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Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Technologies to Support Aging-in-Place for People with Long-Term Disabilities

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Now showing 1 - 3 of 3
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    Autobed: Open Hardware for Accessible Web-based Control of an Electric Bed
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2016) Grice, Phillip M. ; Chitalia, Yash ; Rich, Megan ; Clever, Henry M. ; Kemp, Charles C.
    Individuals with severe motor impairments often have difficulty operating the standard controls of electric beds and so require a caregiver to adjust their position for utility, comfort, or to prevent pressure ulcers. Assistive human-computer interaction devices allow many such individuals to operate a computer and web browser. Here, we present the Autobed, a Wi-Fi-connected device that enables control of an Invacare Full-Electric Homecare Bed, a Medicare-approved device in the US, from any modern web browser, without modification of existing hardware. We detail the design and operation of the Autobed. We also examine its usage by one individual with severe motor impairments and his primary caregiver in their own home, including usage logs from a period of 102 days and detailed questionnaires. Finally, we make the entire system, including hardware design and components, software, and build instructions, available under permissive open-source licenses.
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    A Robotic System for Reaching in Dense Clutter that Integrates Model Predictive Control, Learning, Haptic Mapping, and Planning
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014-09) Bhattacharjee, Tapomayukh ; Grice, Phillip M. ; Kapusta, Ariel ; Killpack, Marc D. ; Park, Daehyung ; Kemp, Charles C.
    We present a system that enables a robot to reach locations in dense clutter using only haptic sensing. Our system integrates model predictive control [1], learned initial conditions [2], tactile recognition of object types [3], haptic mapping, and geometric planning to efficiently reach locations using whole- arm tactile sensing [4]. We motivate our work, present a system architecture, summarize each component of the system, and present results from our evaluation of the system reaching to target locations in dense artificial foliage.
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    Assistive Mobile Manipulation for Self-Care Tasks Around the Head
    (Georgia Institute of Technology, 2014) Hawkins, Kelsey P. ; Grice, Phillip M. ; Chen, Tiffany L. ; King, Chih-Hung ; Kemp, Charles C.
    Human-scale mobile robots with arms have the potential to assist people with a variety of tasks. We present a proof-of-concept system that has enabled a person with severe quadriplegia named Henry Evans to shave himself in his own home using a general purpose mobile manipulator (PR2 from Willow Garage). The robot primarily provides assistance by holding a tool (e.g., an electric shaver) at user-specified locations around the user’s head, while he/she moves his/her head against it. If the robot detects forces inappropriate for the task (e.g., shaving), it withdraws the tool. The robot also holds a mirror with its other arm, so that the user can see what he/she is doing. For all aspects of the task, the robot and the human work together. The robot uses a series of distinct semi-autonomous subsystems during the task to navigate to poses next to the wheelchair, attain initial arm configurations, register a 3D model of the person’s head, move the tool to coarse semantically-labeled tool poses (e.g, “Cheek”), and finely position the tool via incremental movements. Notably, while moving the tool near the user’s head, the robot uses an ellipsoidal coordinate system attached to the 3D head model. In addition to describing the complete robotic system, we report results from Henry Evans using it to shave both sides of his face while sitting in his wheelchair at home. He found the process to be long (54 minutes) and the interface unintuitive. Yet, he also found the system to be comfortable to use, felt safe while using it, was satisfied with it, and preferred it to a human caregiver.