MRI: Acquisition of a Multimodal Collaborative Robot System (MCROS) to Support Cross-Disciplinary Human-Centered Research and Education at Montclair State University

该提案解决了目前在危险环境中对协作机器人的需求（例如，危险化学实验），以及智能制造的最新研究的传播（缺乏这些研究限制了知识的发现）。研究人员声称，机器人的角色已经从“笼子模型中的机器人”转变为“共享环境中的人类互动模型”，他们的目标是获得一个机器人系统（MCROS），以支持以人为中心的科学和工程跨学科研究和教育。利用两个协作机械手、全向移动的基座、控制和计算单元以及多模态人机接口（包括3D视觉，3D激光雷达，GPS和F/T传感），研究人员希望最有效地利用MCROS，推进广泛的变革和多样化的研究分布在四个学院和12个学术单位（部门/研究所集中在研究所MCROS）。它们涵盖5个重点领域：-智能系统和先进计算，-生态学和化学科学，-智能城市农业和食品科学，-人因工程和社会科学，以及-交互式学习。MCROS预计将：-提供最先进的机器人平台，以加速广泛的研究项目。扩大跨不同部门的创新合作研究，并促进潜在的资金机会，以利用和创造新的跨学科知识。利用机器人协作实现的高生产力方法，实现多个科学和工程领域的基础研究。-通过智能制造、交互式学习和智能城市农业的发展，建立具有成本效益和高质量的解决方案，而这些解决方案又通过人机协作模型实现。该机构将提供培训，并准备使用人工智能和机器人技术的职业生涯，“可能有利于国民经济”。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为是值得通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

This proposal addresses the current need for collaborative robots in hazardous environments (e.g., hazardous chemical experiments), as well as transmission of the latest studies in smart manufacturing (where their absence limit knowledge discovery). Claiming that the role of robots has changed from “robots in a cage model” to the “human interaction model in a shared environment,” the investigators aim to acquire a robotic system (MCROS) to support human-centered science and engineering interdisciplinary research and education. Utilizing two collaborative manipulators, an omnidirectional mobile base, a control and computing unit, and multimodal human-robot interfaces (including 3D vision, 3D Lidar, GPS, and F/T sensing), the investigators expect to make the most efficient use of the MCROS, advancing a wide range of transformative and diverse research distributed across four colleges and 12 academic units (departments/institute centering at the institute MCROS). They cover 5 focus areas:- Intelligence systems and advanced computing,- Ecology and chemistry science,- Smart urban agriculture and food science,- Human factors engineering and social sciences, and- Interactive learning.The MCROS are expected to:- Provide a State-of-the-art robot platform to accelerate a wide-range of research projects.- Expand innovative collaborative research across diverse departments and foster potential funding opportunities to exploit and create new cross-disciplinary knowledge.- Enable fundamental research in multiple science and engineering areas utilizing high productivity approaches enabled by the robot collaboration.- Establish cost-effective and high-quality solutions, enabled by the developments in smart manufacturing, interactive learning, and smart urban agriculture, that in turn is enabled by the human-robot collaboration model. The institution will offer training and prepare careers using AI and robotics, “possibly benefitting the national economy.”This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.