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Robots and Sensors for the Human Well-being (ROSE-HUB)

Center Overview

Robots and Sensors for the Human Well-Being (ROSE-HUB) focuses on technologies that will automate tasks or organize and extract useful information from large volumes of data related to the well-being of humans - such as their activity, communications, mental conditions, and rehabilitation.

ROSE-HUB's mission is to conduct multidisciplinary research on computation-driven robotic and sensor systems augmented by data analysis to improve the safety, capability, and well-being of humans as workers, patients, and customers.

Robotics and artificial intelligence technologies are the driving forces enabling automation of processes previously unimaginable. Examples include virtual environments, immersion and visualization, the 'internet of things', autonomous driving, medical imaging for cancer detection, environmental monitoring, and precision animal agriculture.

ROSE-HUB research will make heavy use of commercial cameras that can work in different parts of the electromagnetic spectrum (e.g., visible, infrared, thermal, etc.), laser, or radar sensors. Sensors may be embedded in robots or flying drones or they may be fixed with limited degrees of motion (pan-tilt-zoom cameras).

In the areas of algorithms and learning methods, the focus and the challenge is to create methodologies that can balance real-time operation and computational power while providing high-level semantic information either for planning, interaction, or situational awareness for human operators.

Efforts to develop robots will focus on building systems with advanced mobility, manipulation, human-machine interaction, and coordination skills.

Universities

University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Purdue University
University of Minnesota
University of Denver

View Center Website

Center Personnel

Dr. Vassilios Morellas
ROSE-HUB Center Director
+1 612 624 4822
morellas@umn.edu

Prof. Jing Xiao
Site Director - University of North Carolina at Charlotte
+1 704 687 8587
xiao@uncc.edu

Anneliese Andrews
Site Director - Denver University
+1 303 871 3374
andrews@cs.du.edu

Eric Matson
Center Staff
+1 765 494 1055
ematson@purdue.edu

Prof. Mo Rastgaar,
Site Director - Purdue University
+1 765 494 8634
rastgaar@purdue.edu

Mr. Michael Bazakos
Site Managing Director - University of Minnesota
+1 612 554 1343
bazakos@umn.edu

Ani Hsieh
Site Director _ University of Pennsylvania
+1 215 746 6449
m.hsieh@seas.upenn.edu

Research Focus

ROSE-HUB's research areas are organized in the following topics:

Agriculture

Agriculture is an ideal industry for autonomous robots and systems because it involves many processes that are labor intensive and repetitive. ROSE-HUB focuses on two areas of agriculture: precision agriculture, which aims to maximize yield per acre and sustainability while minimizing costs; and automated agriculture, which is the physical process of maintaining and harvesting the produce.

Industrial, transportation

Many industrial events, such as nuclear or natural disasters, are too dangerous for humans. Smart robots equipped with the right suite of sensors can prove very valuable in these situations, and put a safe distance between people and harm's way.

Tracking goods 24/7, including food and other products, has enormous impact on our economy and national security. Containers arriving at our ports from international sites are moving targets for potential terrorism. Automated transportation and persistent sensing technologies will minimize and eventually eliminate these risks.

Medical, health

Medical robotics, including surgical robotics and robotics for rehabilitation, is a new field of research that has dramatic impact on society. Advances in computer vision and robotic research have enabled the creation of advanced tools to aid in the diagnosis of mental illnesses, types of cancer, and more.

Robots, unmanned aerial vehicles

This research area develops the next-generation robotic systems and has two major components. One is to develop and embed real-time computer vision and artificial intelligence algorithms that will enable humanlike capabilities and behaviors in robots. The other component is to develop systems of collaborating heterogeneous robotic platforms (land, air, and sea) to accomplish very complex and/or dangerous tasks to keep humans from harm's way.

Awards

1939061

Phase II I/UCRC WPI: Center for Robots and Sensors for the Human Well-Being

The NSF Industry/University Cooperative Research Center (I/UCRC) on Robots and Sensors for Human Well-Being (ROSE-HUB) Phase II will play a leadership role in nurturing and accelerating the deployment of robotics and intelligent sensor technologies in a wide range of application domains key to the national economy, e.g., transportation, energy, logistics, manufacturing, and infrastructure and the well-being of the society, e.g., in healthcare. The ROSE-HUB center will facilitate center university researchers to work with partners from industry, government, other universities, and non-profit organizations to seek solutions to critical real-world challenges.

The research foci of Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) ROSE-HUB projects strive to make fundamental advances both in key technology components, such as algorithms, sensors, and robots, and in integrative systems. The objectives are to advance mobility, manipulation, robot learning, human-machine interaction, and multi-agent coordination capabilities in general and in the context of relevant applications by collaborating with industrial partners. Methodologies will be developed to balance real-time operation and computational cost or energy while providing high-level semantic information of task environments through integrating perception, planning, and learning. Novel robot and sensor systems will also be developed, especially soft robots, sensors, and assistive devices.

Center research will focus on applications including physical/mental health, robots and sensor systems to assist humans, innovative robot designs for monitoring and data collection, precision agriculture, digitization of construction processes, intelligent transportation systems, etc. Research will impact: a) industrial members by inserting research into product pipelines, b) researchers by exploring new ideas and application domains, c) students by providing hands-on experience and future employment potential, and d) academic curricula. Additionally, annual technology days will attract middle school students from underrepresented groups to engineering, and outreach programs to local K-16 institutions will encourage pursuit of engineering education.

The project will create hardware and software and collect experimental data from fixed and mobile robots, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), and sensors. A database for data management and dissemination will be established. The software components include: (i) system framework software (e.g., low-level software that operates electro-mechanical systems, i.e., robots, UAVs, etc.), (ii) software for planning, control, sensing, and learning algorithms, (iii) software for demonstration testbeds and prototypes. The data retention period is five years after the conclusion of the award. The data will be released as it becomes available to the http://rosehubiucrc.github.io site.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. Read More >

1939033

Phase II IUCRC University of Minnesota: Center for Robots and Sensors for the Human Well-being

The NSF Industry/University Cooperative Research Center (I/UCRC) on Robots and Sensors for Human Well-Being (ROSE-HUB) Phase II will play a leadership role in nurturing and accelerating the deployment of robotics and intelligent sensor technologies in a wide range of application domains key to the national economy, e.g., transportation, energy, logistics, manufacturing, and infrastructure and the well-being of the society, e.g., in healthcare. The ROSE-HUB center will facilitate center university researchers to work with partners from industry, government, other universities, and non-profit organizations to seek solutions to critical real-world challenges.

The ROSE-HUB center at the University of Minnesota will build on recent AI/Machine learning breakthroughs to develop systems and robots with embedded sensors to exhibit enhanced au-tonomy and intelligence. Particularly, it will focus on large scale data generation in the domains of agriculture (for maximizing yield and protecting the environment), medical (for exploring mental disorders and independent living), construction (for digitizing and assess work progress), and innovative UAV robot designs exhibiting unique mobility and energy consumption characteristics. The project is ready to catalyze bold ideas to propel the nation to new technological advance-ments in the aforementioned application domains.

Center research will focus on applications including physical/mental health, robots and sensor systems to assist humans, innovative robot designs for monitoring and data collection, precision agriculture, digitization of construction processes, intelligent transportation systems, etc. Re-search will impact: a) industrial members by inserting research into product pipelines, b) re-searchers by exploring new ideas and application domains, c) students by providing hands-on experience and future employment potential, and d) academic curricula. Additionally, annual technology days will attract middle school students from underrepresented groups to engineer-ing, and outreach programs to local K-16 institutions will encourage pursuit of engineering educa-tion.

The project will create hardware and software and collect experimental data from fixed and mo-bile robots, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), and sensors. A database for data management and dissemination will be established. The software components include: (i) system framework software (e.g., low-level software that operates electro-mechanical systems, i.e., robots, UAVs, etc.), (ii) software for planning, control, sensing, and learning algorithms, (iii) software for demon-stration testbeds and prototypes. The data retention period is five years after the conclusion of the award. The data will be released as it becomes available to the http://rosehubiucrc.github.io site.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. Read More >

1939058

PHASE II IUCRC Clemson University: Center for Robots and Sensors for Human Well-Being

The NSF Industry/University Cooperative Research Center (I/UCRC) on Robots and Sensors for Human Well-Being (ROSE-HUB) Phase II will play a leadership role in nurturing and accelerating the deployment of robotics and intelligent sensor technologies in a wide range of application domains key to the national economy, e.g., transportation, energy, logistics, manufacturing, and infrastructure and the well-being of the society, e.g., in healthcare. The ROSE-HUB center will facilitate center university researchers to work with partners from industry, government, other universities, and non-profit organizations to seek solutions to critical real-world challenges.

The research efforts at the Clemson site focus on exploring the integration, deployment and validation of Connected Autonomy paradigm in networked real-time robotics and automation systems-of-systems. This new generation of distributed intelligent robotic systems build upon recent advances in AI-enhanced perceptual processing and low-latency real-time wireless communications within the real-time sense-think-act robotics paradigm. Tangible embodiment into integrative use-cases and domain-customization remain crucial for success with edge- and cloud-based autonomy systems. To this end, we will focus both on process-improvement evaluations as well as creation of exemplar demonstrators for the advanced manufacturing, agribusiness, automotive, and logistics verticals.

Center research will focus on applications including physical/mental health, robots and sensor systems to assist humans, innovative robot designs for monitoring and data collection, precision agriculture, digitization of construction processes, intelligent transportation systems, etc. Research will impact: a) industrial members by inserting research into product pipelines, b) researchers by exploring new ideas and application domains, c) students by providing hands-on experience and future employment potential, and d) academic curricula. Additionally, annual technology days will attract middle school students from underrepresented groups to engineering, and outreach programs to local K-16 institutions will encourage pursuit of engineering education.

The project will create hardware and software and collect experimental data from fixed and mobile robots, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), and sensors. A data management and dissemination framework will be established. The software components include: (i) system framework software (e.g., low-level software that operates electro-mechanical systems, i.e., robots, UAVs, etc.), (ii) software for the planning, control, sensing, and learning algorithms, (iii) software for demonstration testbeds and prototypes. The data retention period is five years after the conclusion of the award. The data will be released as it becomes available to the http://rosehubiucrc.github.io site.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. Read More >

Member Organizations

IUCRC affiliated member organizations are displayed as submitted by the Center. Non-federal organizations are not selected, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the U.S. National Science Foundation.

Eversource
HistoSonics
Honeywell
Kansas Department of Transportation
Minnesota Department of Transportation
Raytheon
South Carolina Research Authority
Worcester Envelope Company

The opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed are those of the Center author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the U.S. National Science Foundation.