7/01/2008 PERMALINK
Care-O-bot® a mobile robot home assistant Care-O-bot® was developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation (IPA) in Stuttgart, department robot systems as a mobile robot home assistant for elderly or handicapped people. The latest version 3.0 is a vision of a future household product for any home. It unites numerous innovations in the area of control, sensors and kinematics that make it suitable for performing numerous household tasks. The hardware of the robot is based on two completely autonomous systems. The mobile platform with the adjustable walking supports and the top level system with a 6-dof manipulator and gripper designed for handling objects in home environments and a tilting sensor head for 3-D scanning and vision.

The control software for both, the mobile and arm/head control platform of Care-O-bot II is based on the Robotics Toolbox, an extensive software library, which - in several independent packages - contains modules for implementing all necessary robot control functions, such as navigation, sensor and actuator drivers, task planner etc. This software library not only enables the development of complex robot control programs in a short time, it also facilitates the transfer of existing programs to different hardware platforms and operating systems.