In the industrial domain as well as in daily life, robots are spreading in all areas. Difficulties arise especially if the human acts in the workspace of the robot. Thus, a suitable environmental perception is indispensable for a successful interaction between human and robot. This requires acquisition of reliable sensor data, interfaces adapted to the human and intuitive interaction strategies. We at the Measurement and Sensor Technology Group achieve this by building on our hardware competences and interdisciplinary cooperations with psychologists, industrial engineers and medical experts.

In order to assure appropriate robot behavior during an interaction, the human's behavior has to be measured. Among other methods, we capture the human's motions based on inertial measurement units (IMUs).

In his Bachelor's thesis, Felix Herbst designed this easy to manufacture prototype of a 3D printed 6-axis robot. It is now in its third generation and has been replicated for use across multiple experiments. More information about the backgrounds in this article (German only) by Mareike Hochschild.

In contrast to conventional rigid-link robots, continuum robots feature a continuous backbone which replaces vertebrates. The flexible structure offers new capabilities such as performing full body deformation. Continuous joints also remove the dependency on small discrete joints and therefore enable the possibility of advanced miniaturization. Applications for continuum robots are broad including search and rescue operations, object manipulation, and interventional medicine.

Exoskeletons are wearable robotic systems that enhance the power and assist the accuracy of both healthy and disabled individuals. By combining the best of both worlds we can design intelligent human-machine systems for power-assistance, rehabilitation, teleoperation and haptic interaction in virtual reality.