Questions to be answered

• How can intelligent tools support rapid and simple implementation of safe human-robot collaboration?
• How can AI, such as ChatGPT, be integrated into tools for supporting and guiding users with limited safety expertise?
• Why is it essential to consider worker-specific characteristics (such as age, gender, and disabilities) in ensuring the safety of human-robot collaboration in industrial settings?
• How can user-specific needs be considered in the safe design of human-robot collaboration on the industrial shop floor with the help of digital risk assessment tools?

Description

The democratization of safe human-robot collaboration involves efficiently and simply designing risk assessment processes while considering the diverse needs of various user groups. The following points will be discussed in this workshop:

• Robotics for everyone: Addressing worker’s diversity in the safe design of Human-Robot-Collaboration (age, gender, disabilities)
• Upcoming challenges of robot safety: Need for fast reconfigurability, easy adaptation to new tasks, adaptable or automated CE
• Potential solution: Use of intelligent software tools that guide users through risk assessment and risk reduction, automatically identify optimal safety parameters, facilitate a dynamic electronic CE certification, and also provide methods for evaluating safety functions that include AI
• Explore currently existing approaches and tools and discuss future potential; identify requirements for further development of such tools from end-user perspective
• Robotics for inclusion ·Diversity in Robot Safety: Integrating gender and diversity aspects in current safety requirements and design guidelines for HRC
• Hazards in human-robot collaborations: studies on new injury thresholds, key learnings on the diversity of injury severity
• Robotic solutions for worker support: relieve overstraining, prevent work-related illnesses, and compensate for age-related changes or disabilities, exoskeletons in production
• Semi-automatic and user-oriented safety: how existing tools can be further developed to meet the diversity in industrial shop floors

Organisation of the WS

The WS is organized as follows:

WS Introduction - 5-10 mins

• What is the WS about and how is it organized?
• Who are the speakers
• What are the goals?

3 pitch presentations - 30 min total (8 min + 2 min questions each)

• Topic 1: Making Risk Assessment Simple and Fast with Intelligent Software Tools (Theo Jacobs, Fraunhofer IPA)
• Motivation: Maintaining safety fast, simple, and prospectively autonomous in changing applications
• Tools for the planning stage: CARA, Digital Risk Assessment
• Tools for safety at runtime: Digital Safety Validation, Robo-Dashcam
• Topic 2: Addressing Worker’s Diversity in the Safe Design of Human-Robot-Collaboration (Clara Fischer, Joanneum Research Robotics)
• Biomechanical limits according to ISO 15066-1 with differentiation between different groups of people
• Effect of body size in collisions collision scenarios
• An adaptive workplace
• Topic 3: Practical Applicability of Considering Diversity in Safe Human-Robot Collaboration through Digital Risk Assessment (Roland Behrens, Fraunhofer IFF)
• Concept of a holistic, digital safety
• Extension of the risk assessment process to consider the individual user

Interactive part - 30 min

• Attendees will be divided in 3 break out sessions (related to the pitch presentations)
• Each group elaborates on one of the three topics presented using the Start-Stop-Continue method

Final summary - 20-25 min

• The outcomes of the breakout sessions will be shared and discussed with all participants

Intended outcome

• Get feedback from the market
• Dissemination (state of the art, ongoing research and feedback received in the WS)
• Awareness (Risks, Safety, users needs, diversity, acceptance)
• Build project consortiums / new contacts for consortiums

Speakers, Panelists, etc

• Roland Behrens (Fraunhofer IFF) - Germany
• Theo Jacobs (Fraunhofer IPA) - Germany
• Clara Fischer (JOANNEUM RESEARCH ROBOTICS) - Austria
• Cecilia Scoccia (Università Politecnica delle Marche, ilabs) - Italy
• Rasmus Adler (Fraunhofer IESE) – Germany

Topic Groups and/or Innovation networks involved

TG safety

Projects involved

• SAFEIVERSE: Integrating diversity and inclusion into the design of safe human-robot collaboration - Project of JOANNEUM RESEARCH ROBOTICS (Austria) - https://www.joanneum.at/robotics/en/projects/safeiverse/

Further information

Organisers

• Roland Behrens (Fraunhofer IFF), roland.behrens@iff.fraunhofer.de
• Theo Jacobs (Fraunhofer IPA), theo.jacobs@ipa.fraunhofer.de
• Clara Fischer (JOANNEUM RESEARCH ROBOTICS), clara.fischer@joanneum.at
• Cecilia Scoccia (Università Politecnica delle Marche, ilabs), c.scoccia@staff.univpm.it
• Robin Kirschner (TU München) robin-jeanne.kirschner@tum.de