ARPH: an assistant robot for disabled people

Abstract

Technologies or know how derived from robotic researches can contribute to the restoration of some functions lost by disabled p eople. However the overcost generated by the additive potentialities must be affordable and related to the value of the usual product. In most cases, autonomous functions are direct transpositions of solutions applied in industrial robotics. If we c onsider that in addition with cost, security is a supplementary constraint of rehabilitation robotics, an important research effort is needed to propose technological components. The first part of the paper presents the system ARPH developed taking into account the constraints of the rehabilitation robotics. Another aspect of assistance robotics is that the person is involved in the service made by the robot. Before and during the design process of an assistance device it i s important to be sure that it will be “controlable”. Human aspects are studied following two directions. Is human adaptation ability sufficient for performing task through a c omplex machine and what human machine cooperation (HMC) could favor or improve the control of the machine?