The development and evaluation of Robot Light Skin: A novel robot signalling system to improve communication in industrial human–robot collaboration

• Published in: Robotics and computer-integrated manufacturing Vol. 56; pp. 85 - 94
• Main Authors: Tang, Gilbert, Webb, Phil, Thrower, John
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford Elsevier Ltd 01.04.2019; Elsevier BV
• Subjects: Automation; Collaborative system; Communications systems; Ergonomics; Human–robot interaction; Industrial ergonomics; Manufacturing; Multiple robots; Reaction time; Response time; Robots; Signaling; Industrial ergonomics; Automation; Human–robot interaction; Collaborative system
• ISSN: 0736-5845; 1879-2537
• DOI: 10.1016/j.rcim.2018.08.005

•The Robot Light Skin (RLS) was designed to reduce mental workload of robot operators in order to minimise the occurrence of human errors.•The experiment results show that the RLS performs better than a traditional tower light in all experimental aspects, these include shortened reaction time, improved hit-rate and higher level of concentration on relevant tasks.•Majority of participants suggested the RLS has lesser impact on their cognitive workload throughout the trials due to its dynamic nature. In a human–robot collaborative production system, the robot could make request for interaction or notify the human operator if an uncertainty arises. Conventional industrial tower lights were designed for generic machine signalling purposes which may not be the ultimate solution for robot signalling in a collaborative setting. In this type of system, human operators could be monitoring multiple robots while carrying out a manual task so it is important to minimise the diversion of their attention. This paper presents a novel robot signalling solution, the Robot Light Skin (RLS),which is an integrated signalling system that could be used on most articulated robots. Our experiment was conducted to validate this concept in terms of its effect on improving operator's reaction time, hit-rate, awareness and task performance. The results showed that participants reacted faster to the RLS as well as achieved higher hit-rate. An eye tracker was used in the experiment which shows a reduction in diversion away from the manual task when using the RLS. Future study should explore the effect of the RLS concept on large-scale systems and multi-robot systems.