Initiative for Life Design Innovation (iLDi)

Symbiotic Intelligent System Project

The Symbiotic Intelligent System Project consists of the following two sub-projects:

An elderly healthcare method that stimulates conversations using an interactive robot

Maintaining health is not just about physical exercise; it is also essential to have a sufficient amount of conversations. Especially in the case of the elderly, maintaining mental health through conversation also improves physical health.

In our previous work, we have shown that interactive robots are effective at stimulating conversations. In this subproject, we build a database that enables robots to stimulate conversations, and ultimately plan to build a real robotic system that can stimulate conversations in real-world environments. Starting from a relatively closed environment such as private rooms in homes and hospitals, we will gradually extend our experiments to more open environments such as university campuses, hospitals and cities. Based on the activity history of people within such large spaces, we will create an interactive robot with even better conversation stimulation capabilities.

Creating a comfortable environment via interactive robots and environment control

Especially in the case of young people, conversation among family members contributes to healthy cognitive development, and it also helps with establishing and maintaining healthy human relationships.

In our previous work, we have shown that interactive robots are effective at stimulating conversations. In this subproject, we aim to create a comfortable environment that supports the cognitive development of children as well as the relationships among family members. Towards this end, we combine multiple interactive robots with environment control systems such as projections on the wall, and we build a database that enables the system to stimulate conversations. We first start with relatively closed environments such as private rooms in homes and childcare facilities, and then we will gradually extend our experiments to open environments such as kindergartens and schools.