Robots dress humans without the full picture

The robot seen here can't see the human arm during the entire dressing process, yet it manages to successfully get a jacket sleeve pulled onto the arm. Robots are already adept at certain things, such as lifting objects that are too heavy or cumbersome for people to manage. Another application they're well suited for is the precision assembly of items like watches that have large numbers of tiny parts -- some so small they can barely be seen with the naked eye. "Much harder are tasks that require situational awareness, involving almost instantaneous adaptations to changing circumstances in the environment," explains Theodoros Stouraitis, a visiting scientist in the Interactive Robotics Group at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL). "Things become even more complicated when a robot has to interact with a human and work together to safely and successfully complete a task," adds Shen Li, a PhD candidate in the MIT Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Li and Stouraitis -- along with Michael Gienger of the Honda Research Institute Europe, Professor Sethu Vijayakumar of the University of Edinburgh, and Professor Julie A. Shah of MIT, who directs the Interactive Robotics Group -- have selected a problem that offers, quite literally, an armful of challenges: designing a robot that can help people get dressed.