Teleoperation: Definition Forms of feedback Teleoperation setup Uses of teleoperating systems: Space missions Teleoperations in nuclear reactors Military missions Tele-surgery Problems in teleoperations Haptics in teleoperation

1. Teleoperation
Mariacarla Memeo
Robotics, Brain and Cognitive Science(RBCS)
Multisensory mapping group
Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT), Italy

2. ● Teleoperation
● Definition
● Forms of feedback
● Teleoperation setup
Outline
● Space missions
● Teleoperations in nuclear reactors
● Military missions
● Tele-surgery
● Problems in teleoperations
● Haptics in teleoperation

3. Definition
● Teleoperation, also called telerobotics, is the technical term for the
remote control of a robot called a telechir .
● In a telerobotic system, a human operator controls the movements
of a telechir from some distance away.
● Since the user cannot see the robot directly, he or she must rely on
feedback from the robot's worksite. This is presented to the user by
way of the interface.

4. Forms of Feedback
● Live video from video cameras
● Haptic (touch, such as a vibration)
● Auditory (human ear range)
● temperature
● contact sensors
● sonar images

5. What would we do?

6. Teleoperation
Signals are sent to the telechir to control it; other signals come
back, telling the operator that the telechir has followed the
instructions. These control and return signals are called telemetry .
Master Slave - telechir
control
feedback

7. Sample Teleoperation
Setup

8. Common Uses for
Controlling Robots
• in space missions;
• in a nuclear reactor;
• in military missions;
• for minimally-invasive surgery;
• Etc… (mines, rescues in water, rescues in burning buildings…)

9. Space missions
● For planetary surface operations, the European Space Agency
initiated a development for teleoperated mini-rovers.
● Remote control functions related to autonomous reaction
capabilities and sensor data processing on-board the vehicle exhibit
interesting transfer potential to industrial and educational
teleoperation tasks.

10. Space missions
With its rover named Curiosity, Mars Science Laboratory mission is part
of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, a long-term effort of robotic
exploration of the red planet. Curiosity was designed to assess whether
Mars ever had an environment able to support small life forms called
microbes. In other words, its mission is to determine the planet's
"habitability."

11. Space missions
● Activities in space are fundamentally limited by the amount of
energy required to raise loads into earth orbit.
● An additional requirement, when humans are involved, is the
expense and additional mass of life support and safety critical
systems. Because of these reasons, conducting operations such as
protein crystal growth on manned space missions is very expensive.
● Teleoperation technology can thus have a very substantial impact on
the cost of microgravity operations by reducing the number of
humans required in space for a given amount of work.
● Secondly, if the size of the teleoperation slave system is reduced, the
cost of launching and housing the robotic system is also reduced.

12. Issues
● communication time delay
● restrictions of communication capacity
● limitations of computation power on board
These space systems demand a high level of safety and reliability. A
mis-operation may induce serious damages to human life or to the
space system itself.

13. Space missions
An example of a slave system based in space

14. Teleoperation in Nuclear
Reactors
Inspection and maintenance is essential in the nuclear industry. It is not
easy to carry out such maintenance tasks since the environments are
usually highly radioactive and are unsafe for human workers.

15. ● suffer from low payload capacity;
● relatively large end point deflections.;
● installation and the storage of these long manipulators could be
costly.
Issues

16. Military missions
Clearly military missions can be very
unsafe for a human, so the use of a
robot to do this could be a solution
(peace is the only solution)…
….operating it from a distance.
● MSNBC, Jan 24, 2005: Army robot
soldier for Iraq

17. Robot soldier for Iraq
MSNBC, Jan 24, 2005
“The Army is preparing to send 18 of
these remote-controlled robotic
warriors to fight in Iraq beginning
in March or April.”
Made by a small Massachusetts
company these will be the first armed
robotic vehicles to see combat.
A SWORDS robot shoots only when its
human operator presses a button
after identifying a target on video
shot by the robot’s cameras.
At least a perfect soldier.

18. Tele-surgery
An operation is performed with instruments and viewing equipment
that is inserted into the body through small incisions.

19. Tele-surgery
With the da Vinci Surgical System, surgeons operate through just a few
small incisions. The da Vinci System features a magnified 3D high-definition
vision system and tiny wristed instruments that bend and
rotate far greater than the human wrist. As a result, da Vinci enables
your surgeon to operate with enhanced vision, precision, dexterity and
control.

20. ● ADVANTAGES
This minimizes the surgical trauma and damage to the healthy tissue,
resulting in shorter patient recovery time.
● DISADVANTAGES
● Reduced dexterity
● Reduced workspace
● Reduced sensory input to surgeon which is only available through
a single video image

21. Problems in Teleoperation
● The unreachable ideal transparency
● Time delay
● Industrial robotics is sometimes opposed to teleoperation solutions
● Reliability and safety

22. The unreachable ideal
transparency
● One of the most important teleoperator characteristics after stability
is transparency;
● The goal of teleoperation is to achieve transparency by mimicking
human motor and sensory functions;
● An established fact is that ideal transparency can never be reached
by conventional bilateral control unless it is redefined by other
criteria or conceived differently.

23. Time Delay
● Communication time delay between master and slave is very crucial
in teleoperation;
● Time delay affects not only transparency, because the operator
actions and feedback are delayed, but also stability.

24. Problems with Industrial
Robotics
● Industrial robotics is sometimes opposed to teleoperation solutions
from a flexibility viewpoint;
● Teleoperation flexibility is in many ways dependent on operator
adaptation to the teleoperation system;
● to perform a task the operator must be trained and specialized.

25. Reliability and Safety
● Use of high-powered master/slave devices is very dangerous;
● Powered manipulation arms are very slow devices;
● quick or jerky motions should not be used.

26. Haptics in teleoperations
● Haptics machines communicate with humans using movement and
forces
● The most common devices are force-feedback joysticks that can give
a certain force back to the user, dependent on the joystick position.
● Sometimes the forces are generated from a virtual environment, and
sometimes from a real robot somewhere else. In this case, it is called
force-reflecting (or haptic) teleoperation.

27. Teleoperation
Signals are sent to the telechir to control it; other signals come
back, telling the operator that the telechir has followed the
instructions. These control and return signals are called telemetry .
Master Slave - telechir
control
feedback

28. Force feedback

29. Simulate tactile perception