38 HUGGIE BOT

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HUGGIE BOT USES SCIENCE TO DELIVER A SATISFYING HUG

HuggieBot 3.0 is the third generation of a robot that, designers hope, is coming closer to giving a perfect hug.

Hugging probably is not the first thing that comes to mind when you think about things that robots might do to help humankind, but a team of scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems disagrees. Alexis Block and her colleagues have been involved in the HuggieBot project for years, trying to create a robot that can deliver human-like hugs and thus replace actual people in various scenarios like providing comfort to the lonely or replacing someone, who for some reason, just cannot deliver a hug in person. Their third version, the HuggieBot 3.0, is quite a successful hugger.

Its creators claim that it is “the first fully autonomous human-sized hugging robot that recognizes and responds to the movements of the one being hugged.” It features a custom sensing system called “HuggieChest,” made of two inflated chambers of soft plastic that imitate a human chest. But there is a lot more than just a soft chest to the HuggieBot 3.0.

The advanced robot delivers hugs using a pair of arms, mounted to a custom metal frame, that were selected for being human-like, quiet, and safe. As a hug takes place, a pressure sensor and microphone inside the artificial chest detect human touch and begin transmitting data to a Robot Operating System (ROS) computer located in the HuggieBot 3.0’s head.

The team used feedback from 512 real people over 32 trials to train a machine learning system capable of detecting and classifying a range of gestures performed during a hug and then responding appropriately. The HuggieBot 3.0 can stay still, move up slightly, tap or pat a person’s back, and squeeze with varying degrees of pressure.

“Rather than forcing a user to accept a programmed robot gesture, which would result in the robot only squeezing the user, our behavior algorithm creates a natural, spontaneous robot that provides comforting hugs,” the team wrote.

Alexis Block started working on the original HuggieBot back in 2016 while studying for a master’s degree in robotics. The prototype was built on six “hugging commandments,” such as the need for the robot to be soft and warm, the need for it to contribute to the hugging experience, and the need to know when to end an embrace.

The HuggieBot 2.0 took the project a step further to deliver adaptive hugging, but the 3.0 generation is the most advanced version yet, with five added hugging commandments designed to deliver a human-like hugging experience.

In a recent test on 16 participants who had also tried previous versions of the HuggieBot, 12 participants who hugged the robot declared that they felt significantly more “understood” by the machine and that it was “significantly nicer to hug” than previous designs.

The HuggieBot 3.0 is not perfect, and its creators point out that it is not quite like hugging a real person just yet, but they are already working on a fourth version that should come with improved hug positioning and techniques. They hope that one day HuggieBot will be able to replicate the sensation of a human hug, to perfection.