Humanoids'16 WS on " Can We Build Baymax? Part 2: Making Hard Robots Soft Sensors, Skin and Airbags"

Link: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~cga/humanoids16workshop/

Abstract

This will be the 2nd workshop entitled “Can we build Baymax?”. The 1st workshop was held at Humanoids 2015 in Korea. Baymax is the soft humanoid character in Disney's feature animation "Big Hero 6." It is a healthcare robot with an inflatable body, capable of walking, bumping into surrounding objects and physically interacting with people. However, in the real world, it is not an easy robot to build. For the realization of this robot, awareness of the environment, especially a sense of touch and vision, is very important. Covering robots with soft material to protect both humans and the robot is also required. Integrating these features into actual hardware using reasonable fabrication methods is a challenging task. In this workshop, we will discuss topics related to building robots like Baymax with special features including but not limited to implementation of skin sensors, methods to protect humans and robots, and fabrication of soft skin for humanoids.