Haptic Interfaces and Force-Control Robotic Application in Medical and Industrial Contexts Applicants Prof. Doo Yong Lee, KAIST Prof. Rolf Johansson, Lund University Dr. Magnus Annerstedt, LU, Dept Clinical Sciences, Div. Surgery

Research Issues Real-time force control and planning for bimanual robotic tasks. Software architecture for haptic interfaces in medical or industrial applications Biomedical simulation methodologies and technologies Tissue modeling for haptic interaction between vein and catheter Tissue and organ modeling for haptic interaction in ERCP simulation ** ERCP (Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangio-pancreatography)

Research Interaction Joint research project on the haptic interfaces and force-control robotic application in both medical and industrial contexts. Mutual visits of research staff (including Ph.D. course students) visiting KAIST and LU for sabbatical or conducting the joint projects. Ph.D. course students at KAIST and LU for mutual visits to participate in the research for 6 months to 1 year. Ph.D. graduates from KAIST and LU for mutual visits for post-doctoral positions.

Research Issues―Haptic Interfaces Haptic interfaces play (or will play) in increasingly important role in virtual manufacturing and for teaching/programming of force control applications. Force control is currently reaching industrial products and practices, as an key technology to permit more flexible (compliant and error- tolerant and the like) and robust robot operation. Even if core algorithms have been available for more than two decades, attempts to use force control in real applications will create both generic and application-specific problems. In this context, both the system design including the algorithms, as well as the tools and methods needed for analyzing and configuring the robot control with respect to the specific application needs, will be of key importance. This also includes the user interaction and the programming methods. Haptic interfaces are not only important as such, they also need to be considered in the context of programming virtual or real robots with force interaction with the work piece.

Research Interaction Ph.D. Programme Ph.D. students visiting KAIST or LU and vice versa for research for 6-12 months Motion control techniques, including non-linear control, observers, and system identification. Real-time systems and implementation of control. Special attention on model-based generation of control software, the engineering process, and the testability of the system (even during operation). Robot programming with emphasis on sensor based applications, ranging from implementation of basic skills and up to more intelligent behaviors. PostDoc Programme Ph.D. graduates from KAIST visiting LU and vice versa for post-doctoral research With knowledge and experience from some of the above topics, a postdoc research will give opportunities to work on advanced topics that spans over tow of more research areas. Special attention should be paid to the reusability and reproducibility of technologies and results respectively. A sound algorithmic and model-based approach in combination with suitable tools such as simulation environments, should make results portable such that a series of visits results in improved platforms and systems.

Research Issues In addition to the above suggestions, there are application and system aspects. Some examples are: Safe operation: How to ensure safe (for humans) operation, both along the lines of using certified safe components and COTS unsafe components. In both cases the resulting system must fulfill the safety demands, which are less strict than compared to mission critical systems (which for a given engineering effort can never be as flexible as robots that may be stopped in case of a failure). The role of formal methods needs further investigation. Meta-level descriptions and automatic generation of system configurations (including configurations of specific devices), both on a modular mechatronic level and on a higher level of system design. Information processing today is typically expressed in an imperative way using ordinary programming languages. Such entities of processing, however, do not compose. For DAE systems there has been a development of declarative description that do compose, such as Modelica. For computations that are locally sequential even mathematically, corresponding declarative, ways of describing systems/components are needed. So called aspect-oriented programming offers one approach. Reactive modeling: Models of systems today are typically created during some kind of engineering stage, prior to operation. Future flexible and increasingly autonomous robots will need to have extensive models of the environment, which more automatic will need to be updated as a result of external stimuli. Anticipatory systems: Intelligent behavior can benefit from systems being able to simulate other involved activities or even their own operation. A complication today is that software systems are based on global properties and functions, such as functionality for time and concurrency, with threads of execution being based on the hardware clock, which in turn cannot be represented in a self simulating system without explicit considering the issue during system design. A better approach would be to have software platforms that automatically support anticipatory systems. Resource-aware systems: Actual and predictable robot operation will need to take resources and resource limitations into account. That, in turn, requires extensive engineering. One idea is then to have resource management built into the software components, and have a system platform that supports automatic configuration by means of optimization of quality of service.