Research of Cybernic Intelligent Mobility System With Recognition for Approaching Targets and Physiological Management Function

Abstract

Care recipients use a wheelchair or an electric wheelchair because they have difficulty in moving. To support the independent movement of Care recipients indoors, it is necessary that an electric wheelchair performs autonomous movement in narrow spaces and approaches a target whose position frequently changes, such as a chair and observe the physical condition such as the heart function of the care recipients. The purpose of this research is to develop cybernic intelligent mobility system as an autonomous mobile robot wheelchair that has an object recognition function, an autonomous movement function, and a approaching function to correspond the position change of the target object and a vital sensing function to check(detect and manage) the physiological condition of care recipients and to confirm the effectiveness of this mobility system through the basic experiment. The mobility system has a function to find and approach a target such as a desk or chair in a room based on the calculated relative position, even if the initial position of the target is changed. Moreover, a vital sensor was equipped to constantly perform physiological management. To confirm the basic ability of the developed mobility system, we carried out an experiment conducted in a simple living environment assuming a real environment where electric wheelchairs are used. The developed mobility system found the target that was placed in a different position from the initial position in the environmental map. And the mobility system moved autonomously into the area near the target avoiding objects such as walls or furniture. Furthermore, we confirmed basic function to operate the developed mobility system depending on physiological condition. We developed intelligent mobility system that has an object recognition function, an autonomous movement function based on relative position estimation, and a function to find and approach a target. And through the basic experiment, we confirmed the effectiveness of this mobility system.