A Hybrid Architecture for Safe Human–Robot Industrial Tasks
Abstract
:1. Introduction
1.1. Context and Motivations
1.2. Paper Contributions
- The development of a reliable human detection strategy based on a robust and fast perception system able to detect multiple workers in large workspaces (see Section 4);
- The definition of a simple and fast human-tracking pipeline that considers only the points of the human body that are truly exposed to risk, avoiding complex software architectures and data processing latency;
- The development of an intention estimation predictive technique through the real-time estimation of human velocity based on a linear Kalman filter (see Section 5);
- The development of a smooth robot control system that performs a real-time risk analysis and, therefore, evaluates the actual danger of the scenario to appropriately adjust the speed of the robot and avoid unnecessary slowdowns or stops (see Section 6).
2. Safety Standards
- represents the maximum speed of the operator and it is assumed as 2000 mm/s with the option to use 1600 mm/s when mm;
- is the maximum robot speed;
- is the time required by the machine to respond to the operator’s presence;
- represents the response time of the machine, which brings the robot to a safe, controlled stop;
- B is the Euclidean distance traveled by the robot while braking;
- C is the intrusion distance safety margin, which represents an additional distance, based on the expected intrusion toward the critical zone prior to the actuation of the protective equipment;
- is the operator position uncertainty (i.e., the sensor uncertainty);
- is the robot position uncertainty.
3. Literature Review
3.1. The Human Tracking Module
3.2. The Intention Estimation Module
3.3. The Robot Control Module
4. Human Tracking Module
4.1. Experimental Setup Configuration
4.2. Networking Configuration
4.3. System Calibration
4.4. Rigid Body Tracking
5. Intention Estimation Module
5.1. Estimation of the Operator Velocities
5.2. Estimation of the Robot Velocity
5.3. Relative Speed Computation
6. Robot Control Module
6.1. Human–Robot Separation Distances
6.2. Minimum Protective Separation Distance Computation
- : contribution from the rigid body speed towards the robot;
- : contribution from the robot’s reaction time;
- : contribution from the robot’s stopping distance;
- Safety margins: intrusion distance (C) and uncertainties in robot and human positions ( and ).
- : the contribution from the human velocity is calculated as
- : the contribution from the robot velocity is calculated as
- : the robot stopping distance is a constant value B.
- C: intrusion distance, a small buffer to avoid accidents.
- : robot position uncertainty.
- : rigid body position uncertainty.
6.3. Robot Speed Override Computation
7. Experimental Results
7.1. Inspection Task
7.1.1. Task Description
7.1.2. Task Results
7.2. Co-Kitting Task
7.2.1. Task Description
7.2.2. Task Results
8. Conclusions
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
Abbreviations
CNN | Convolutional Neural Network |
DYNAMICA | DYNamic Assessment and Mitigation of the Impact of Collaborative Applications |
HRC | Human–Robot collaboration |
HRI | Human–Robot Interaction |
IE | intention estimation |
ISO | International Organization for Standardization |
LKF | Linear Kalman Filter |
RB | Rigid Body |
ROS | Robot Operating System |
SMEs | Small and Medium Enterprises |
SoA | State-of-the-Art |
SSM | Speed and Separation Monitoring |
TS | Technical Specification |
URDF | Unified Robot Description Format |
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Lettera, G.; Costa, D.; Callegari, M. A Hybrid Architecture for Safe Human–Robot Industrial Tasks. Appl. Sci. 2025, 15, 1158. https://doi.org/10.3390/app15031158
Lettera G, Costa D, Callegari M. A Hybrid Architecture for Safe Human–Robot Industrial Tasks. Applied Sciences. 2025; 15(3):1158. https://doi.org/10.3390/app15031158
Chicago/Turabian StyleLettera, Gaetano, Daniele Costa, and Massimo Callegari. 2025. "A Hybrid Architecture for Safe Human–Robot Industrial Tasks" Applied Sciences 15, no. 3: 1158. https://doi.org/10.3390/app15031158
APA StyleLettera, G., Costa, D., & Callegari, M. (2025). A Hybrid Architecture for Safe Human–Robot Industrial Tasks. Applied Sciences, 15(3), 1158. https://doi.org/10.3390/app15031158