Teaching and understanding intelligent service robots: A Machine Learning Approach

. One of the most important aspects in service robotics is the communication of service robots with their users. Since these users must in general be considered as not familiar with either robots or computers, this communication must take place in a human-oriented manner and employ human-understandable symbols. Here, two techniques relying heavily on learning mechanisms are presented that facilitate this kind of communication: Programming by Demonstration enables the user to easily communicate action and world knowledge to the robot. Operational Concepts support this task, but they can as well be used by the robot itself in order to communicate its own knowledge to the user in an understandable way. 1 Introduction Enormous potential markets exist for mobile robots in the areas of materials transport, mobile surveillance systems, and floor cleaning. In addition, the idea of the "personal robot" or "personal robotic assistant" (e.g., for aiding the elderly or disabled) is lately receivi..