Welcome to IntuitArmIntuitArm is an initiative started by four graduating Mechatronics Engineering students at the University of Waterloo, class of 2012, as their fourth year design project. With a shared interest in telerobotics, the team set off to tackle a current need in this field, namely the lack of a natural method for controlling robotic arms.
Telerobotics is an area of robotics involved with the control and use of a robot at a remote site for the purpose of completing a task that is deemed dangerous or too critical for a human operator to complete. Applications of telerobotics exist in surgery, space exploration, and disaster stricken or hazardous areas. Current control methods, however, involve the use of joysticks and button, which are not natural methods for completing the task. There exists a need for a control interface that allows the operator to use natural gestures, similar to what would be used if the operator were to the complete the task in person, while allowing the disconnect between the operator and the work site. Moreover, some current robotics applications provide a feedback mechanism to relay sensory from the work site to the operator. However, these applications tend to be expensive and customized for a particular application. The goal of IntuitArm is to design a robotic arm control system that is operated through natural arm gestures while providing force feedback to the operator, and which is accessible for general applications. |