Development and evaluation of demonstration information recording approach for wheelchair mounted robotic arm

To offer simple and convenient assistance for the elderly and disabled, researchers focus on programming by demonstration approach to improve the intelligence and adaptability of wheelchair mounted robotic arm assistive robot. But how to easily and quickly obtain the demonstration information is still an urgent problem to be solved. Based on the systematic analysis of the daily living tasks in need of robot assistance, this paper proposes the key-point-based programming by demonstration recording approach to quickly obtain the demonstration information and develops a specified demonstration interface to simplify the operation process. A corresponding evaluation approach is also proposed from the demonstration trajectories and demonstration process two aspects. Additionally, tasks of “holding water glass task”, “eating task”, and “opening door task” are carried out and experimental results, as well as comparative evaluations confirm the validity of the proposed approach with high efficiency. This study can not only offer a convenient and feasible way to obtain the demonstration information of daily living tasks, but also lay a good foundation for the assistive robot to learn relative motion skills, especially for the demonstrated dexterous manipulation skills, and semi-autonomously accomplish complex, multi-step tasks following the user’s instructions in the daily home environment.