Shared Control: Dynamic Allocation of Autonomy
As robotics technology becomes more ubiquitous, we increasingly will see instances of robot operation that shares control with human users and task partners. Our premise is that to reason about the quality of both the information signals from the human as well as those from the autonomy is fundamental to robotic systems operating in collaboration with, in close proximity to, sharing control with or assisting humans.
For human-robot teams operating with limited communication bandwidth, perhaps separated by physical distance and in adversarial environments, the information shared live between teammates will likely be sparse, intermittent or inconsistent. Under such circumstances, it is crucial not only that the human understand the robot autonomy in order to provide sound control input or guidance, but likewise that the automated system understand the quality limitations on the information provided by the human.
This project introduces a framework for the dynamic allocation of control between human and robot teammates, that is appropriate for use under the constraints of limited communication bandwidth and changing capabilities of the human-robot team. The allocation of autonomy is dynamic, as is the interaction between and roles of the teammates. To inform this framework, an initial pilot study explicitly modulated various degradations of the communication channel and predicts when and what type of degradation is occuring. We also have evaluated various formulations for control sharing at a single autonomy level and found a difference in preference across users that moreover can be predicted with reasonably good accuracy, suggesting that dynamic allocation perhaps also should occur within a given autonomy level.
Funding Source: Office of Naval Research (ONR N00014-16-1-2247)
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