Mobile manipulators in the home can provide increased autonomy to individuals with severe motor impairments, who often cannot complete activities of daily living (ADLs) without the help of a caregiver. Teleoperation of an assistive mobile manipulator could enable an individual with motor impairments to independently perform self-care and household tasks, yet limited motor function can impede one's ability to interface with a robot. In this work, we present a unique inertial-based wearable assistive interface, embedded in a familiar head-worn garment, for individuals with severe motor impairments to teleoperate and perform physical tasks with a mobile manipulator. We evaluate this wearable interface with both able-bodied (N = 16) and individuals with motor impairments (N = 2) for performing ADLs and everyday household tasks. Our results show that the wearable interface enabled participants to complete physical tasks with low error rates, high perceived ease of use, and low workload measures. Overall, this inertial-based wearable serves as a new assistive interface option for control of mobile manipulators in the home.

翻译：摘要：家用移动机械臂可为重度运动障碍患者提供更强的自主性，这类患者若无护理人员协助往往难以完成日常生活活动（ADLs）。通过辅助移动机械臂的遥操作，运动障碍患者可独立执行自理及家务任务，然而其有限的运动功能会阻碍人与机器人的交互能力。本研究提出一种独特的基于惯性传感器的可穿戴辅助界面，将其集成于常见的头戴式服饰中，使重度运动障碍患者能够通过遥操作方式利用移动机械臂执行物理任务。我们分别对健全受试者（N=16）与运动障碍患者（N=2）开展了该可穿戴界面在ADLs及日常家务任务中的效果评估。结果表明，该可穿戴界面使参与者能够以低错误率、高感知易用性和低工作负荷完成物理任务。总体而言，这种基于惯性传感器的可穿戴设备为家用移动机械臂控制提供了新型辅助界面选项。