According to the announcement of the National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Robotics Initiative 2.0 (NRI-2.0) project in the United States is being tendered, and it is planned to support four main research directions, focusing on the development of general-purpose collaborative robots (co-robots) and robot joint actuator,robot joint motor.
The NRI-2.0 program builds on the original National Robotics Initiative (NRI) to support basic U.S. research, and it will accelerate the development and use of collaborative robots (co-robots) that work or collaborate with humans. The NRI-2.0 project focuses on seamless integration with collaborative robots in all aspects to assist all aspects of human life.
The project supports four main research directions aimed at advancing the goals of general-purpose collaborative robotics: scalability, customizability, lowering barriers to entry, and social impact. Topics addressing scalability include: how robots can effectively collaborate with multiple humans or other robots; how robots can perceive, plan, act, and learn in uncertain real-world environments, especially in a distributed fashion; how Promote the large-scale, safety, robustness and operational reliability of robots. Customizability includes: how a cobot can be adapted to a specific task, environment, or person with minimal modifications to hardware and software; how the robot can interact with a person in a personalized way; how the robot can verbally interact with a person naturally verbal and nonverbal communication. Topics lowering barriers to entry include developing open-source cobot hardware and software, and widely accessible testbeds. Topics of societal impact include: Fundamental research - building the discipline of robotics and integrating it into educational curricula to advance the robotic workforce through educational pathways; and exploring the social, economic, ethical, and legal implications of general-purpose collaborative robots for our future.
The NRI-2.0 project greatly expands the focus of the original NRI project, focusing on general-purpose collaborative robots. Includes the following topics:
Scalability
o enable the robot to effectively collaborate and coordinate with multiple other agents (human or robot);
o enable robotic systems to sense, act, plan and learn reliably, especially in a distributed manner;
o shared learning through digital media between cobots;
o Research methods for managing data generated/used by bots, especially data shared between agents;
o Make the behavior of the bot transparent, interpretable and easy to read;
o Research theories and methods of design and control to facilitate ubiquitous interaction and make cobots inherently safe (eg, soft robots);
o Investigate hardware and software methods for enhancing robustness and reliability, enabling robots to fail safely and gracefully, resume operation, and start over.
customizability
o Investigate ways to enable robots to perform a variety of tasks in a variety of situations with minimal changes to hardware and software;
o Enabling robots to learn effectively from direct experience with humans or other robots, in particular to be able to interact in a personalized way;
o interact naturally with users, including using verbal and non-verbal communication (e.g. gestures, sight, movement, touch);
o Effectively interact with experts through remote operation and other means;
o Enable robots to reliably recognize and predict the behavior and activities of others;
o examine the social intelligence of robots, including use of mental models, use of perspective, and attention;
o Facilitate physical collaboration, including physical human-robot interaction and human empowerment.
Lower barriers to entry
o Develop robust, easy-to-use infrastructure for software, hardware, and systems;
o Research composable hardware or software to support the development of universal collaborative robots;
o Research robotics innovation programming languages/patterns;
o Develop shared-friendly physical testbed technologies, especially those that enable easy sharing of existing testbeds;
o Develop sharable resources such as software and data.
social influence
o Investigate the impact of universal collaborative robots on social and economic equality;
o Research possible economic and government policies;
o Research ethical and legal issues related to universal collaborative robots;
o Research trust issues related to universal collaborative robots;
Research issues related to teamwork and integration, partnerships, employee training in collaboration with robots;
o Develop innovative uses of collaborative robots in education.
NRI-2.0 encourages collaboration among academic, industrial, nonprofit, and other organizations to create better connections between basic science and engineering, technology development, deployment, and use. The NRI-2.0 project is supported by several agencies of the federal government, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the United States Department of Energy (DOE), and the United States Department of Defense (DOD).