Note from the Publisher

It is with great sadness and regret that we inform the contributing authors and future readers of this book that the co-editor, Dr. Pınar Boyraz Baykas, passed away shortly after finishing the book and before having a chance to see its publication.

We would like to acknowledge her contribution and express our gratitude for her pleasant cooperation with us.

IntechOpen Book Department Team November, 2020.

**1**

**Chapter 1**

**Abstract**

Robotic Skins

*and Cihat Bora Yigit*

integration. In UMAY1

**1. Introduction**

*tactile perception* (i.e., smart robotic-skins).

supporting the co-authors of this chapter for their PhD.

Researcher Fellowship project of Dr. Pınar Boyraz.

Safe Human-Robot Interaction

Hyper-Redundancy, and Smart

In service robotics, safe human-robot interaction (HRI) is still an open research topic, requiring developments both in hardware and in software as well as their

design and perception aspects of a framework for safe HRI. Our first focus was to design variable stiffness joints for the robotic neck and arm to enable inherent compliance to protect a human collaborator. We demonstrate the advantages of variable stiffness actuators (VSA) in compliancy, safety, and energy efficiency with applications in exoskeleton and rehabilitation robotics. The variable-stiffness robotic neck mechanism was later scaled down and adopted in the robotic endoscope featuring hyper-redundancy. The hyper-redundant structures are more controllable, having efficient actuation and better feedback. Lastly, a smart robotic skin is introduced to explain the safety support via enhancement of tactile perception. Although it is developed for a hyper-redundant endoscopic robotic platform, the artificial skin can also be integrated in service robotics to provide multimodal tactile feedback. This chapter gives an overview of systems and their integration to attain a safer HRI. We follow a holistic approach for *inherent compliancy* via mechanism design (i.e., variable stiffness), *precise control* (i.e., hyper-redundancy), and *multimodal* 

**Keywords:** variable-stiffness, hyper-redundancy, tactile feedback, smart-skin

In medical mechatronics, especially in the minimally invasive surgery (MIS) applications, the design challenge often has multiple sources. However, these

<sup>1</sup> UMAY was supported by Young Investigator Award of Istanbul Technical University (2011–2016) to build a humanoid robot for rehabilitation uses on children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD),

<sup>2</sup> MEDICARE-C was funded by Alexander von Humboldt Foundation during the Experienced

projects, we addressed both mechanism

Using Variable Stiffness,

*Pinar Boyraz Baykas, Ertugrul Bayraktar* 

and MEDICARE-C2
