Development of an Autonomous Humanoid Robot, iSHA, for Harmonized Human-Machine Environment

Our research aim is to build a harmonized humanmachine environment where humans and machines can interact with each other in a natural, seamless and intuitive manner. Along the sketched scenario, we have been developing a humanoid robot "iSHA" (interactive Systems for Humanoid Agent), which is designed to behave like and interact with humans. We implemented an intelligent robotic architecture, which integrates goal-oriented subsystems by taking the flexibility and scalability of the system into consideration. iSHA has an upper body resembling a human in shape and a mobile base with two wheels. The upper body with a head and two arms has 24 degrees-of-freedom. Two wheels equipped under the body provide safe and robust locomotion. Each eye equipped with a small CCD camera, small microphones embedded in the head, and touch sensory devices on the body respectively provide binocular vision, auditory and touch sensing ability to the robot.