminary experiments to validate the design.

This paper deals with a comparative study on using water and air as actuation means for the control of a fluidic muscle (designed for air) and assesses the performance, particularly from a dynamic and energetic point of view. A medium with higher bulk modulus such as oil/water is believed to increase pressure and force bandwidths and reduce sensitivity to load variations, as is the case with conventional hydraulic stiff actuation systems. However in this application the inherent flexibility of the muscle plays a major role. Water has been chosen because of its non-flammability, environmental friendliness and the low solubility of air in it. The operating pressure range of the pneumatic muscle is 0-6 bar (typical range of a pneumatic system) that is well below typical operating pressures of hydraulic systems (typically over 100 bar). At such low pressures the dynamic behaviour of water is less predictable because of the higher likelihood of entrapped air in the water which physically occurs when operating at low pressures. This can majorly affect water bulk modulus and hence its dynamic performance. Therefore, the behaviour of the system in this unconventional pressure range for a liquid must be more thoroughly investigated. Theoretical and experimental analyses on a dedicated test rig have been carried out to assess these assumptions.

The evaluation of robotic hands is a subjectively biased, complex process. The fields pertaining to robotic hands are human-centric in nature, making human hands a good standard for benchmark comparisons of robotic hands. To achieve this, we propose a new evaluation index, where we evaluate robotic hands on three fronts: their form, features and performance. An evaluation on how anthropomorphic robotic hands are in basic mobility, and appearance constitutes the “Form”, while features that can be read, changed and actuated for effective control of robotic hands constitutes the “Features”. We derived these key features from an extensive analysis of robotic hands in literature. Finally, the robotic hands carry out a series of tasks that evaluate their “Performance”. An individual score for each category is drawn and we carry out a three-pronged analysis. We also propose an additional feature in the form of price to provide context when analysing multiple hands.