Control of Group Robots by a Human Operator

在不久的将来，移动机器人有望承担。各种高级任务代替人类在不利的环境中进行人类。然而，我们认为机器人自主完成高级任务是不可能的。因此，一个由人类用户和机器人相互作用并完成任务的系统更为可行。人类用户执行全局任务规划（这需要高级智能），机器人系统支持具有低级智能的用户。此外，在目前的技术阶段，单个机器人的能力较差，对不同环境的适应性较小。因此，多个移动机器人的协同工作可以完成许多任务，并提高了系统对故障的鲁棒性。因此，我们提出了一个机器人群体与人类用户合作的系统。我们的研究贡献：1。提出一种操作方法，使单个用户能够轻松控制多个移动机器人；利用市售硬件构建一个实际的系统，并通过实验展示如何由一个人操作多个移动机器人。人类用户不是单独命令每个机器人，而是命令一组机器人。我们对可用的用户命令进行分类，并在系统中引入自主权，以弥补命令级别之间的差异。这使系统的命令设计成为可能，并显示了系统的必要自主性。通过将用户的指挥能力与系统有限的自主性相结合，用户可以发挥出多智能体系统的能力。构建了人机协同完成任务的系统，展望了机器人在工业领域、家庭、军事行动、空间开发等各种环境下的操作方法，以及具有人机界面系统的网络机器人

In the near future, mobile robots are expected to undertake. various high-level tasks instead of a human in disadvantageous environments for the human. We think, however, it is not possible for robots to achieve high-level tasks autonomously. Hence, a system in which the human user and the robots interact with each other and achieve the task is more feasible. The human user performs task-planning globally (which requires high-level intelligence), and the robot system supports the user with low-level intelligence. Furthermore, at the present stage of technology, a single robot has poor ability and small adaptability for different environments. Hence cooperation of multiple mobile robots allows many tasks to be performed and improves robustness of the system against faults. Therefore we propose a system for cooperation of robot groups and a human user.Our research contributes :1. to propose an operation method which enables a single human user to easily control multiple mobile robots,2. to build an actual system using commercially available hardware and to show how to operate multiple mobile robots by a single human user by experimentsThe main features of our method are as follows :1. The human user commands not each robot individually, but groups of robots. We classify the available user commands and introduce autonomy into the system to complement the differences between command levels. This' enables systematic command design and shows the necessary autonomy of the system. By combining the command capabilities of the user and the limited autonomy of the system, the user can bring out the capabilities of multi-agent systems.2. We build a system in which the human user and robots achieve tasks cooperatively and have a perspective about operation method for the robots in various environments, such as, industrial fields, home, military operations, and space developing, and network robotics with man-machine interface system